diff options
| author | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 04:52:11 -0700 |
|---|---|---|
| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 04:52:11 -0700 |
| commit | a8d972f4a4b6a555c165e8b76c0b0c2df556249f (patch) | |
| tree | 55de1f6d620e8a830e8b39bf4615a25adc8ca070 | |
| -rw-r--r-- | .gitattributes | 3 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 17922-0.txt | 9047 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 17922-0.zip | bin | 0 -> 201813 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 17922-8.txt | 9047 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 17922-8.zip | bin | 0 -> 201608 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 17922-h.zip | bin | 0 -> 212012 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 17922-h/17922-h.htm | 9253 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 17922.txt | 9047 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 17922.zip | bin | 0 -> 201382 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | LICENSE.txt | 11 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | README.md | 2 |
11 files changed, 36410 insertions, 0 deletions
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/17922-0.txt b/17922-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a5f8d85 --- /dev/null +++ b/17922-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9047 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Visionaries, by James Huneker + +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: Visionaries + +Author: James Huneker + +Release Date: March 4, 2006 [EBook #17922] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VISIONARIES *** + + + + +Produced by Ted Garvin, Taavi Kalju, and the Online +Distributed Proofreaders Europe at http://dp.rastko.net + + + + + + + +VISIONARIES + +BY + +JAMES HUNEKER + + + J'aime les nuages ... là bas...! + + BAUDELAIRE + + +NEW YORK +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS +1916 + + +COPYRIGHT, 1905, +BY CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS + +Published October, 1905. + + + + +A +MON CHER MAÎTRE + +REMY DE GOURMONT +PARIS + + + + +CONTENTS + + PAGE + + I. A MASTER OF COBWEBS 1 + + II. THE EIGHTH DEADLY SIN 23 + + III. THE PURSE OF AHOLIBAH 44 + + IV. REBELS OF THE MOON 64 + + V. THE SPIRAL ROAD 80 + + VI. A MOCK SUN 110 + + VII. ANTICHRIST 135 + + VIII. THE ETERNAL DUEL 145 + + IX. THE ENCHANTED YODLER 149 + + X. THE THIRD KINGDOM 168 + + XI. THE HAUNTED HARPSICHORD 188 + + XII. THE TRAGIC WALL 203 + + XIII. A SENTIMENTAL REBELLION 227 + + XIV. HALL OF THE MISSING FOOTSTEPS 249 + + XV. THE CURSORY LIGHT 266 + + XVI. AN IRON FAN 278 + + XVII. THE WOMAN WHO LOVED CHOPIN 289 + +XVIII. THE TUNE OF TIME 309 + + XIX. NADA 326 + + XX. PAN 332 + + + + +VISIONARIES + + + + +I + +A MASTER OF COBWEBS + + +I + +Alixe Van Kuyp sat in the first-tier box presented to her husband with +the accustomed heavy courtesy of the Société Harmonique. She went early +to the hall that she might hear the entire music-making of the +evening--Van Kuyp's tone-poem, Sordello, was on the programme between a +Weber overture and a Beethoven symphony, an unusual honour for a young +American composer. If she had gone late, it would have seemed an +affectation, she reasoned. Her husband kept within doors; she could tell +him all. And then, was there not Elvard Rentgen? + +She regretted that she had invited the Parisian critic to her box. It +happened at a _soirée_, where he showed his savage profile among +admiring musical lambs. But he was never punctual at musical affairs. +This consoled Alixe. + +Perhaps he would forget her impulsive, foolish speech,--"without him the +music would fall upon unheeding ears,--he, who interpreted art for the +multitude, the holder of the critical key that unlocked masterpieces." +She had felt the banality of her compliment as she uttered it, and she +knew the man who listened, his glance incredulous, his mouth smiling, +could not be deceived. Rentgen had been too many years in the candy shop +to care for sweets. She recalled her mean little blush as he twisted his +pointed, piebald beard with long, fat fingers and leisurely +traversed--his were the measuring eyes of an architect--her face, her +hair, her neck, and finally, stared at her ears until they burned like a +child's cheek in frost time. + +Alixe Van Kuyp was a large woman, with a conscientious head and gray +eyes. As she waited, she realized that it was one of her timid nights, +when colour came easily and temper ran at its lowest ebb. She had begged +Van Kuyp to cancel the habit of not listening to his own music except at +rehearsal, and, annoyed by his stubbornness, neglected to tell him of +the other invitation. The house was quite full when the music began. +Uneasiness overtook her as the Oberon slowly stole upon her +consciousness. She forgot Rentgen; a more disquieting problem presented +itself. Richard's music--how would it sound in the company of the old +masters, those masters who were newer than Wagner, newer than Strauss +and the "moderns"! She envisaged her husband--small, slim, with his +bushy red hair, big student's head--familiarly locking arms with Weber +and Beethoven in the hall of fame. No, the picture did not convince her. +She was his severest censor. Not one of the professional critics could +put their fingers on Van Kuyp's weak spots--"his sore music," as he +jestingly called it--so surely as his wife. She had studied; she had +even played the violin in public; but she gave up her virtuosa ambitions +for the man she had married during their student years in Germany. Now +the old doubts came to life as the chivalric tones of Weber rose to her +sharpened senses. Why couldn't Richard-- + +The door in the anteroom opened, her guest entered. Alixe was not +dismayed. She left her seat and, closing the curtains, greeted him. + +The overture was ending as Rentgen sat down beside her in the intimate +little chamber, lighted by a solitary electric bulb. + +"You are always thoughtful," she murmured. + +"My dear lady, mine is the honour. And if you do not care, can't we hear +the music of your young man--" he smiled, she thought, acidly--"here? If +I sit outside, the world will say--we have to be careful of our +unsmirched reputations--we poor critics and slave-drivers of the deaf." + +She drew her hand gently away. He had held it, playfully tapping it as +he slowly delivered himself in short sentences. He was a Dane, but his +French and English were without trace of accent; certain intonations +alone betrayed his Scandinavian origin. + +Alixe could not refuse, for the moment he finished speaking she heard a +too familiar motive, the ponderous phrase in the brass choir which Van +Kuyp intended as the thematic label for his hero, "Sordello." + +"Ah, there's your Browning in tone for you," whispered the critic. She +wished him miles away. The draperies were now slightly parted and into +the room filtered the grave, languorous accents of the new tone-poem. +Her eyes were fixed by Rentgen's. His expression changed; with nostrils +dilated like a hunter scenting prey, his rather inert, cold features +became transfigured; he was the man who listened, the cruel judge who +sentenced. And she hoped, also the kind friend who would consider the +youth and inexperience of the culprit. To the morbidly acute hearing of +the woman, the music had a ring of hollow sonority after the denser +packed phrases of Weber. + +She had read Sordello with her husband until she thought its meaning was +as clear as high noon. By the critic's advice the subject had been +selected for musical treatment. Sordello's overweening spiritual +pride--"gate-vein of this heart's blood of Lombardy"--appealed to Van +Kuyp. The stress of souls, the welter of cross-purposes which begirt the +youthful dreamer, his love for Palma, and his swift death when all the +world thrust upon him its joys--here were motives, indeed, for any +musician of lofty aim and sympathetic imagination. + +Alixe recalled the interminable arguments, the snatches of poetry, the +hasty rushes to the keyboard; a composer was in travail. At the end of a +year, Rentgen professed his satisfaction; Van Kuyp stood on the highroad +to fame. Of that there could be no doubt; Elvard Rentgen would say so in +print. Alixe had been reassured-- + +Yet sitting now within the loop of her husband's music it suddenly +became insipid, futile, and lacking in those enchantments for which she +yearned. Her eyes dropped to the shapely hands meekly folded in her lap, +dropped because the bold, interrogative expression on Rentgen's face +disturbed her. She knew, as any woman would have known, that he admired +her--but was he not Richard's friend? His glance enveloped her with +piteous mockery. + +The din was tremendous. After passages of dark music, in which the +formless ugly reigned, occurred the poetic duel between Sordello and +Eglamor at Palma's Court of Love. But why all this stress and fury? On +the pianoforte the delicate episode sounded gratefully; with the thick +riotous orchestration came a disillusioning transformation. There was +noise without power, there was sensuality that strove to imitate the +tenderness of passion; and she had fancied it a cloudy garden of love. +Alixe raised an involuntary hand to her ear. + +"Yes," whispered the critic, "I warned him not to use his colours with a +trowel. His theme is not big enough to stand it." He lifted thin +eyebrows and to her overheated brain was an unexpected Mephisto. Then +the music whirled her away to Italy; the love scene of Palma and +Sordello. It should have been the apex of the work. + +"Sounds too much like Tschaïkowsky's Francesca da Rimini," interrupted +Rentgen. She was annoyed. + +"Why didn't you tell Van Kuyp before he scored the work?" she demanded, +her long gray eyes beginning to blacken. + +"I did, my dear lady, I did. But you know what musicians are--" He +shrugged a conclusion with his narrow shoulders. Alixe coldly regarded +him. There was something new and dangerous in his attitude to her +husband's music this evening. + +Her heart began to beat heavily. What if her suspicions were but the +advance guard of a painful truth! What if this keen analyst of other +men's ideas--she dared not finish the thought. With a sluggish movement +the music uncoiled itself like a huge boa about to engulf a tiny rabbit. +The simile forced itself against her volition; all this monstrous +preparation for a--rabbit! In a concert-hall the poetic idea of the +tone-poem was petty. And the churning of the orchestra, foaming hysteria +of the strings, bellowing of the brass--would they never cease! Such an +insane chase after a rabbit! Yes, she said the word to herself and found +her lips carved into a hard smile, which she saw reflected as in a trick +mirror upon the face of Elvard Rentgen. _He_ understood. + +Of little avail Sordello's frantic impotencies. She saw through the +rhetorical trickeries of the music, weighed its cheap splendours, +realized the mediocrity of this second-rate poet turned symphonist. +Image after image pressed upon her brain, each more pessimistic, more +depressing than its predecessor. Alixe could have wept. Her companion +placed his hand on her arm. His fingers burned; she moved, but she felt +his will controlling her mood. With high relief she heard the music end. +There was conventional applause. Alixe restlessly peered into the +auditorium. Again she saw opera-glasses turned toward the box. "Our good +friends," she rather bitterly thought. Rentgen recognized her mental +turmoil. + +"Don't worry," he said soothingly. "It will be all right to-morrow +morning. What I write will make the fortune of the composition." He did +not utter this vaingloriously, but as a man who stated simple truth. She +gazed at him, her timidity and nervousness returning in full tide. + +"I know I am overwrought. I should be thankful. But--but, isn't it +deception--I mean, will it be fair to conceal from Richard the real +condition of affairs?" He took her hand. + +"Spoken like a true wife," he gayly exclaimed. "My dear friend, there +will be no deception. Only encouragement, a little encouragement. As for +deceiving a composer, telling him that he may not be so wonderful as he +thinks--that's impossible. I know these star-shouldering souls, these +farmers of phantasms who exist in a world by themselves. It would be a +pity to let in the cold air of reality--anyhow Van Kuyp has some +talent." + +Like lifting mists revealing the treacherous borders of a masked pool, +she felt this speech with its ironic innuendo. She flushed, her vanity +irritated. Rentgen saw her eyes contract. + +"Let us go when the symphony begins," she begged, "I can't talk to any +one in my present bad humour; and to hear Beethoven would drive me +mad--now." + +"I don't wonder," remarked her companion, consolingly. Alixe winced. + +The silver-cold fire of an undecided moon was abroad in the sky and +rumours of spring filled the air. They parted at a fiacre. He told her +he would call the next afternoon, and she nodded an unforgiving head. It +was her turn to be disagreeable. + +In his music room, Van Kuyp read a volume of verse. He did not hear his +wife enter. It pained her when she saw his serious face with its +undistinguished features and dogged expression. No genius this, was her +hasty verdict, as she quickly went to him and put a hand on his head. +It was her hand now that was hot. He raised eyes, dolent with dreams. + +"Well?" he queried. + +"You are a curious man!" she said wonderingly. "Aren't you interested in +the news about your symphonic poem?" He smiled the smile of the fatuous +elect. "I imagine it went all right," he languidly replied. "I heard it +at rehearsal yesterday--I suppose Thelème took the _tempi_ too slow!" + +She sighed and asked:-- + +"What are you reading a night like this?" His expression became +animated. + +"A volume of Celtic poetry--I've found a stunning idea for music. What a +tone-poem it will make! Here it is. What colour, what rhythms. It is +called The Shadowy Horses. 'I hear the shadowy horses, their long manes +a-shake'--" + +"Who gave you the poem?" + +"Oh, Rentgen, of course. Did you see him to-night?" + +"You dear boy! You must be tired to death. Better rest. The critics will +get you up early enough." + +Through interminable hours the mind of Alixe revolved about a phrase she +had picked up from Elvard Rentgen: "Music is a trap for weak souls; for +the strong as the spinning of cobwebs...." + + +II + +It was pompous July and the Van Kuyps were still in Paris. They lived +near Passy--from her windows high in the air Alixe caught the green at +dawn as the sun lifted level rays. Richard was writing his new +tone-poem, which the Société Harmonique accepted provisionally for the +season following. Sordello had set the town agog because of the +exhaustive articles by Rentgen it brought in its wake. He was a critic +who wrote brilliantly of music in the terms of painting, of plastic arts +in the technical phraseology of music, and by him the drama was +discussed purely as literature. This deliberate and delicate confusion +of æsthetics clouded the public mind. He described Sordello as a vast +mural fresco, a Puvis de Chavannes in tone, a symphonic drama wherein +agonized the shadowy Æschylean protagonist. Even sculpture was rifled +for analogies, and Van Kuyp to his bewilderment found himself called +"The Rodin of Music"; at other times, "Richard Strauss II," or a "Tonal +Browning"; finally, he was adjured to swerve not from the path he had so +wonderfully hewn for himself in the virgin jungle of modern art, and +begged to resist the temptations of the music-drama. + +Rentgen loathed the music of Wagner. Wagner had abused Meyerbeer for +doing what he did himself--writing operas stuffed with spectacular +effects. This man of the foot-lights destroyed all musical imagination +with his puppet shows, magic lanterns, Turkish bazaars, where, to the +booming of mystic bells, the listener was drugged into opium-fed +visions. + +Under a tent, as at a fair, he assembled the mangled masterpieces of +Bach, Gluck, Beethoven, Weber, Schubert, Schumann, Chopin, and to a +gullible public sold the songs of these music-lords--songs that should +swim on high like great swan-clouds cleaving skies blue and +inaccessible. And his music was operatic, after all, grand opera +saccharine with commonplace melodies gorgeously attired--nothing more. +Wagner, declared the indignant critic, was not original. He popularized +the noble ideas of the masters, vulgarized and debased their dreams. He +never conceived a single new melody, but substituted instead, sadly +mauled and pinched thematic fragments of Liszt, Berlioz, and Beethoven, +combined with exaggerated fairy-tales, clothed in showy tinsel and +theatrical gauds, the illusion being aided by panoramic scenery; scenery +that acted in company with toads, dragons, horses, snakes, crazy +valkyrs, mermaids, half-mad humans, gods, demons, dwarfs, and giants. +What else is all this but old-fashioned Italian opera with a new name? +What else but an inartistic mixture of Scribe libretto and Northern +mythology? Music-drama--fudge! Making music that one can _see_ is a +death-blow to a lofty idealization of the art. + +Puzzled by the richness of Rentgen's vocabulary, by his want of logic, +Alixe asked herself many times whether she was wrong and her husband +right. She wished to be loyal. His devotion to his work, his inspiration +springing as it did from poetic sources, counted for something. Why not? +All composers should read the poets. It is a starting-point. Modern +music leans heavily on drama and fiction. Richard Strauss embroiders +philosophical ideas, so why should not Richard Van Kuyp go to Ireland, +to the one land where there is hope of a spiritual, a poetic renascence? +Ireland! The very name evoked dreams! + +When Rentgen called at the Van Kuyps' it was near the close of a warm +afternoon. The composer would not stir, despite the invitation of the +critic or the pleading of his wife. He knew that the angel wings of +inspiration had been brushing his brow all the morning, and such visits +were too rare to be flouted. He sat at his piano and in a composer's +raucous varied voice, imitated the imaginary _timbres_ of orchestral +instruments. Sent forth, Mrs. Van Kuyp and Rentgen slowly walked into +the little Parc of Auteuil, once the joy of the Goncourts. + +"Musicians are as selfish as the sea," he asserted, as they sat upon a +bench of tepid iron. She did not demur. The weather had exhausted her +patience; she was young and fond of the open air--the woods made an +irresistible picture this day. The critic watched her changing, +dissatisfied face. + +"Shall we ride?" he suddenly asked. Before she could shake a negative +head, he quickly uttered the words that had been hovering in her mind +for hours. + +"Or, shall we go to the Bois?" She started. "What an idea! Go to the +Bois without Richard, without my husband?" + +"Why not?" he inquired, "it's not far away. Send him a wire asking him +to join us; it will do him good after his labours. Come, Madame Van +Kuyp, come Alixe, my child." He paused. Her eyes expanded. "I'll go," +she quietly announced--"that is, if you grant me a favour." + +"A hundred!" he triumphantly cried. + + +III + +To soothe her conscience, which began to ring faint alarm-bells at +sundown, Alixe sent several despatches to her husband, and then tried a +telephone; but she was not successful. Her mood shifted chilly, and they +bored each other immeasurably on the long promenade vibrating with gypsy +music and frivolous folk. + +It was after seven o'clock as the sun slowly swam down the sky-line. +Decidedly their little flight from the prison of stone was not offering +rich recompense to Alixe Van Kuyp and her elderly companion. + +"And now for the favour!" he demanded, his eyes contentedly resting upon +the graceful expanse of his guest's figure. + +She moved restlessly: "My dear Rentgen, I am about to ask you a +question, only a plain question. _That_ is the favour." He bowed +incredulously. + +"I must know the truth about Richard. It is a serious matter, this +composing of his. He neglects his pupils--most of them Americans who +come to Paris to study with him. Yet with the reputation he has +attained, due to you entirely"--she waved away an interruption--"he +refuses to write songs or piano music that will sell. He is an +incorrigible idealist and I confess I am discouraged. What can be our +future?" She drew the deep breath of one in peril; this plain talk +devoid of all sham mortified her exceedingly. + +She was thankful that he did not attempt to play the rôle of fatherly +adviser. His eyes were quite sincere when he answered her:-- + +"What you say, Alixe--" the familiarity brought with it no condescending +reverberations--"has bothered me more than once. I shall be just as +frank on my side. No, your husband has but little talent; original +talent, none. He is mediocre--wait!" She started, her cheeks red with +the blood that fled her heart when she heard this doleful news. "Wait! +There are qualifications. In the first place, what do you expect from an +American?" + +"But you always write so glowingly of our composers," she interjected. + +"And," he went on as if she had not spoken, "Van Kuyp is your typical +countryman. He has studied in Germany. He has muddled his brain with +the music of a dozen different nations; if he had had any individuality +it would have been submerged. His memory has killed his imagination. He +borrows his inspiration from the poets, from Liszt, Wagner, Berlioz, +Richard Strauss. Anyhow, like all musicians of his country, he is too +painfully self-conscious of his nationality." + +"You, alone, are responsible for his present ambitions," retorted the +unhappy woman. + +"Quite true, my dear friend. I acknowledge it." + +"And you say this to my face?" + +"Do you wish me to lie?" She did not reply. After a grim pause she burst +forth:-- + +"Oh, why doesn't he compose an opera, and make a popular name?" + +"Richard Wagner Number II!" There were implications of sarcasm in this +which greatly displeased Mrs. Van Kuyp. They strolled on slowly. It was +a melodious summer night; mauve haze screened all but the exquisite +large stars. Soothed despite rebellion, Alixe told herself sharply that +in every duel with this man she was worsted. He said things that +scratched her nerves; yet she forgave. He had not the slightest +attraction for her; nevertheless, when he spoke, she listened, when he +wrote, she read. He ruled the husband through his music; he ruled her +through her husband. And what did he expect? + +They retraced their way. A fantastic bridge spanning the brief +marshland, frozen by the moonlight, appealed to them. They crossed. A +coachman driving an open carriage hailed confidentially. Alixe entered +and with a dexterous play of draperies usurped the back seat. Rentgen +made no sign. He had her in full view, the moon streaking her disturbed +features with its unflattering pencil. + +They started bravely, the horses running for home; but the rapid gait +soon subsided into a rhythmic trot. Rentgen spoke. She hardly recognized +his voice, so gently monotonous were his phrases. + +"Dear Alixe. It is a night for confessions. You care for your husband, +you are wrapped up in his art work, you are solicitous of his future, of +his fame. It is admirable. You are a model wife for an artist. But tell +me frankly, doesn't it bore you to death? Doesn't all this talk of +music, themes, orchestration, of the public, critics, musicians, +conductors, get on your nerves? Is it any consolation for you to know +that Van Kuyp will be famous? What is his fame or his failure to you? +Where do you, Alixe Van Kuyp, come in? Why must your charming woman's +soul be sacrificed, warped to this stunted tree of another's talent? You +are silent. You say he is trying to make me deny Richard! You were never +more mistaken. I am interested in you both; interested in you as a noble +woman--stop! I mean it. And interested in Richard--well--because he is +my own creation...." + +She watched him now with her heart in her eyes; he frightened her more +with these low, purring words, than if he declared open love. + +"He is my own handiwork. I have created him. I have fashioned his +outlines, have wound up the mechanism that moves him to compose. Did you +ever read that terrifying thought of Yeats, the Irish poet? I've +forgotten the story, but remember the idea: 'The beautiful arts were +sent into the world to overthrow nations, and, finally, life itself, +sowing everywhere unlimited desires, like torches thrown into a burning +city.' There--'like torches thrown into a burning city!' Richard Van +Kuyp is one of my burning torches. In the spectacle of his impuissance I +find relief from my own suffering." + +The booming of the Tzigane band was no longer heard--only the horses' +muffled footfalls and the intermittent chromatic drone of hidden distant +tram-cars. She shivered and shaded her face with her fan. There was +something remote from humanity in his speech. He continued with +increasing vivacity:-- + +"Music is a burning torch. And music, like ideas, can slay the brain. +Wagner borrowed his harmonic fire from the torch of Chopin--" She broke +in:-- + +"Don't talk of Chopin! Tell me more of Van Kuyp. Why do you call him +_yours_?" Her curiosity was become pain. It mastered her prudence. + +"In far-away Celtic legends there may be found a lovely belief that our +thoughts are independent realities, that they go about in the void +seeking creatures to control. They are as bodiless souls. When they +descend into a human being they possess his moods, in very existence--" + +"And Richard!" she muttered. His words swayed her like strange music; +the country through which they were passing was a blank; she could see +but two luminous points--the nocturnal eyes of Elvard Rentgen, as he +spun his cobwebs in the moonshine. She did not fear him; nothing could +frighten her now. One desire held her. If it were unslaked, she felt she +would collapse. It was to know the truth, to be told everything! He put +restraining fingers on her ungloved hand; they seemed like cold, fat +spiders. Yet she was only curious, with a curiosity that murdered the +spirit within her. + +"To transfuse these shadows, my dear Alixe, has been one of my delights, +for I can project my futile desires into another's soul. I am denied the +gift of music-making, so this is my revenge on nature for bungling its +job. If Richard had genius, my intervention would be superfluous. He has +none. He is dull. You must realize it. But since he has known me, has +felt my influence, has been subject to my volition, my sorcery, you may +call it,--" his laugh was disagreeably conscious,--"he has developed the +shadow of a great man. He will seem a great composer. I shall make him +think he is one. I shall make the world believe it, also. It is my +fashion of squaring a life I hate. But if I chose to withdraw--" + +The road they entered was black and full of the buzzing shadows of hot +night, but she was oblivious to everything but his hallucinating +voice:-- + +"And if you withdraw?" Her mouth echoed phrases without the complicity +of her brain. + +"If I do--ah, these cobweb spinners! Good-by to Richard Van Kuyp and +dreams of glory." This note of harsh triumph snapped his weaving words. + +"I don't believe you or your boasts," remarked Alixe, in her most +conventionally amused manner. "You are trying to scare me, and with this +hypnotic joke about Richard you have only hypnotized yourself. I mean to +tell Mr. Van Kuyp every bit of our conversation. I'm not frightened by +your vampire tales. You critics are only shadows of composers." + +"Yes, but we make ordinary composers believe they are great," he replied +acridly. + +"I'll tell this to Richard." + +"He won't believe you." + +"He shall--he won't believe _you_! Oh, Rentgen, how can you invent such +cruel things? Are you always so malicious? What do you mean? Come--what +do you expect?" She closed her eyes, anticipating an avowal. Why should +a man seek to destroy her faith in her husband, in love itself, if not +for some selfish purpose of his own? But she was wrong, and became +vaguely alarmed--at least if he had offered his service and sympathy in +exchange for her friendship, she might have understood his fantastic +talk. Rentgen sourly reflected--despite epigrams, women never vary. For +him her sentiment was suburban. It strangled poetry. But he said +nothing, though she imagined he looked depressed; nor did he open his +mouth as the carriage traversed avenues of processional poplars before +arriving at her door. She turned to him imploringly:-- + +"You must come with me. I shall never be able to go in alone, without an +excuse. Don't--don't repeat to Richard what you said to me, in joke, I +am sure, about his music. Heavens! What will my husband think?" There +was despair in her voice, but hopefulness in her gait and gesture, when +they reached the ill-lighted hall. + +A night-lamp stood on the composer's study table. The piano was open. He +sat at the keyboard, though not playing, as they hurriedly entered the +room. + +"You poor fellow! You look worn out. Did you think we had run away from +you? Did you get the wires, the telephone messages? Oh, why did you keep +us expecting you, Richard! We have had a wonderful time and missed you +so much! Such a talk with Rentgen! And all about _you_. _Nicht wahr_, +Rentgen? He says you are the only man in the world with a musical +future. Isn't that so, Rentgen? Didn't you say that Richard was the only +man in whom you took any interest? Say what you said to me! I _dare_ +you!" + +The musician, aroused by this wordy assault, looked from one to the +other with his heavy eyes, the eyes of an owl rudely disturbed. Alixe +almost danced her excitement. She hummed shrilly and grasped Van Kuyp's +arm in the gayest rebounding humour. + +"Why don't you speak, Maestro?" + +"I didn't join you because I was too busy at my score. Listen, children! +I have sketched the beginning of The Shadowy Horses. You remember the +Yeats poem, Rentgen? Listen!" + +Furiously he attacked the instrument, from which escaped accents of +veritable torture; a delirium of tone followed, meagre melodies fighting +for existence in the boiling madness of it all; it was the parody of a +parody, the music of yesterday masquerading as the music of to-morrow. +Alixe nervously watched the critic. He stood at the end of the piano and +morosely fumbled his beard. Again a wave of anxious hatred, followed by +forebodings, crowded her alert brain. She desperately clutched her +husband's shoulder; he finished in a burst of sheer pounding and brutal +roaring. Then she threw her arms about him in an ecstasy of pride--her +confidence was her only anchorage. + +"There, Elvard Rentgen! What did you tell me? I dare you to say that +this music is not marvellous, not original!" Her victorious gaze, in +which floated indomitable faith, challenged him, as she drew the head of +her husband to her protecting bosom. The warring of exasperated eyes +endured a moment; to Alixe it seemed eternity. Rentgen bowed and went +away from this castle of cobwebs, deeply stirred by the wife's tender +untruths.... She was the last dawn illuminating his empty, sordid +life,--now a burnt city of defaced dreams and blackened torches. + + + + +II + +THE EIGHTH DEADLY SIN + + Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which + the Lord God had made.--_Genesis._ + + +I + +THE SERMON + +"And the Seven Deadly Sins, beloved brethren, are: Pride, Covetousness, +Lust, Anger, Gluttony, Envy, Sloth. To these our wise Mother, the +Church, opposes the contrary virtues: Humility, Chastity, Meekness, +Temperance, Brotherly Love, Diligence." The voice of the preacher was +clear and well modulated. It penetrated to the remotest corner of the +church. Baldur, sitting near the pulpit, with its elaborate traceries of +marble, idly wondered why the sins were, with few exceptions, words of +one syllable, while those of the virtues were all longer. Perhaps +because it was easier to sin than to repent! The voice of the speaker +deepened as he continued:-- + +"Now the Seven Deadly Arts are: Music, Literature, Painting, Sculpture, +Architecture, Dancing, Acting. The mercy of God has luckily purified +these once pagan inventions, and transformed them into saving +instruments of grace. Yet it behooves us to examine with the utmost +diligence the possible sources of evil latent in each and every one of +those arts. Then we shall consider some of the special forms of sin that +may develop from them. St. Chrysostom warned the faithful against the +danger of the Eighth Deadly Art--Perfume...." + +His phrases, which began to fall into the rhythmic drone of a Sunday +sermon, lulled Baldur to dreaming. Perfume--that delicious vocable! And +the contrast with what his own nostrils reported to his consciousness +made him slightly shiver. It was on a Friday night in Lent that, weary +in flesh and spirit, his conscience out of tune, he had entered the +church and taken the first vacant seat. Without, the air was sluggish; +after leaving his club the idea of theatres or calls had set his teeth +on edge. He longed to be alone, to weigh in the silence of his heart the +utter futility of life. Religion had never been a part of his training +as the only son of a millionnaire, and if he preferred the Roman +Catholic ritual above all others, it was because the appeal was to his +æsthetic sense; a Turkish mosque, he assured his friends, produced the +same soothing impression--gauze veils gently waving and slowly obscuring +the dulling realities of everyday existence. This _morbidezza_ of the +spirit the Mahometans call _Kef_; the Christians, pious ecstasy. + +But now he could not plunge himself, despite the faint odour of incense +lingering in the atmosphere, into the deepest pit of his personality. At +first he ascribed his restlessness to the sultry weather, then to his +abuse of tea and cigarettes,--perhaps it was the sharp odour of the +average congregation, that collective odour of humanity encountered in +church, theatre, or court-rooms. The smell of poverty was mingled with +the heavy scents of fashionable women, who, in the minority, made their +presence felt by their showy gowns, rustling movements, and attitudes of +superior boredom. In a vast building like this extremes touch with +eagerness on the part of the poor, to whom these furtive views of the +rich and indolent brought with them a bitter consolation. + +Baldur remarked these things as he leaned back in his hard seat and +barely listened to the sermon, which poured forth as though the tap +would never be turned off again. And then a delicate note of iris, most +episcopal of perfumes, emerged from the mass of odours--musk, garlic, +damp shoes, alcohol, shabby clothing, rubber, pomade, cologne, +rice-powder, tobacco, patchouli, sachet, and a hundred other tintings of +the earthly symphony. The finely specialized olfactory sense of the +young man told him that it was either a bishop or a beautiful woman who +imparted to the air the subtle, penetrating aroma of iris. But it was +neither ecclesiastic nor maid. At his side was a short, rather thick-set +woman of vague age; she might have been twenty-five or forty. Her hair +was cut in masculine fashion, her attire unattractive. As clearly as he +could distinguish her features he saw that she was not good-looking. A +stern mask it was, though not hardened. He would not have looked at such +an ordinary physiognomy twice if the iris had not signalled his peculiar +sense. There was no doubt that to her it was due. Susceptible as he was +to odours, Baldur was not a ladies' man. He went into society because it +was his world; and he attended in a perfunctory manner to the enormous +estate left him by his father, bound up in a single trust company. But +his thoughts were always three thousand miles away, in that delectable +city of cities, Paris. For Paris he suffered a painful nostalgia. There +he met his true brethren, while in New York he felt an alien. He was +one. The city, with its high, narrow streets--granite tunnels; its rude +reverberations; its colourless, toiling barbarians, with their +undistinguished physiognomies, their uncouth indifference to art,--he +did not deny that he loathed this nation, vibrating only in the presence +of money, sports, grimy ward politics, while exhibiting a depressing +snobbery to things British. There was no _nuance_ in its life or its +literature, he asserted. France was his _patrie psychique_; he would +return there some day and forever.... + +The iris crept under his nostrils, and again he regarded the woman. This +time she faced him, and he no longer wondered, for he saw her eyes. +With such eyes only a great soul could be imprisoned in her brain. They +were smoke-gray, with long, dark lashes, and they did not seem to focus +perfectly--at least there was enough deflection to make their expression +odd, withal interesting, like the slow droop of Eleonora Duse's magic +eye. Though her features were rigid, the woman's glance spoke to Baldur, +spoke eloquently. Her eyes were--or was it the iris?--symbols of a +soul-state, of a rare emotion, not of sex, nor yet sexless. The pupils +seemed powdered with a strange iridescence. He became more troubled than +before. What did the curious creature want of him! She was neither +coquette nor cocotte, flirtation was not hinted by her intense +expression. He resumed his former position, but her eyes made his +shoulders burn, as if they had sufficient power to bore through them. He +no longer paid any attention to his surroundings. The sermon was like +the sound of far-away falling waters, the worshippers were so many black +marks. Of two things was he aware--the odour of iris and her eyes. + +He knew that he was in an overwrought mood. For some weeks this mood had +been descending upon his spirit, like a pall. He had avoided music, +pictures, the opera--which he never regarded as an art; even his +favourite poets he could not read. Nor did he degustate, as was his +daily wont, the supreme prose of the French masters. The pleasures of +robust stomachs, gourmandizing and drinking, were denied him by nature. +He could not sip a glass of wine, and for meat he entertained distaste. +His physique proved him to be of the neurotic temperament--he was very +tall, very slim, of an exceeding elegance, in dress a finical dandy; +while his trim pointed blue-black beard and dark, foreign eyes were the +cause of his being mistaken often for a Frenchman or a Spaniard--which +illusion was not dissipated when he chose to speak their several +tongues. + +Involuntarily, and to the ire of his neighbours, he arose and indolently +made his way down the side aisle. When he reached the baize swinging +doors, he saw the woman approaching him. As if she had been an +acquaintance of years, she saluted him carelessly, and, accompanied by +the scandalized looks of many in the congregation, the pair left the +church, though not before the preacher had sonorously quoted from the +Psalm, _Domine ne in Furore_, "For my loins are filled with illusions; +and there is no health in my flesh." + + +II + +THE SÉANCE + + Je cherche des parfums nouveaux, des fleurs plus larges, des + plaisirs inéprouvés.--FLAUBERT. + +"It may be all a magnificent illusion, but--" he began. + +"Everything is an illusion in this life, though seldom magnificent," she +answered. They slowly walked up the avenue. The night was tepid; motor +cars, looking like magnified beetles, with bulging eyes of fire, went +swiftly by. The pavements were almost deserted when they reached the +park. He felt as if hypnotized, and once, rather meanly, was glad that +no one saw him in company of his dowdy companion. + +"I wonder if you realize that we do not know each other's name," he +said. + +"Oh, yes. You are Mr. Baldur. My name is Mrs. Lilith Whistler." + +"Mrs. Whistler. Not the medium?" + +"The medium--as you call it. In reality I am only a woman, happy, or +unhappy, in the possession of super-normal powers." + +"Not supernatural, then?" he interposed. He was a sceptic who called +himself agnostic. The mystery of earth and heaven might be interpreted, +but always in terms of science; yet he did not fancy the superior manner +in which this charlatan flouted the supernatural. He had heard of her +miracles--and doubted them. She gave a little laugh at his correction. + +"What phrase-jugglers you men are! You want all the splendours of the +Infinite thrown in with the price of admission! I said super-normal, +because we know of nothing greater than nature. Things that are off the +beaten track of the normal, across the frontiers, some call +supernatural; but it is their ignorance of the vast, unexplored +territory of the spirit--which is only the material masquerading in a +different guise." + +"But you go to church, to a Lenten service--?" It was as if he had known +her for years, and their unconventional behaviour never crossed his +mind. He did not even ask himself where they were moving. + +"I go to church to rest my nerves--as do many other people," she +replied; "I was interested in the parallel of the Seven Deadly Sins and +the Seven Deadly Arts." + +"You believe the arts are sinful?" He was curious. + +"I don't believe in sin at all. A bad conscience is the result of poor +digestion. Sins are created so that we pay the poll-tax to eternity--pay +it on this side of the ferry. Yet the arts may become dangerous engines +of destruction if wrongfully employed. The Fathers of the early Church, +Ambrose and the rest, were right in viewing them suspiciously."--He +spoke:-- + +"The arts diabolic! Then what of the particular form of wizardry +practised so successfully by the celebrated Mrs. Whistler, one of whose +names is, according to the Talmud, that of Adam's first wife?" + +"What do you know, my dear young man, of diabolic arts?" + +"Only that I am walking with you near the park on a dark night of April +and I never saw you before a half-hour ago. Isn't that magic--white, not +black?" + +"Pray do not mock magic, either white or black. Remember the fate of the +serpents manufactured by Pharaoh's magicians. They were, need I tell +you, speedily devoured by the serpents of Moses and Aaron. Both parties +did not play fair in the game. If it was black magic to transform a rod +into a snake on the part of Pharaoh's conjurers, was it any less +reprehensible for the Hebrew magicians to play the same trick? It was +prestidigitation for all concerned--only the side of the children of +Israel was espoused in the recital. Therefore, do not talk of black or +white magic. There is only one true magic. And it is not slate-writing, +toe-joint snapping, fortune-telling, or the vending of charms. Magic, +too, is an art--like other arts. This is forgotten by the majority of +its practitioners. Hence the sordid vulgarity of the average mind-reader +and humbugging spiritualist of the dark-chamber séance. Besides, the +study of the super-normal mind tells us of the mind in health--nature is +shy in revealing her secrets." + +They passed the lake and were turning toward the east driveway. Suddenly +she stopped and under the faint starlight regarded her companion +earnestly. He had not been without adventures in his career--Paris +always provided them in plenty; but this encounter with a homely woman +piqued him. Her eye he felt was upon him and her voice soothing. + +"Mr. Baldur--listen! Since Milton wrote his great poem the +English-speaking people are all devil-worshippers, for Satan is the hero +of Paradise Lost. But I am no table-tipping medium eager for your +applause or your money. I don't care for money. I think you know enough +of me through the newspapers to vouchsafe that. You are rich, and it is +your chief misery. Listen! Whether you believe it or not, you are very +unhappy. Let me read your horoscope. Your club life bores you; you are +tired of our silly theatres; no longer do you care for Wagner's music. +You are deracinated; you are unpatriotic. For that there is no excuse. +The arts are for you deadly. I am sure you are a lover of literature. +Yet what a curse it has been for you! When you see one of your friends +drinking wine, you call him a fool because he is poisoning himself. But +you--you--poison your spirit with the honey of France, of Scandinavia, +of Russia. As for the society of women--" + +"The Eternal Womanly!" he sneered. + +"The Eternal Simpleton, you mean. In _that_ swamp of pettiness, idiocy, +and materialism, a man of your nature could not long abide. Religion--it +has not yet responded to your need. And without faith your sins lose +their savour. The arts--you don't know them all, the Seven Deadly Arts +and the One Beautiful Art!" She paused. Her voice had been as the sound +of delicate flutes. He was aflame. + +"Is there, then, an eighth art?" he quickly asked. + +"Would you know it if you saw it?" + +"Of course. Where is it, what is it?" + +She laughed and took his arm. + +"Why did you look at me in church?" + +"Because--it was mere chance--no, it may have been the odour of iris. I +am mad over perfume. I think it a neglected art, degraded to the +function of anointment. I have often dreamed of an art by which a +dazzling and novel synthesis of fragrant perfumes would be invented by +some genius, some latter-day Rimmel or Lubin whom we could hail as a +peer of Chopin or Richard Strauss--two composers who have expressed +perfume in tone. Roinard in his Cantiques des Cantiques attempted a +concordance of tone, light, and odours. Yes--it was the iris that +attracted me." + +"But I have no iris about me. I have none now," she simply replied. He +faced her. + +"No iris? What--?" + +"I _thought_ iris," she added triumphantly, as she guided him into one +of the side streets off Madison Avenue. He was astounded. She must be a +hypnotist, he said to himself. No suggestion of iris clung to her now. +And he remembered that the odour disappeared after they left the church. +He held his peace until they arrived before a brown-stone house of the +ordinary kind with an English basement. She took a key from her pocket +and, going down several steps, beckoned to him. Baldur followed. His +interest in this modern Cassandra and her bizarre words was too great +for him to hesitate or to realize that he would get himself into some +dangerous scrape. And was this truly the Mrs. Whistler whose tricks of +telepathy and other extraordinary antics had puzzled and angered the +wise men of two continents? He did not have much time for reflection. A +grilled door opened, and presently he was in a room furnished very much +like a physician's office. Electric bulbs, an open grate, and two +bookcases gave the apartment a familiar, cheerful appearance. Baldur sat +down on a low chair, and Mrs. Whistler removed her commonplace headgear. +In the bright light she was younger than he had imagined, and her head a +beautifully modelled one--broad brows, very full at the back, and the +mask that of an emotional actress. Her smoke-coloured eyes were most +remarkable and her helmet of hair blue black. + +"And now that you are my guest at last, Mr. Baldur, let me apologize for +the exercise of my art upon your responsive nerves;" she made this +witch-burning admission as if she were accounting for the absence of +tea. To his relief she offered him nothing. He had a cigarette between +his fingers, but he did not care to smoke. She continued:-- + +"For some time I have known you--never mind how! For some time I have +wished to meet you. I am not an impostor, nor do I desire to pose as the +goddess of a new creed. But you, Irving Baldur, are a man among men who +will appreciate what I may show you. You love, you understand, perfumes. +You have even wished for a new art--don't forget that there are others +in the world to whom the seven arts have become a thrice-told tale, to +whom the arts have become too useful. All great art should be useless. +Yet architecture houses us; sculpture flatters us; painting imitates us; +dancing is pure vanity; literature and the drama, mere vehicles for +bread-earning; while music--music, the most useless art as it should +have been--is in the hands of the speculators. Moreover music is too +sexual--it reports in a more intense style the stories of our loves. +Music is the memory of love. What Prophet will enter the temple of the +modern arts and drive away with his divine scourge the vile +money-changers who fatten therein?" Her voice was shrill as she paced +the room. A very sibyl this, her crest of hair agitated, her eyes +sparkling with wrath. He missed the Cumæan tripod. + +"There is an art, Baldur, an art that was one of the lost arts of +Babylon until now, one based, as are all the arts, on the senses. +Perfume--the poor, neglected nose must have its revenge. It has outlived +the other senses in the æsthetic field." + +"What of the palate--you have forgotten that. Cookery, too, is a fine +art," he ventured. His smile irritated her. + +"Yes, Frenchmen have invented symphonic sauces, they say. But again, +eating is a useful art; primarily it serves to nourish the body. When +man was wholly wild--he is a mere barbarian to-day--his sense of smell +guarded him from his foes, from the beasts, from a thousand dangers. +Civilization, with its charming odours of decay,--have you ever ventured +to savour New York?--cast into abeyance the keenest of all the senses. +Little wonder, then, that there was no art of perfume like the arts of +vision and sound. I firmly believe the Hindoos, Egyptians, and the +Chinese knew of such an art. How account for the power of theocracies? +How else credit the tales of the saints who scattered perfumes--St. +Francis de Paul, St. Joseph of Cupertino, Venturini of Bergamo?" + +"But," he interrupted, "all this is interesting, fascinating. What I +wish to know is what form your art may take. How marshal odours as +melodies in a symphony, as colours on a canvas?" She made an impatient +gesture. + +"And how like an amateur you talk. Melody! When harmony is infinitely +greater in music! Form! When colour is infinitely greater than line! The +most profound music gives only the timbre--melodies are for infantile +people without imagination, who believe in patterns. Tone is the quality +_I_ wish on a canvas, not anxious drawing. So it is with perfumes. I can +blend them into groups of lovely harmony; I can give you single notes of +delicious timbre--in a word, I can evoke an odour symphony which will +transport you. Memory is a supreme factor in this art. Do not forget how +the vaguest scent will carry you back to your youthful dreamland. It is +also the secret of spiritual correspondences--it plays the great rôle of +bridging space between human beings." + +"I sniff the air promise-crammed," he gayly misquoted. "But when will +you rewrite this Apocalypse? and how am I to know whether I shall really +enjoy this feast of perfume, if you can simulate the odour of iris as +you did an hour ago?" + +"I propose to show you an artificial paradise," she firmly asserted. In +the middle of the room there was a round table, the top inlaid with +agate. On it a large blue bowl stood, and it was empty. Mrs. Whistler +went to a swinging cabinet and took from it a dozen small phials. "Now +for the incantation," he jokingly said. In her matter-of-fact manner she +placed the bottles on the table, and uncorking them, she poured them +slowly into the bowl. He broke the silence:-- + +"Isn't there any special form of hair-raising invocation that goes with +this dangerous operation?" + +"Listen to this." Her eyes swimming with fire, she intoned:-- + + As I came through the desert thus it was, + As I came through the desert: Lo you there, + That hillock burning with a brazen glare; + Those myriad dusky flames with points aglow + Which writhed and hissed and darted to and fro; + A Sabbath of the serpents, heaped pell-mell + For Devil's roll-call and some fête in Hell: + Yet I strode on austere; + No hope could have no fear. + +He did not seem to hear. From out the bowl there was stealing a perfume +which overmastered his will and led him captive to the lugubrious glade +of the Druids.... + + +III + +THE CIRCUS OF CANDLES + + Comme d'autres esprits voguent sur la musique, + Le míen, ô mon amour! nage sur ton parfum. + + --BAUDELAIRE. + +He was not dreaming, for he saw the woman at the bowl, saw her +apartment. But the interior of his brain was as melancholy as a lighted +cathedral. A mortal sadness encompassed him, and his nerves were like +taut violin strings. It was within the walls of his skull, that he +saw--his mundane surroundings did not disturb his visions. And the waves +of dolour swept over his consciousness. A mingling of tuberoses, +narcissus, attar of roses, and ambergris he detected in the air--as +_triste_ as a morbid nocturne of Chopin. This was followed by a blending +of heliotrope, moss-rose, and hyacinth, together with dainty touches of +geranium. He dreamed of Beethoven's manly music when whiffs of +apple-blossom, white rose, cedar, and balsam reached him. Mozart passed +roguishly by in strains of scarlet pimpernel, mignonette, syringa, and +violets. Then the sky was darkened with Schumann's perverse harmonies as +jasmine, lavender, and lime were sprayed over him. Music, surely, was +the art nearest akin to odour. A superb and subtle chord floated about +him; it was composed of vervain, opoponax, and frangipane. He could not +conceive of a more unearthly triad. It was music from Parsifal. Through +the mists that were gathering he savoured a fulminating bouquet of +patchouli, musk, bergamot, and he recalled the music of Mascagni. Brahms +strode stolidly on in company with new-mown hay, cologne, and sweet +peas. Liszt was interpreted as ylang-ylang, myrrh, and maréchale; +Richard Strauss, by wistaria, oil of cloves, chypre, poppy, and +crab-apple. + +Suddenly there developed a terrific orchestration of chromatic odours: +ambrosia, cassia, orange, peach-blossoms, and musk of Tonkin, magnolia, +eglantine, hortensia, lilac, saffron, begonia, peau d'Espagne, acacia, +carnation, liban, fleur de Takeoka, cypress, oil of almonds, benzoin, +jacinth, rue, shrub, olea, clematis, the hediosma of Jamaica, olive, +vanilla, cinnamon, petunia, lotus, frankincense, sorrel, neroli from +Japan, jonquil, verbena, spikenard, thyme, hyssop, and decaying orchids. +This quintessential medley was as the sonorous blasts of Berlioz, +repugnant and exquisite; it swayed the soul of Baldur as the wind sways +the flame. There were odours like wingèd dreams; odours as the plucked +sounds of celestial harps; odours mystic and evil, corrupt and opulent; +odours recalling the sweet, dense smell of chloroform; odours evil, +angelic, and anonymous. They painted--painted by Satan!--upon his +cerebellum more than music--music that merged into picture; and he was +again in the glade of the Druids. The huge scent-symphony dissolved in a +shower of black roses which covered the ground ankle-deep. An antique +temple of exotic architecture had thrown open its bronze doors, and out +there surged and rustled a throng of Bacchanalian beings who sported and +shouted around a terminal god, which, with smiling, ironic lips, +accepted their delirious homage. White nymphs and brown displayed in +choric rhythms the dance of the Seven Deadly Sins, and their goat-hoofed +mates gave vertiginous pursuit. At first the pagan gayety of the scene +fired the fancy of the solitary spectator; but soon his nerves, +disordered by the rout and fatigued by the spoor of so many odours, +warned him that something disquieting was at hand. He felt a nameless +horror as the sinister bitter odour of honeysuckle, sandalwood, and +aloes echoed from the sacred grove. A score of seductive young witches +pranced in upon their broomsticks, and without dismounting surrounded +the garden god. A battalion of centaurs charged upon them. The +vespertine hour was nigh, and over this iron landscape there floated the +moon, an opal button in the sky. Then to his shame and fear he saw that +the Satyr had vanished and in its place there reared the Black Venus, +the vile shape of ancient Africa, and her face was the face of Lilith. +The screaming lovely witches capered in fantastic spirals, each sporting +a lighted candle. It was the diabolic Circus of the Candles, the +infernal circus of the Witches' Sabbath. Rooted to the ground, Baldur +realized with fresh amazement and vivid pain the fair beauty of Adam's +prehistoric wife, her luxurious blond hair, her shapely shoulders, her +stature of a goddess--he trembled, for she had turned her mordant gaze +in his direction. And he strove in vain to bring back the comforting +vision of the chamber. She smiled, and the odours of sandal, coreopsis, +and aloes encircled his soul like the plaited strands of her glorious +hair. She was that other Lilith, the only offspring of the old Serpent. +On what storied fresco, limned by what worshipper of Satan, had these +accursed lineaments, this lithe, seductive figure, been shown! Names of +Satanic painters, from Hell-fire Breughel to Arnold Böcklin, from +Felicien Rops to Franz Stuck, passed through the halls of Irving +Baldur's memory. + +The clangour of the feast was become maddening. He heard the Venus +ballet music from Tannhäuser entwined with the acridities of aloes, +sandal, and honeysuckle. Then the aroma of pitch, sulphur, and +assafœtida cruelly strangled the other melodic emanations. Lilith, +disdaining the shelter of her nymphs and their clowneries, stood forth +in all the hideous majesty of Ænothea, the undulating priestess of the +Abominable Shape. His nerves macerated by this sinful apparition, Baldur +struggled to resist her mute command. What was it? He saw her wish +streaming from her eyes. Despair! Despair! Despair! There is no hope for +thee, wretched earthworm! No abode but the abysmal House of Satan! +Despair, and you will be welcomed! By a violent act of volition, set in +motion by his fingers fumbling a small gold cross he wore as a +watch-guard, the heady fumes of the orgy dissipated.... + +He was sitting facing the bowl, and over it with her calm, confidential +gaze was the figure of Lilith Whistler. + +"Have I proved to you that perfume is the art of arts?" she demanded. He +rushed from the room and was shaking the grilled gate in the hallway +like a caged maniac, when with a pitying smile she released him. He +reached the street at a bound.... + + * * * * * + +... "the evil of perfume, I repeat, was one against which the venerable +Fathers of the Church warned the faithful." The preacher's voice had +sagged to a monotone. Baldur lifted his eyes in dismay. Near him sat the +same woman, and she still stared at him as if to rebuke him for his +abstraction. About her hovered the odour of iris. Had it been only a +disturbing dream? Intoxicated by his escape from damnation, from the +last of the Deadly Arts, he bowed his head in grateful prayer. What +ecstasy to be once more in the arms of Mother Church! There, dipped in +her lustral waters, and there alone would he find solace for his barren +heart, pardon for his insane pride of intellect, and protection from the +demons that waylaid his sluggish soul. The sermon ended as it began:-- + +"And the Seven Deadly Sins, beloved brethren, are: Pride, Covetousness, +Lust, Anger, Gluttony, Envy, Sloth. _Oremus!_" + +"Amen," fervently responded Baldur the Immoralist. + + + + +III + +THE PURSE OF AHOLIBAH + + Lo, this is that Aholibah + Whose name was blown among strange seas.... + + --SWINBURNE. + + +I + +THE AVIARY + +When the last breakfast guests had gone the waiters of the café began +their most disagreeable daily task. All the silver was assembled on one +of the long tables in an inner room, where, as at a solemn conclave, the +servants took their seats, and, presided over by the major-domo of the +establishment, they polished the knives and forks, spoons, and +sugar-tongs, filled the salt-cellars, replenished the pepper-boxes and +other paraphernalia of the dining art. The gabble in this close +apartment was terrific. Joseph, the maître d'hôtel, rapped in vain a +dozen times for silence. The chef poked his head of a truculent Gascon +through the door and indulged in a war of wit with a long fellow from +Marseilles,--called the "mast" because he was very tall and thin, and +had cooked in the galley of a Mediterranean trading brig. From time to +time one of the piccolos, a fat little boy from the South, carried in +pitchers of flat beer, brewed in the suburbs. As it was a hot day, he +was kept busy. The waiters had gone through a trying morning; there were +many strangers in Paris. Outside, the Boulevard des Italiens, despite +its shade trees, broiled under a torrid July sun that swam in a +mercilessly blue sky. + +The majority of the men were listening to gossip about their colleagues +in the Café Cardinal across the way. Ambroise alone sat apart and patted +and smoothed the salt in its receptacles. He was a young man from some +little town in Alsace, a furious patriot, and the butt of his +companions--for he was the latest comer in the Café Riche. Though he +told his family name, Nettier, and declared that his father and mother +were of French blood, he was called "the German." He was good-looking, +very blond, with big, innocent blue eyes; and while he was never +molested personally,--a short, sharp tussle with a cook had proved him +to be a man of muscle,--behind his back his walk was mimicked, his +precise attitudes were openly bantered. But Ambroise stood this torture +gantlet equably. He had lived long enough among Germans to copy their +impassive manner and, coupled with a natural contempt for his +fellow-monkeys in the cage, he knew that perhaps in a day a new man +would receive all these unwelcome attentions. Moreover, his work, +clear-cut, unobtrusive, and capable, pleased M. Joseph. And when the +patron himself dined at the café, Ambroise was the garçon selected to +wait upon him. Hence the jealousy of his colleagues. Couple to this the +fact that he was reported miserly, and had saved a large sum--which were +all sufficient reasons for his unpopularity. + +As the afternoon wore on little airs began to play in the tree-tops; the +street watering carts had been assiduous, and before the terrace water +had been sprinkled by the piccolos so effectively that at five o'clock, +when the jaded stock-brokers, journalists, and business men began to +flock in, each for his apéritif, the café was comparatively cool. + +A few women's frocks relieved the picture with discreet or joyous shades +of white and pink. Ambroise was diligent and served his regular +customers, the men who grumbled if any one occupied their favourite +corners. Absinthe nicely iced, dominoes, the evening papers--these he +brought as he welcomed familiar faces. But his thoughts were not his +own, and his pose when not in service was listless, even bored. Would +_she_ return that evening with the same crowd--was the idea that had +taken possession of his brain. He was very timid in the presence of +women, and it diverted the waiters to see him blush when he waited upon +the gorgeous birds that thronged the aviary at night, making its walls +echo with their chattering, quarrels, laughter. This provincial, modest, +sensitive, the only child of old-fashioned parents, was stupefied and +shocked in the presence of the over-decorated and under-dressed +creatures, daubed like idols, who began to flock in the café, with or +without escorts, after eleven o'clock every night in the year. He knew +them all by name. He knew their histories. He could detect at a glance +whether they were unhappy or merely depressed by the rain, whether they +drank champagne from happiness or desperation. Notwithstanding his +dreamy disposition his temperament was ardent; his was an unspoiled +soul; he felt himself a sort of moral barometer for the magnificent and +feline women who treated him as if he were a wooden post when they were +gossiping, harried him like an animal when they were thirsty. He noted +that they were always thirsty. They smoked more than they ate, and +whispered more, if no men were present, than they smoked. But then, men +were seldom absent. + +The night previous, Ambroise recalled the fact, she had not come in with +a different set. This was not her custom, and he worried over it. +Protected by princes and financiers, she nevertheless loved her liberty +so much that one seldom caught her in the same company twice in +succession. For this singular caprice Aholibah, oftener called the Woman +from Morocco,--because she had lived in Algiers,--was the despair of her +circle. Why, argued the other birds, why fly in the face of luck? To be +sure, she was still young, still beautiful, with that sort of metallic +beauty which reminded Ambroise of some priceless bronze blackened in the +sun. She was meagre, diabolically graceful, dark, with huge saucer-like +eyes that greedily drank in her surroundings. But her lashes were long, +and she could veil her glance so that her brilliant face looked as if +the shutters had been closed on her soul. Across her brows a bar of +blue-black marked the passage of her eyebrows--which sable line was +matched by her abundant hair, worn in overshadowing clusters. She +dressed winter and summer in scarlet, and her stage name was +Aholibah--bestowed upon her by some fantastic poet who had not read +Ezekiel, but Swinburne. It was rumoured by her intimates that her real +name was Clotilde Durval, that her mother had been a seamstress.... + +With a sinking at the heart Ambroise saw her enter in the company of the +same gentleman she had brought the previous evening. The garçon did not +analyze this strange, jealous feeling, for he was too busily employed in +seating his guests and relieving the man of his hat and walking-stick. +An insolent chap it was, with his air of an assured conqueror and the +easy bearing of wealth. There was little discussion as to the order--a +certain brand of wine, iced beyond recognition for any normal palate, +was always served to Aholibah. She loved "needles on her tongue," she +asseverated if any one offered her weaker stuff. That July night she +looked like a piratical craft that had captured a sleek merchantman for +prize. She was all smoothness; Ambroise alone detected the retracted +claws of the leopardess. She blazed in the electric illumination, and +her large hat, with its swelling plumes, threw her dusky features into +shadow--her eyes seemed far away under its brim and glowed with unholy +phosphorescence. + +While he arranged the details of the silver wine-pail in the other room, +the chef asked him if the Princess Comet had arrived. Ambroise almost +snarled--much to the astonishment of the Gascon. And when the sommelier +attempted to help him with the wine, he was elbowed vigorously. Ambroise +must have been drinking too much, said the boys. Joseph rather curiously +inspected his waiter as he made his accustomed round in the café. But, +pale as usual, Ambroise stood near his table, his whole bearing an +intent and thoroughly professional one. Joseph was satisfied and drove +the chef back to the kitchen. + +The young Alsatian had never seen Aholibah look so radiant. She was in +high spirits, and her pungent talk aroused her companion from incipient +moroseness. After midnight the party grew--some actresses from a near-by +theatre came in with their male friends, and another waiter was detailed +to the aid of Ambroise. But he stuck to the first-comers and served so +much wine to them that he had the satisfaction of seeing Aholibah's +disagreeable protector collapse. She hardly noticed it, for she was +talking vivaciously to Madeleine about the première of Donnay's comedy. +Thrice Ambroise sought to fill her glass; but she repulsed him. He was +sad. Something told him that Aholibah was farther away from him than +ever; was she on the eve of forming one of those alliances that would +rob him finally of her presence? He eyed the sleeping man--surely a +monster, a millionnaire, with the tastes of a brute. It was all very +trying to a man with fine nerves. Several times he caught Aholibah's eye +upon him, and he vaguely wondered if he had omitted anything--or, had he +betrayed his feelings? In Paris the waiter who shows that he has ears, +or eyes, or a heart, except in the exercise of his functions, is lost. +He is bound to be caught and his telltale humanity scourged by instant +dismissal. So when those fathomless eyes glittered in his direction, his +knees trembled, and a ball of copper invaded his throat. He could barely +drag himself to her side and ask if he could help her. A burst of +impertinent laughter greeted him, and Madeleine cried:-- + +"Your blond garçon seems smitten, Aholibah!" When Ambroise heard this +awful phrase, his courage quite forsook him, and he withdrew into the +obscurity of the hall. So white was he that the kindly Joseph asked +solicitously if he were ill. Ambroise shook his head. The heat, he +feebly explained, had made his head giddy. Better drink some iced +mineral water, was suggested--the other man could look after the party! +But Ambroise would not hear of this, and feeling once more the beckoning +gaze of Aholibah he marched bravely to her and was rewarded by a tap on +the wrist. + +"There, loiterer! Go call a carriage. The Prince is sleepy--dear sheep!" +This last was a tender apostrophe to her snoring friend. Ambroise helped +them into a fiacre. When it drove away it was past two o'clock; the +house had to be closed. He walked slowly home to his little chamber on +the Rue Puteaux, just off the Batignolles. But he could not sleep until +the street-cleaners began the work of another day.... The Woman from +Morocco was the scarlet colour of his troubled dreams.... + + * * * * * + +August had almost spent itself, and Aholibah remained in the arid and +flavourless town. Her intimate friends had weeks earlier gone to +Trouville, to Dinard, to Ostende, to Hombourg, even as far as Brighton; +but she lingered, seemingly from perversity. She came regularly to the +café about eleven, always in company with her Prince, and was untiringly +served by Ambroise. He was rewarded for his fidelity with many valuable +tips and latterly with gifts--for on being questioned he was forced to +admit that gratuities had to be shared with the other waiters. He was so +amiable, his smile so winning, his admiration so virginal, that +Aholibah kept him near her. Her Prince drank, sulked, or grumbled as +much as ever. He was bored by the general heat and the dulness, yet made +no effort to escape either. One night they entered after twelve o'clock. +Aholibah was in vicious humour and snapped at her garçon. Dog-like he +waited upon her, an humble, devoted helot. He overheard her say to her +companion that she must have lost the purse at the Folies-Bergères. + +"Well, go to the Rue de la Paix to-morrow and buy another," was the +reply. + +"I can't replace that purse. Besides, it was a prized gift--" + +"From your sainted mother in heaven!" he sneered. + +Ambroise saw the windows of her eyes close with a snap, and he moved +away, fearing to be present in the surely impending quarrel. He +remembered the purse. It was a long gold affair, its tiny links crusted +with precious pearls--emeralds, rubies, diamonds. And the top he saw +before him with ease, for its pattern was odd--a snake's head with jaws +distended by a large amethyst. Yes, it was unique, that purse. And its +value must have been bewildering for any but the idle rich. Ah! how he +hated all this money, coming from nowhere, pouring in golden streams +nowhere. He was not a revolutionist,--not even a socialist,--but there +were times when he could have taken the neck of the Prince between his +strong fingers and choked out his worthless life. These attacks of envy +were short-lived--he could not ascribe them to the reading of the little +hornet-like anarchist sheet, _Père Peinard_, which the other waiters +lent him; rather was it an excess of bile provoked by the coveted beauty +of Aholibah. + +She usurped his day dreams, his night reveries. He never took a step +without keeping her memory in the foreground. When he closed his eyes, +he saw scarlet. When he opened them, he felt her magnetic glance upon +him, though she was far from the café. His one idea was to speak with +her. His maddest wish assumed the shape of a couple walking slowly arm +in arm through the Bois--_she_ was the woman! But this particular vision +bordered on delirium, and he rarely indulged in it.... He stooped to +look under the chairs, under the table, for the missing treasure. It was +not to be seen. Indolently the Prince watched him as he peered all over +the café, out on the terrace. Aholibah was deeply preoccupied. She +sipped her wine without pleasure. Her brows were thunderous. The +cart-wheel hat was tipped low over them. Several times Ambroise sought +her glance. He could have sworn that she was regarding him steadily. So +painful became the intensity of her eyes that he withdrew in confusion. +His mind was made up at last. + +The next day was for him a free one. He wandered up and down the Rue de +la Paix staring moodily into the jewellers' windows. That night, though +he could have stayed away from the café, he returned at ten o'clock, and +luckily enough was needed. Joseph greeted him effusively. The "mast," +the thin fellow from Marseilles, had gone home with a splitting +headache. Would Ambroise stay and serve his usual table? To his immense +astonishment and joy he saw her enter alone. He took her wraps and +seated her on her favourite divan near an electric fan. Then he stared +expectantly at the door. But her carriage had driven away. Was a part of +his dream coming true? He closed his eyes, and straightway saw scarlet. +Then he went for wine, without taking her order. + +Aholibah was preoccupied. She played with the bracelet on her tawny left +wrist. Occasionally she lifted her glass, or else tossed her hair from +her eyes. If any stranger ventured near her, she began to hum +insolently, or spoke earnestly with Ambroise. He was in the eleventh +heaven of the Persians. Two Ambroises appeared to be in him: one served +his lady, spoke with her; the other from afar contemplated with the +ecstasy of a hasheesh eater his counterfeit brother. It was an exquisite +sensation. + +"The purse--has Mademoiselle--" He stammered. + +"No," she crisply answered. + +"Can it never be duplicated? Perhaps--" + +"Never. It is impossible. It was made in Africa." + +"But--but--" he persisted. His bearing was so peculiar that she bent +upon him her dynamic gaze. + +"What's the matter with you this evening, Ambroise? Have you come into a +successful lottery ticket? Or--" She was suspiciously looking at him. +"Or--you haven't found _it_?" + +He nodded his head, his face beatific with joy. He resembled the +youthful Saint George after slaying the dragon. She was startled. Her +eyes positively lightened; he listened for the attendant peal of +thunder. + +"Speak out, you booby. Cornichon! Where did you find it? Let me see +it--at once." All fire and imperiousness, she held out grasping fingers. +He shook. And then carefully he drew from the inside pocket of his coat, +the purse. She snatched it. Yes--it was her purse. And yet there was +something strange about it. Had the stones been tampered with? She +examined it searchingly. She boasted a jeweller's knowledge of diamonds +and rubies. One of the stones had been transposed, that she could have +sworn. And how different the expression of the serpent's eyes--small +carbuncles. No--it was not her purse! She looked at Ambroise. He was +paling and reddening in rapid succession. + +"It is _not_ my purse! How did this come into your possession? It is +very valuable, quite as valuable as mine. But the eyes of my serpent +were not so large--I mean the carbuncles. Ambroise--look at me! I +command you! Where did you find this treasure--cher ami!" Her seductive +voice lingered on the last words as if they were a morsel of delicious +fruit. He leaned heavily on the table and closed his eyes to shut out +her face--but he only saw scarlet. He heard scarlet. + +"I--I--bought the thing because--you missed the other--" He could get no +further. She smiled, showing her celebrated teeth. + +"You bought the thing--_hein_? You must be a prince in +disguise--Ambroise! And I have just lost _my_ Prince! Perhaps--you +thought--you audacious boy--" + +He kept his eyes closed. She was in a corner of the room--quite +empty--the other waiters were on the terrace. She weighed his appearance +and smiled mysteriously; her smile, her glance, and her scarlet gowns +were her dramatic assets. Then she spoke in a low voice--a contralto +like the darker tones of an English horn:-- + +"I fancy I'll keep your thoughtful _gift_--Ambroise. And now, like a +good boy, get a fiacre for me!" She went away, leaving him standing in +the middle of the room, a pillar of burning ice. When Joseph spoke to +him he did not answer. Then they took him by the arm, and he fell over +in a seizure which, asserted the practical head waiter, was caused by +indigestion. + + +II + +ACROSS THE STYX + +It was raining on the Left Bank. The chill of a November afternoon cut +its way through the doors of the Café La Source in the Boul' Mich' and +made shiver the groups of young medical students who were reading or +playing dominos. Ambroise Nettier, older, thinner, paler, waited +carefully on his patrons. He had been in the hospital with brain fever, +and after he was cured, one of the students secured him a position at +this café in the Quartier. He had been afraid to go back to the Café +Riche; Joseph had harshly discharged him on that terrible night; alone, +without a home, without a penny, his savings gone, his life insurance +hypothecated,--it had been intended for the benefit of his parents,--his +clothes, his very trunk gone, and plunged in debt to his fellow-waiters, +his brain had succumbed to the shock. But Ambroise was young and strong; +when he left the hospital he was relieved to find that he no longer saw +scarlet. He was a healed man. He had intended to seek for a place at the +Café Cardinal, but it was too near the Café Riche--he might meet old +acquaintances, might be asked embarrassing questions. So he gladly +accepted his present opportunity. + +The dulness of the day waxed with its waning. It was nearly six o'clock +when the door slowly opened and Aholibah entered. She was alone. Her +scarlet plumage was wet, and she was painted like a Peruvian war-god. +She did not appear so brilliant a bird of paradise--or elsewhere--as at +the aviary across the water. Yet her gaze was as forthright as ever. She +sat on a divan between two domino parties, and was hardly noticed by the +fanatics of that bony diversion. Recognizing Ambroise, she made a sign +to him. It was some minutes before he could reach her table; he had +other orders. When he did, she said she wanted some absinthe. He stared +at her. Yes, absinthe--she had discarded iced wines. The doctor told her +that cold wine was dangerous. He still stared. Then she held up the +purse. It was a mere shell; all the stones save the amethyst in the +mouth of the serpent were gone. She laughed shrilly. He went for the +drink. She lighted a cigarette.... + +Every night for six months she haunted the café. She was always +unattended, always in excellent humour. She made few friends among the +students. Her scarlet dress grew shabbier. Her gloves and boots were +pitiful to Ambroise, who recalled her former splendours, her outrageous +extravagances. Why had fortune flouted her! Why had she let it, like +water, escape through her jewelled, indifferent fingers! He made no +inquiries. She vouchsafed none. They were now on a different footing. +Tantalizingly she dangled the purse under his nose as he brought her +absinthe--always this opalescent absinthe. She drank it in the morning, +in the afternoon, at night. She seldom spoke save to Ambroise. And +he--he no longer saw scarlet, for the glorious tone of her hat and gown +had vanished. They were rusty red, a carroty tint. Her face was like the +mask of La Buveuse d'Absinthe, by Felicien Rops; her eyes, black wells +of regard; her hair without lustre, and coarse as the mane of a horse. +Aholibah no longer manifested interest in the life of Paris. She did not +read or gossip. But she still had money to spend. + +The night he quarrelled with his new patron, Ambroise was not well. All +the day his head had pained him. When he reached La Source, the dame at +the cashier's desk told him that he was in for a scolding. He shrugged +his thin shoulders. He didn't care very much. Later the prophesied event +occurred. He had been much too attentive to the solitary woman who drank +absinthe day and night. The patron did not propose to see his +establishment, patronized as it was by the shining lights of medicine--! + +Ambroise changed his clothes and went away without a word. He was weary +of his existence, and a friend who shared his wretched room in the Rue +Mouffetard had apprised him of a vacant job at a livelier resort, the +Café Vachette, commonly known as the Café Rasta. There he would earn +more tips, though the work would be more fatiguing. And--the Morocco +Woman might not follow him. He hurried away. + + +III + +AVERNUS + +She sat on a divan in the corner when he entered the Vachette for the +first time. He said nothing, nor did he experience either a thrill of +pleasure or disgust. The other waiters assured him that she was an old +customer, sometimes better dressed, yet never without money. And she was +liberal. He took her usual order, but did not speak to her, though she +played with the purse as if to tempt him--it had become for him a symbol +of their lives. A quick glance assured him that the amethyst had +disappeared. She was literally drinking _his_ gift away in absinthe. The +spring passed, and Ambroise did not regain his former health. His limbs +were leaden, his head always heavy. The alert waiter was transformed. He +took his orders soberly, executed them soberly,--he was still a good +routinier; but his early enthusiasm was absent. Something had gone from +him that night; as she went to her carriage with her scornful, snapping, +petulant _Ça_!--he felt that his life was over. Aholibah watched like a +cat every night; he was not on for day duty. She never came to the Rasta +before dark. The story of her infatuation for the well-bred, melancholy +garçon was noised about; but it did not endanger his position, as at La +Source. He paid little attention to the jesting, and was scrupulously +exact in his work. But the sense of his double personality began to +worry him again. He did not see scarlet as of old; he noticed when his +eyes were closed that the apparition of a second Ambroise swam into the +field of his vision. And he was positively certain that this spectre of +himself saw scarlet--the attitude of his double assured him of the fact. +Simple-minded, ignorant of cerebral disorders, loyal, and laborious, +Ambroise could not speak of these disquieting things--indeed, he only +worked the more.... + +At last, one night in late summer, she did not appear. It was after a +day when she had sung more insolently than ever, drunk more than her +accustomed allowance, and had shown Ambroise the purse--the sockets of +the serpent's eyes untenanted by the beautiful carbuncles. Apathetic as +he had become, he was surprised at her absence. It was either caprice or +serious illness. She had dwindled to a skeleton, with a maleficent +smile. Her teeth were yellow, her hands become claws, the scarlet of her +clothes a drab hue, the plumes on her hat gone. Ambroise wondered. About +midnight a mean-looking fellow entered and asked for him. A lady, a very +ill lady, was in a coupé at the door. He hurried out. It was Aholibah. +Her eyes were glazed and her lips black and cracked. She tried to croon, +in a hoarse voice:-- + +"I am the Woman of Morocco!" But her head fell on the window-sill of the +carriage. Ambroise lifted the weary head on his shoulder. His eyes were +so dry that they seemed thirsty. The old glamour gripped him. The cabman +held the reins and waited; it was an every-night occurrence for him. The +starlight could not penetrate to the Boulevard through the harsh +electric glare; and the whirring of wheels and laughter of the café's +guests entered the soul of Ambroise like steel nails. She opened her +eyes. + +"I am that Aholibah ... a witness through waste Asia ... that the strong +men and the Captains knew ..." This line of Swinburne's was pronounced +in the purest English. Ambroise did not understand. Then followed some +rapidly uttered jargon that might have been Moorish. He soothed her, and +softly passed his hand over her rough and dishevelled hair. His heart +was bursting. She was after all his Aholibah, his first love. A crowd +gathered. He asked for a doctor. A dozen students ran in a dozen +different directions. The tired horse stamped its feet impatiently, and +once it whinnied. The coachman lighted his pipe and watched his dying +fare. Some wag sang a drunken lyric, and Ambroise repeated at +intervals:-- + +"Please not so close, Messieurs. She needs air." Then she moved her head +and murmured: + +"Where's--my Prince? My--Prince Ambroise--I have something--" Her head +fell back on his shoulder with a rigid jerk. In her clenched fingers he +recognized his purse--smudged, torn, the serpent mouth gaping, the eyes +empty.... And for the last time Ambroise saw scarlet--saw scarlet +double. His two personalities had separated, never to merge again. + + + + +IV + +REBELS OF THE MOON + + "On my honour, friend," Zarathustra answered, "what thou speakest + of doth not exist: there is no devil nor hell. Thy soul will be + dead even sooner than thy body: henceforth fear naught." + + +The moon, a spiritual gray wafer, fainted in the red wind of a summer +morning as the two men leaped a ditch soft with mud. The wall was not +high, the escape an easy one. Crouching, their clothes the colour of +clay, they trod cautiously the trench, until opposite a wood whose trees +blackened the slow dawn. Then, without a word, they ran across the road, +and, in a few minutes, were lost in the thick underbrush of the little +forest. It was past four o'clock and the dawn began to trill over the +rim of night; the east burst into stinging sun rays, while the moving +air awoke the birds and sent scurrying around the smooth green park a +cloud of golden powdery dust.... + +Arved and Quell stood in a secret glade and looked at each other +solemnly--but only for a moment. Laughter, unrestrained laughter, +frightened the squirrels and warned them that they were still in +danger. + +"Well, we've escaped this time," said the poet. + +"Yes; but how long?" was the sardonic rejoinder of the painter. + +"See here, Quell, you're a pessimist. You are never satisfied; which, I +take it, is a neat definition of pessimism." + +"I don't propose to chop logic so early in the morning," was the surly +reply. "I'm cold and nervous. Say, did you lift anything before we got +away?" Arved smiled the significant smile of a drinking man. + +"Yes, I did. I waited until Doc McKracken left his office, and then I +sneaked _this_." The severe lines in Quell's face began to swim +together. He reached out his hand, took the flask, and then threw back +his head. Arved watched him with patient resignation. + +"Hold on there! Leave a dozen drops for a poor maker of rhymes," he +chuckled, and soon was himself gurgling the liquor. + +They arose, and after despairing glances at their bespattered garments, +trudged on. In an hour, the pair had reached the edge of the forest, +and, as the sun sat high and warm, a rest was agreed upon. But this time +they did not easily find a hiding-place. Fearing to venture nearer the +turnpike, hearing human sounds, they finally retired from the clearing, +and behind a moss-etched rock discovered a cool resting-place on the +leafy floor. + +At full length, hands under heads, brains mellowed by brandy, the men +summed up the situation. Arved was the first to speak. He was tall, +blond, heavy of figure, and his beard hung upon his chest. His +dissatisfied eyes were cynical when he rallied his companion. A man of +brains this, but careless as the grass. + +"Quell, let us think this thing out carefully. It is nearly six o'clock. +At six o'clock the cells will be unlocked, and then,--well, McKracken +will damn our bones, for he gets a fat board fee from my people, and the +table is not so cursed good at the Hermitage that he misses a margin of +profit! What will he do? Set the dogs after us? No, he daren't; we're +not convicts--we're only mad folk." He smiled good-humouredly, though +his white brow was dented as if by harsh thoughts. + +Quell's little bloodshot eyes stared up into a narrow channel of +foliage, at the end of which was a splash of blue sky. He was +mean-appearing, with a horselike head, his mustache twisted into a +savage curl. His forehead was abnormal in breadth and the irritable +flashes of fire in his eyes told the story of a restless soul. The +nostrils expanded as he spoke:-- + +"We're only mad folk, as you say; nevertheless, the Lord High Keeper +will send his police patrol wagon after us in a jiffy. He went to bed +dead full last night, so his humour won't be any too sweet when he hears +that several of his boarders have vanished. He'll miss you more than me; +I'm not at the first table with you swells." + +Quell ended his speech with so disagreeable an inflection that Arved was +astonished. He looked around and spat at a beetle. + +"What's wrong with you, my hearty? I believe you miss your soft iron +couch. Or did you leave it this morning left foot foremost? Anyhow, +Quell, don't get on your ear. We'll push to town as soon as it's +twilight, and I know a little crib near the river where we can have all +we want to eat and drink. Do you hear--drink!" Quell made no answer. The +other continued:-- + +"Besides, I don't see why you've turned sulky simply because your family +sent you up to the Hermitage. It's no disgrace. In fact, it steadies the +nerves, and you can get plenty of booze." + +"If you have the price," snapped his friend. + +"Money or no money, McKracken's asylum--no, it's bad taste to call it +that; his retreat, ah, there's the word!--is not so awful. I've a theory +that our keepers are crazy as loons; though you can't blame them, +watching us, as they must, from six o'clock in the morning until +midnight. Say, why were you put away?" + +"Crazy, like yourself, I suppose." Quell grinned. + +"And now we're cured. We cured ourselves by flight. How can they call us +crazy when we planned the job so neatly?" + +Arved began to be interested in the sound of his own voice. He searched +his pockets and after some vain fumbling found a half package of +cigarettes. + +"Take some and be happy, my boy. They are boon-sticks indeed." Quell +suddenly arose. + +"Arved, what were you sent up for, may I ask?" + +The poet stretched his big legs, rolled over on his back again, and +scratching his tangled beard, smoked the cigarette he had just lighted. +In the hot hum of the woods there was heard the occasional dropping of +pine cones as the wind fanned lazy music from the leaves. They could not +see the sun; its power was felt. Perspiration beaded their shiny faces +and presently they removed collars and coats, sitting at ease in +shirt-sleeves.... Arved's tongue began to speed:-- + +"Though I've only known you twenty-four hours, my son, I feel impelled +to tell you the history of my happy life--for happiness has its +histories, no matter what the poets say. But the day is hot, our time +limited. Wait until we are recaptured, then I'll spin you a yarn." + +"You expect to get caught for sure?" + +"I do. So do you. No need to argue--your face tells me that. But we'll +have the time of our life before they gather us in. Anyhow, we'll want +to go back. The whole world is crazy, but ashamed to acknowledge it. We +are not. Pascal said men are so mad that he who would not be is a madman +of a new kind. To escape ineffable dulness is the privilege of the +lunatic; the lunatic, who is the true aristocrat of nature--the unique +man in a tower of ivory, the elect, who, in samite robes, traverses +moody gardens. Really, I shudder at the idea of ever living again in +yonder stewpot of humanity, with all its bad smells. To struggle with +the fools for their idiotic prizes is beyond me. The lunatic asylum--" + +"Can't you find some other word?" asked Quell, dryly. + +"--is the best modern equivalent for the tub of Diogenes--he who was the +first Solitary, the first Individualist. To dream one's dreams, to be +alone--" + +"How about McKracken and the keepers?" + +"From the volatile intellects of madmen are fashioned the truths of +humanity. Mental repose is death. All our modern theocrats, +politicians,--whose minds are sewers for the people,--and lawyers are +corpses, their brains dead from feeding on dead ideas. Motion is +life--mad minds are always in motion." + +"Let up there! You talk like the doctor chaps over at the crazy crib," +interrupted Quell. + +"Ah, if we could only arrange our dreams in chapters--as in a novel. +Sometimes Nature does it for us. There is really a beginning, a +development, a dénouement. But, for the most of us, life is a crooked +road with weeds so high that we can't see the turn of the path. Now, my +case--I'm telling you my story after all--my case is a typical one of +the artistic sort. I wrote prose, verse, and dissipated with true +poetic regularity. It was after reading Nietzsche that I decided to quit +my stupid, sinful ways. Yes, you may smile! It was Nietzsche who +converted me. I left the old crowd, the old life in Paris, went to +Brittany, studied new rhythms, new forms, studied the moon; and then +people began to touch their foreheads knowingly. I was suspected simply +because I did not want to turn out sweet sonnets about the pretty stars. +Why, man, I have a star in my stomach! Every poet has. We are of the +same stuff as the stars. It was Marlowe who said, 'A sound magician is a +mighty god.' He was wrong. Only the mentally unsound are really wise. +This the ancients knew. Even if Gerard de Nerval did walk the boulevards +trolling a lobster by a blue ribbon--that is no reason for judging him +crazy. As he truly said, 'Lobsters neither bark nor bite; and they know +the secrets of the sea!' His dreams simply overflowed into his daily +existence. He had the courage of his dreams. Do you remember his +declaring that the sun never appears in dreams? How true! But the moon +does, 'sexton of the planets,' as the crazy poet Lenau called it--the +moon which is the patron sky-saint of men with brains. Ah, brains! What +unhappiness they cause in this brainless world, a world rotten with +hypocrisy. A poet polishes words until they glitter with beauty, +charging them with fulminating meaning--straightway he is called mad by +men who sweat and toil on the stock exchange. Have you ever, my dear +Quell, watched those little, grotesque brokers on a busy day? No? Well, +you will say that no lunatic grimacing beneath the horns of the moon +ever made such ludicrous, such useless, gestures. And for what? Money! +Money to spend as idiotically as it is garnered. The world is crazy, I +tell you, crazy, to toil as it does. How much cleverer are the apes who +won't talk, because, if they did, they would be forced to abandon their +lovely free life, put on ugly garments, and work for a living. These +animals, for which we have such contempt, are freer than men; they are +the Supermen of Nietzsche--Nietzsche whose brain mirrored both a +Prometheus and a Napoleon." Quell listened to this speech with +indifference. Arved continued:-- + +"Nor was Nietzsche insane when he went to the asylum. His sanity was +blinding in its brilliancy; he voluntarily renounced the world of +foolish faces and had himself locked away where he would not hear its +foolish clacking. O Silence! gift of the gods, deified by Carlyle in +many volumes and praised by me in many silly words! My good fellow, +society, which is always hypocritical, has to build lunatic asylums in +self-defence. These polite jails keep the world in countenance; they +give it a standard. If _you_ are behind the bars--" + +"Speak for yourself," growled Quell. + +"Then the world knows that you are crazy and that _it_ is not. There is +no other way of telling the difference. So a conspiracy of fools, +lawyers, and doctors is formed. If you do not live the life of the +stupid: cheat, lie, steal, smirk, eat, dance, and drink--then you are +crazy! That fact agreed upon, the hypocrites, who are quite mad, but +cunning enough to dissemble, lock behind bolted doors those free souls, +the poets, painters, musicians--artistic folk in general. They brand our +gifts with fancy scientific names, such as Megalomania, Paranoia, _Folie +des grandeurs_. Show me a genius and I'll show you a madman--according +to the world's notion." + +"There you go again," cried Quell, arising to his knees. "Genius, _I_ +believe, is a disease of the nerves; and I don't mind telling you that I +consider poets and musicians quite crazy." + +Arved's eyes were blazing blue signals. + +"But, my dear Quell, are not all men mad at some time or another? Madly +in love, religiously mad, patriotically insane, and idiotic on the +subject of clothes, blood, social precedence, handsome persons, money? +And is it not a sign of insanity when one man claims sanity for his own +particular art? Painting, I admit, is--" + +"What the devil do you know about painting?" Quell roughly interposed; +"you are a poet and, pretending to love all creation,--altruism, I think +your sentimental philosophers call it,--have the conceit to believe you +bear a star in your stomach when it is only a craving for rum. I've +been through the game." + +He began to pace the sward, chewing a blade of grass. He spoke in +hurried, staccato phrases:-- + +"Why was I put away? Listen: I tried to paint the sun,--for I hate your +moon and its misty madness. To put this glorious furnace on canvas is, +as you will acknowledge, the task of a god. It never came to me in my +dreams, so I wooed it by day. Above all, I wished to express truth; the +sun is black. Think of an ebon sun fringed with its dazzling +photosphere! I tried to paint sun-rhythms, the rhythms of the quivering +sky, which is never still even when it seems most immobile; I tried to +paint the rhythms of the atmosphere, shivering as it is with chords of +sunlight and chromatic scales as yet unpainted. Like Oswald Alving in +Ibsen's Ghosts, my last cry will be for 'the sun.' How did my friends +act? What did the critics say? A black sun was too much for the world, +though astronomers have proven my theory correct. The doctors swore I +drank too much absinthe; the critics said a species of optical madness +had set in; that I saw only the peripheral tints--I was yellow and blue +crazy. Perhaps I was, perhaps I am. So is the fellow crazy who invented +wireless telegraphy; so is the man off his base who invents a folding +bird cage. We are all crazy, and the craziest gang are our doctors at +the Hermitage." He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. Arved rolled his +handsome head acquiescingly. + +"You poets and musicians are trying to compass the inane. You are trying +to duplicate your dreams, dreams without a hint of the sun. The painter +at least copies or interprets real life; while the composer dips his +finger in the air, making endless sound-scrolls--noises with long tails +and whirligig decorations like foolish fireworks--though I think the art +of the future will be pyrotechnics. Mad, mad, I tell you! But whether +mad or not matters little in our land of freedom, where all men are born +unequal, where only the artists are sad. They are useless beings, openly +derided, and when one is caught napping, doing something that offends +church or State or society, he is imprisoned. Mad, you know! No wonder +anarchy is thriving, no wonder every true artist is an anarch, unavowed +perhaps, yet an anarch, and an atheist." + +"Not so fast!" interrupted Arved. "I'm an anarchist, but I don't believe +in blowing up innocent policemen. Neither do you, Quell. You wouldn't +hurt a bartender! Give an anarchist plenty to drink, and he sheds his +anarchy like a shirt. There are, I have noticed, three stages in the +career of a revolutionist: destruction, instruction, construction. He +begins the first at twenty, at forty he is teaching, at sixty he +believes in society--especially if he has money in the bank." Quell +regarded the speaker sourly. + +"You are a wonder, Arved. You fly off on a wild tangent stimulated by +the mere sound of a word. Who said anything about dynamite-anarchy? +There's another sort that men of brains--madmen if you will--believe and +indirectly teach. Emerson was one, though he hardly knew it. Thoreau +realized it for him, however. Don't you remember his stern rebuke when +Emerson visited him in Concord jail: 'Henry, why art thou here?' meekly +inquired the mystic man. 'Ralph, why art thou _not_ here?' was the +counter-question. Thoreau had brave nerves. To live in peace in this +malicious swamp of a world we must all wear iron masks until we are +carted off to the _domino-park_; pious people call it the cemetery. Now, +I'm going to sleep. I'm tired of all this jabbering. We are crazy for +sure, or else we wouldn't talk so much." + +Arved grumbled, "Yes, I've noticed that when a man in an asylum begins +to suspect his keepers of madness he's mighty near lunacy himself." + +"You have crazy blue eyes, Arved! Where's that flask--I'm dry again! +Let's sleep." + +They drained the bottle and were soon dozing, while about them buzzed +the noon in all its torrid splendour. + +When they awoke it was solid night. They yawned and damned the darkness, +which smelt like stale india-rubber, so Quell said. They cursed life and +the bitter taste in their mouths. Quell spoke of his thirst in words +that startled the easy-going Arved, who confessed that if he could rid +himself of the wool in his throat, he would be comparatively happy. Then +they stumbled along, bumping into trees, feeling with outstretched arms, +but finding nothing to guide them save the few thin stars in the torn +foliage overhead. Without watches, they could catch no idea of the hour. +The night was far spent, declared Arved; he discovered that he was very +hungry. Suddenly, from the top of a steep, slippery bank they pitched +forward into the highroad. + +Arved put out his hand, searching for his comrade. "Quell, Quell!" he +whispered. Quell rose darkly beside him, a narrow lath of humanity. +Locking arms, both walked briskly until, turning a sharp, short corner, +they beheld, all smiling in the night, a summer garden, well lighted and +full of gay people, chattering, singing, eating, drinking--happy! The +two fugitives were stunned for a moment by such a joyful prospect. Tears +came slowly to their eyes, yet they never relaxed their gait. Arriving +at an outlying table and seats, they bethought themselves of their +appearance, of money, of other disquieting prospects; but, sitting down, +they boldly called a waiter. + +Luckily it was a country girl who timidly took their order for beer and +sandwiches. And they drank eagerly, gobbling the food as soon as it +came, ordering more so noisily that they attracted attention. The beer +made them brave. As they poured down glass after glass, reckless of the +reckoning, insolent to the servant, they began wrangling over the +subject that had possessed their waking hours. + +"Look here, Quell!" Arved exclaimed crustily, "you said I had crazy blue +eyes. What about your own red ones? Crazy! Why, they glow now like a +rat's. Poets may be music-mad, drunk with tone--" + +"And other things," sneered the painter. + +"--but at least their work is great when it endures; it does not fade +away on rotten canvas." + +"Now, I know you ought to be in the Brain-College, Arved, where your +friends could take the little green car that goes by the grounds and see +you on Sunday afternoons if weather permits." + +His accent seemed deliberately insulting to Arved, who, however, let it +pass because of their mutual plight. If they fell to fighting, detection +would ensue. So he answered in placatory phrases:-- + +"Yes, my friend, we both belong to the same establishment, for we are +men of genius. As the cat said to Alice, 'We must be mad or else we +shouldn't be here.' I started to tell you why my people thought I had +better take the cure. I loved the moon too much and loathed sunlight. If +I had never tried to write lunar poetry--the tone quality of music +combined with the pictorial evocation of painting--I might be in the +bosom of my family now instead of--" + +"Drinking with a crazy painter, eh?" Quell was very angry. He shouted +for drinks so rapidly that he alarmed the more prudent Arved; and as +they were now the last guests, the head waiter approached and curtly +bade them leave. In an instant he was dripping with beer thrown at +him--glass and all--by the irate Quell. A whistle sounded, two other +waiters rushed out, and the battle began. Arved, aroused by the sight of +his friend on the ground with three men hammering his head, gave a roar +like the trumpeting of an elephant. A chair was smashed over a table, +and, swinging one-half of it, he made a formidable onslaught. Two of the +waiters were knocked senseless and the leader's nose and teeth crushed +in by the rude cudgel. The morose moon started up, a tragic hieroglyph +in the passionless sky. Quell, seeing its hated disk, howled, his face +aflame with exaltation. Then he leaped like a hoarsely panting animal +upon the poet; a moment and they were in the grass clawing each other. +And the moon foamed down upon them its magnetic beams until darkness, +caused by a coarse blanket, enveloped, pinioned, smothered them. When +the light shone again, they were sitting in a wagon, their legs tightly +bound.... + +They began singing. The attendant interrupted:-- + +"Will you fellows keep quiet? How can a man drive straight, listening to +your cackle?" + +Arved touched his temple significantly and nudged Quell. + +"Another one of us. Another rebel of the moon!" + +"Shut up or I'll gag you both!" imperiously commanded the doctor, as the +wheels of the ambulance cut the pebbly road. They were entering the +asylum; now they passed the porter's lodge. In the jewelled light of a +senescent moon, his wife and little daughter gazed at them curiously, +without semblance of pity or fear. Then, as if shot from the same vocal +spring-board, the voices of poet and painter merged into crazy +rhythmatic chanting:-- + +"Rebels of the moon, rebels of the moon! We are, we are, the rebels of +the moon!" + +And the great gates closed behind them with a brazen clangour--metal +gates of the moon-rebels. + + + + +V + +THE SPIRAL ROAD + + There can be nothing good, as we know it, nor anything evil, as we + know it, in the eye of the Omnipresent and the + Omniscient.--_Oriental Proverb._ + + +I + +THE STRAND OF DREAMS + +"I must see him if only for a minute. I can't go back to the city after +coming so far. Please--" but the girl's face disappeared and the rickety +door, which had been opened on a chain, was slammed after this +imperative speech, and Gerald Shannon found himself staring +exasperatedly at its rusty exterior. To have travelled on foot such a +distance only to be turned away like a beggar enraged him. Nor was the +prospect of returning over the path which had brought him to Karospina's +house a cheering one. He turned and saw that a low, creeping mist had +obliterated every vestige of the trail across the swamp lands. There was +no sun, and the twilight of a slow yellow day in late September would +soon, in complicity with the fog, leave him totally adrift on this +remote strand--he could hear the curving fall and hiss of the breakers, +the monotonous rumour of the sea. So he was determined to face +Karospina, even if he had to force his way into the house. + +Two hours earlier, at the little railway station, they had informed him +that the road was easy flatland for the greater part of the way. He had +offered money for a horse or even a wheel; but these were luxuries on +this bleak, poverty-ridden coast. As there was no alternative, Gerald +had walked rapidly since three o'clock. And he had not been told the +truth about the road; where the oozing, green, unwholesome waters were +not he stepped, sometimes sinking over his ankles in the soft mud. Not a +sign of humanity served him for comfort or compass. He had been assured +that if he kept his back to the sun he would reach his destination. And +he did, but not without many misgivings. It was the vision of a squat +tower-like building, almost hemmed in by a monster gas reservoir, +fantastic wooden galleries, and the gigantic silhouettes of strange +machinery, that relieved his mind. But this house and its surroundings +soon repelled him. His reception was the final disenchantment. + +He played a lively tattoo with his blackthorn stick on the panels of the +door. For five minutes this continued, interspersed with occasional loud +calls for Karospina. At last the siege was raised. After preliminary +unboltings, unbarrings, and the rattling of the chain, Gerald saw before +him a middle-aged man with a smooth face and closely shaven head, who +quietly asked his name and business. + +"I have a letter for you, Mr. Karospina--if you are that gentleman--and +as I have put myself to much trouble in getting to you, I think I +deserve a little consideration." + +"A letter, my worthy sir! And for me? Who told you to come here? How do +you know my name?" This angered the young man. + +"It is from Prince K. _The_ Prince. Now are you satisfied?" he added, as +his questioner turned red and then paled as if the news were too +startling for his nerves. + +"Come in, come in!" he cried. "Mila, Mila, here is a guest. Fetch tea to +the laboratory." He literally dragged Shannon within doors and led him +across a stone corridor to a large room, but not before he had bolted +and barred the entrance to his mysterious fortress. Seeing the other's +look of quiet amusement, he laughed himself:-- + +"Wolves, my dear sir, wolves, _human_ wolves, prowl on the beach at +night, and while I have no treasures, it is well to be on the safe side. +Mila, Mila, the tea, the tea." There was a passionate intensity in his +utterance that attracted Gerald from his survey of the chamber. He saw +that in the light Karospina was a much older man than he had at first +supposed. But the broad shoulders, the thick chest, and short, powerful +figure and bullet head belied his years. Incredulously his visitor asked +himself if this were the wonderful, the celebrated Karospina, chemist, +revolutionary, mystic, nobleman, and millionnaire. A Russian, he knew +that--yet he looked more like the monk one sees depicted on the canvases +of the early Flemish painters. His high, wide brow and deep-set, dark +eyes proclaimed the thinker; and because of his physique, he might have +posed as a prize-fighter. + +He took the letter and read it as the door opened and the girl came in +with the tea. She wore her hair braided in two big plaits which hung +between her shoulders, and her bold, careless glance from eyes sea-blue +made the Irishman forget his host and the rigours of the afternoon. A +Russian beauty, with bare, plump arms, and dressed in peasant costume; +but--a patrician! Her fair skin and blond hair filled him with +admiration. What the devil!--he thought, and came near saying it aloud. + +"My niece, Princess Mila Georgovics, Mr. Shannon." Gerald acknowledged +the introduction with his deepest bow. He was dazzled. He had come to +this dreary place to talk politics. But now this was out of the +question. And he began explaining to the Princess; Mila he had fancied +was some slattern waiting on the old fanatic of a prince. He told Mila +this in a few words, and soon the pair laughed and chatted. In the +meantime Karospina, who had finished the letter, began to pace the +apartment. Apparently he had forgotten the others. + +"Tea, tea, where's the tea?" he presently shouted. As they drank, he +said: "The prince asks an impossibility, Mr. Shannon. Say to him, _no_, +simply no; he will understand, and so will you, I hope. I'm done with +all militant movements. I'm converted to the peace party. What's the use +of liberty to people who won't know what to do with it when they get it? +Tolstoy is right. Let the peasant be shown how to save his soul--that +and a little to eat and drink and a roof are all he needs in this life." + +Gerald was startled. He had expected to find an "advanced" leader of the +Bakounine type. Instead, a man of the "vegetarian" order,--as he had +heard them called,--who talked religion instead of dynamite;--and after +all the bother of bringing the letter down to this remote country! +Decidedly the princess was more enjoyable than a reformed anarchist. She +was gazing at him seriously now, her society manner gone. Her nose, +rather large for the harmony of her face, palpitated with eagerness. +Evidently, thought Gerald, the young lady is the real revolutionist in +this curious household. He also ventured to say so to her, but she did +not meet his smiling declaration. Her uncle, irritated by his +interrupted discourse, exclaimed:-- + +"Never mind what the Princess Mila thinks, Mr. Shannon. Women change +their minds. The chief matter just now is that you cannot go away +to-night. You would lose your way, perhaps be drowned. Can you sleep on +a hard bed?" He was assured by Gerald that, if he had been turned away, +he would have slept in an outhouse, even under one of those windmills he +saw in such number on the strand. Karospina smiled. + +"Hardly there--that is, if you expected to awaken." Then he left the +room, saying that some one must see to the supper. His niece burst into +laughter. Gerald joined in. + +"He's always like that, fussy, nervous, but with a heart of gold, +Mr.--Mr. Shannon. Thank you. It's an Irish name, is it not? And you look +like an Irishman; a soldier, too, I fancy!" + +Gerald blushed. "A soldier in the cause of humanity," he answered, "but +no longer a hireling in the uniform of kings." He felt so foolish after +this brave bit of rhetoric that he kept his eyes on the floor. In an +instant she was at his side. + +"Give me your hand--_comrade_!" she said, with a peculiar intonation. +"Oh! if you only knew how I longed to meet the right men. Uncle is a +convert--no, hardly a backslider; but he swears by the regenerating +process instead of violence. Formerly the cleverest living chemist, he +now--oh! I shame to say it--he now indulges in firework displays instead +of manufacturing bombs with which to execute tyrants." She slowly +dropped his hand and her eyes wore a clairvoyant expression. He was +astounded. + +"Fireworks! Doesn't the prince hold by his old faith--he, a pupil of +Bakounine, Netschajew, and Kropotkin?" Just then the prince came in, +bearing a tray. He seemed happy. + +"Here, sit down, dear sir, and partake of a few things. We live so far +from civilization that we seldom get a good chicken. But eggs I can +offer you, eggs and ham, cooked by me on an electric machine." + +"You have no servants?" Gerald ventured. + +"Not one. I can't trust them near my--toys. The princess plays Chopin +mazourkas after she makes the beds in the morning, and in the afternoon +she is my assistant in the laboratory." Again the young man looked about +him. If the room was a laboratory, where were the retorts, the oven, the +phials, the jars, the usual apparatus of a modern chemist? He saw +nothing, except an old-fashioned electric fan and a few dusty books. The +fireworks--were those overgrown wheels and gaunt windmills and gas-house +the secret of the prince's self-banishment to this dreary coast? What +dreams did he seek to incarnate on this strand, in this queer tower, +locked away from the world with a charming princess--a fairy princess +whose heart beat with love for the oppressed, in whose hand he might +some time see the blazing torch of freedom? He, himself, was enveloped +by the hypnotism of the place. Mila spoke:-- + +"I fear I must leave you. I am studying to-night and--I go early to +rest. Pray dine as well as you can, with such a chef." She smiled +mischievously at her uncle, courtesied in peasant fashion to the +bewildered Gerald, who put out his hand, fain to touch hers, and +disappeared. The prince gazed inquiringly at the young man. + +"Revolutionists soon become friends, do they not? The Princess Mila is +part Russian, part Roumanian,--my sister married a Roumanian,--hence her +implacable political attitude. I can't lead her back to civilized +thinking. She sees war in the moon, sun, and stars. And I--I have +forsworn violence. Ah! if I could only make the prince change. +Bakounine's death had no effect; Netschajew's fate did not move him; nor +was Illowski's mad attempt to burn down Paris with his incendiary +symphony an example to our prince that those who take up the sword +perish by the sword. Ah, Tolstoy, dear Leon Nikolaievitch, you showed me +the true way to master the world by love and not by hate! Until I +read--but there, it's late. Come with me to your room. You may smoke and +sleep when you will. In the morning I will show you my--toys." They +shook hands formally and parted. + +His bed was hard, and his room cheerless, but anything, even a haymow, +rather than walking back to the station. After he went to his bed, he +rehearsed the day's doings from the three hours' ride in the train to +the tower. How weary he was! Hark--some one played the piano! A Chopin +mazourka! It was the princess. Mila! How lovely her touch!... Mila! What +a lovely name! A sleeping princess. A prince with such a sleepy head. +How the girl could play ... along the spiral road he saw the music glow +in enigmatic figures of fire.... + + +II + +THE PANACEA OF CORUSCATION + +He seemed to be uttering her name when he awoke. It was daylight; the +sun poured its rays over his face, and he asked himself how he could +have fallen asleep leaving the lamp burning on the table near his bed. +He must have slept long, for he felt rested, cheerful--happy. As he +dressed he speculated whether it was the sunshine, or the prospect of +going back to life, or--or--Did he wish to return so soon? He wondered +what Mila was doing. Then he went into the stone corridor and coughed as +a hint that he was up. Not a sound but the persistent fall at a distance +of some heavy metallic substance. It must be Karospina in his workshop, +at his rockets, pinwheels, torpedoes, and firecrackers. What a singular +change in a bloodthirsty revolutionist. And how childish! Had he +squandered his millions on futile experimentings? What his object, what +his scheme, for the amelioration of mankind's woes? Gerald's stomach +warned him that coffee and rolls were far dearer to him than the +downfall of tyranny's bastions, and impatiently he began whistling. The +rhythmic thud never ceased. He noticed an open door at the back of the +house, and he went out, his long legs carrying him about the yard, +toward the beach. The air was glorious, a soft breeze blowing landward +from the ocean. He almost forgot his hunger in the face of such a +spectacle. The breakers were racing in, and after crumbling, they +scudded, a film of green, crested by cottony white, across the hard sand +to the young man's feet. He felt exhilarated. And his hunger returned. +Then Mila's voice sounded near him. She carried a basket and fairly ran +in her eagerness. + +"Mr. Shannon, Mr. Shannon, good Prince Gerald--" he was amazed; where +could she have heard his Christian name?--"your breakfast. Wait--don't +swim the seas to New York for it. Here it is." She opened the basket and +handed him a jug of coffee and showed him the rolls inside. Without the +slightest embarrassment he thanked her and drank his coffee, walking; he +ate the bread, and felt, as he expressed it, like leading a forlorn +hope. They went on, the cutting sunshine and sparkling breeze alluring +them to vague distances. It was long after midday when they marched back +at a slower pace, Gerald swinging the basket like a light-hearted boy, +instead of the desperado he fancied himself. + +Entering the house, Mila hunted up some cold meat, and with fresh tea +and stale bread they were contented. The formidable pyrotechnist did not +appear, and so the young people enjoyed the day in each other's company. +She conducted him like a river through the lands of sociology, +Dostoïewsky, and Chopin. She played, but made him sit in the hall, for +the piano was in her private room. And then they began to exchange +confidences. It was dusk before the prince returned, in the attire of a +workingman, his face and hands covered with soot and grease. A hard +day's labour, he said, and did not seem surprised to see Shannon. + +After supper he asked Gerald if he would smoke a pipe with him in his +laboratory. Mila must have bored him enough by this time! They lighted +their pipes; but Mila refused to be sent away. She sat down beside her +uncle and put her elbows on the table--white, strong arms she had, and +Gerald only took his eyes from their pleasing contemplation to lift them +to hers. He was fast losing what little prudence he had; he was a Celt, +and he felt that he had known Mila for a century. + +"Young man," said Prince Karospina, sharply, "you have the message I +gave you last night! Well--and you will say _no_, to my beloved friend +K., without knowing why. And you will think that you have been dealing +with a man whose hard head has turned to the mush of human kindness,--an +altruist. Ah! I know how you fellows despise the word. But what have +Kropotkin, Elisée Reclus, Jean Grave, or the rest accomplished? To +build up, not to tear down, should be the object of the scientific +anarch. Stop! You need not say the earth has to be levelled and ploughed +before sowing the seed. That suits turnip fields, not the garden of +humanity. Educate the downtrodden into liberty, is my message, not the +slaughtering of monarchs. How am I going to go about it? Ah! that's my +affair, my dear sir. After I read a certain book by Tolstoy, I realized +that art was as potent an agent for mischief as the knout. Music--music +is rooted in sex; it works miracles of evil--" + +"Now, uncle, I won't hear a word against Chopin," said Mila, looking +toward Gerald for approval. + +"Music, Mila, in the hands of evil men is an instrument dangerous to +religion, to civilization. What of Illowski and his crazy attack on +Paris and St. Petersburg? You remember, Shannon! Leave Wagner out of the +question--there is no fusion of the arts in his music drama--only bad +verse, foolish librettos, dealing with monsters and gods, and +indifferent scene-painting. Moreover, this new music is not understood +by the world. Even if the whole of mankind could be assembled on the +roof of the world and at a preconcerted signal made to howl the +Marseillaise, it would not be educated to the heights I imagine. Stage +plays--Shakespeare has no message for our days; Ibsen is an +anarchist--he believes in placing the torpedo under the social ark. +Painting--it is an affair for state galleries and the cabinets of +wealthy amateurs. Literature is a dead art--every one writes and reads +and no one understands. Religion! Ah! Yes, religion; the world will be a +blackened cinder or cometary gas before the love of God is stamped from +its heart. But religion and art must go hand in hand. Divorced, art has +fallen into the Slough of Despond; else has been transformed into an +acrid poison wherewith men's souls are destroyed as if by a virulent +absinthe. United with religion, art is purified. All art sprang from +religion. All great art, from a Greek statue to a Gothic cathedral, from +a Bach fugue to Michael Angelo, was religious. Therefore, if we are to +reach the hearts of the people, we must make art the handmaid of +religion." He stopped for breath. Gerald interposed:-- + +"But, dear prince, you say 'art.' What art--painting, sculpture, +architecture, music, poetry, drama--?" + +"One art," harshly cried the now excited man, as he pounded the table +with his hard fist. "One art, _my_ art, the fusion of all the arts. I, +Prince Igorovitch Karospina, tell you that I have discovered the secret +of the arts never dreamed of by Wagner and his futile, painted music on +a painted stage; I have gone, not to art, but to nature--colour, fire, +the elements. The eye is keener than the ear, vision is easier +comprehended than tone. Ah! I have you interested at last." + +He began walking as if to overtake a missing idea. His niece watched him +cynically. + +"I fear you are boring Mr. Shannon," she said in her most birdlike +accents. Her uncle turned on her. + +"I don't care if I am. Go to bed! I am nearing the climax of a lifetime, +and I feel that I must talk to a sympathetic ear. You are not bored, +dear friend. I have pondered this matter for more than thirty years. I +have studied all the arts--painting particularly; and with colour, with +colourful design I mean to teach mankind the great lessons of the +masters and of religion." + +"Ah, you will exhibit in large halls, panoramic pictures, I suppose," +interrupted Shannon. + +"Nothing of the sort," was the testy reply. "For thousands of years the +world has been gazing upon dead stones and canvases, reading dead words. +Dead--all, I tell you, all of these arts. And painting is only in two +dimensions--a poor copy of nature. The theatre has its possibilities, +but is too restricted in space. Music is alive. It moves; but its +message is not articulate to _all_. I want an art that will be +understood and admired at a glance by the world from pole to pole. I +want an art that will live and move and tell a noble tale. I want an art +that will appeal to the eye by its colouring and the soul by its +beautiful designs. Where is that legend-laden art? Hitherto it has not +existed. I have found it. I have tracked it down until I am the master +who by a touch can liberate elemental forces, which will not destroy, +like those of Illowski's, but will elevate the soul and make mankind one +great nation, one loving brotherhood. Ah! to open once more those doors +of faith closed by the imperious dogmas of science--open them upon a +lovely land of mystery. Mankind must have mystery. And beyond each +mystery lies another. This will be our new religion." + +Gerald had caught the enthusiasm of this swelling prologue and rose, his +face alight with curiosity. + +"And that art is--is--?" he stammered. + +"That art is--pyrotechny." It was too much for the young man's nerves, +and he fell back in his chair, purple with suppressed laughter. Angrily +darting at him and catching his left shoulder in a vicelike grip, +Karospina growled: + +"You fool, how dare you mock something you know nothing of?" He shook +his guest roughly. + +"Uncle, uncle, be patient! Tell Mr. Shannon, and he, too, will become a +believer. I believe in you. I believe in him, Mr. Shannon. Don't sneer! +Tell him, uncle." Mila's words, almost imploring in their tone, calmed +the infuriated inventor, who left the room. He reëntered in a moment, +his head dripping, and he was grinning broadly. + +"Whenever I encounter a refractory pattern in my fireworks--as you call +them--I am compelled to throw a bucket of water over it to quench its +too ardent spirits. I have just done the same to my own head, dear Mr. +Shannon, and I ask your pardon for my rudeness. Get some fresh tea, +Mila, strong tea, Mila." Pipes were relighted and the conversation +resumed. + +"I forgot in my obsession, in what Jacob Boehme calls 'the shudder of +divine excitement,' that I was talking to one of the uninitiated. I +suppose you think by pyrotechny I mean the old-fashioned methods of set +pieces, ghastly portraits in fire, big, spouting wheels, rockets, war +scenes from contemporary history, seaside stuff, badly done--and flowery +squibs. My boy, all that, still admired by our country cousins, is the +very infancy of my art. In China, where nearly everything was invented +ages ago, in China I learned the first principles, also the +possibilities of the art of fireworks; yes, call it by its humble title. +In China I have seen surprising things at night. Pagodas blown across +the sky, an army of elephants in pursuit, and all bathed in the most +divine hues imaginable. But their art suffers from convention. They +accomplish miracles considering the medium they work in--largely +gunpowder. And their art has no meaning, no message, no moral principle, +no soul. Years ago I discovered all the aids necessary to the +pyrotechnist. I am not a chemist for nothing. If I can paint a fair +imitation of a Claude Monet on canvas, I can also produce for you a +colourless gas which, when handled by a virtuoso, produces astonishing +illusions. In the open air, against the dark background of the horizon, +I can show you the luminous dots planewise of the Impressionists; or I +can give you the broad, sabrelike brushwork of Velasquez, or the +imperial tintings of Titian. I can paint pictures on the sky. I can +produce blazing symphonies. I will prove to you that colour is also +music. This sounds as if I were a victim to that lesion of the brain +called 'coloured-audition.' Perhaps! Not Helmholtz or Chevreul can tell +me anything new in the science of optics. I am the possessor of the +rainbow secrets--for somewhere in Iceland, a runic legend runs, there is +a region vast as night, where all the rainbows--worn out or to be +used--drift about in their vapoury limbo. I have the key to this land of +dreams. Over the earth I shall float my rainbows of art like a flock of +angels. With them I propose to dazzle the eyes of mankind, to arouse +sleeping souls. From the chords of the combined arts I shall extort +nobler cadences, nobler rhythms, for men to live by, for men to die +for!" + +Shannon was impressed. Through the smoke of his host's discourse he +discovered genuine fire. The philosopher took his hand and led him to +the window. + +"Stand there a moment!" he adjured. Mila joined him and after turning +the lamp to a pin-head of light, their shoulders touching--for the +window was narrow--they peered into the night. They were on the side of +the water. Suddenly Gerald exclaimed:-- + +"What's that light out at sea--far out? It looks like the moon!" + +"It is the sun," coolly replied his companion. They saw arise from the +waters a majestic, glowing sphere of light, apparently the size of the +sun. It flooded the country with its glare, and after sailing nearly in +front of the house it shrank into a scarlet cross not larger than a +man's hand. Then in a shower of sparks it ceased, its absence making the +blackness almost corporeal. Instinctively the hands of the two indulged +in a long pressure, and Mila quickly adjusted the lamp. But Gerald still +stood at the window a prey to astonishment, terror, stupefaction. + +Karospina entered. His face was slightly flushed and in his eyes there +burned the sombre fire of the fanatic. Triumphantly he regarded his +young friend. + +"That was only a little superfluous gas--nothing I cared to show you. +Read the newspapers to-morrow, and you will learn that a big meteor +burst off the north coast the night before, and fell into the sea." Then +he moved closer and whispered:-- + +"The time is at hand. Within three weeks--not later than the middle of +October--I shall make my first public test. 'Thus saith the Lord God to +the mountains and to the hills, to the rivers and to the valleys: +Behold, I, _even_ I, will bring a sword upon you, and I will destroy +your high places.'" + +His voice rose in passion, his face worked in anger, and he shook his +clenched fists at an imaginary universe. So this man of peace was a +destroyer, after all! Gerald aroused him. Again he asked pardon. Mila +was nowhere to be seen, and with a sinking at the heart new to his +buoyant temperament, Gerald bade the magician good night. It was +arranged that he would leave the next day, for, like Milton, he was +haunted by "the ghost of a linen decency." But that night he did not +sleep, and no sound of music came to his ears from Mila's chamber. Once +he tried to open his window. It was nailed down. + +A gray day greeted his tired eyes. In an hour he was bidding his friends +good-by and thanking them for their hospitality. He had hoped that Mila +would accompany him a few steps on his long journey, but she made no +sign beyond a despairing look at her uncle, who was surly, as if he had +felt the reaction from too prolonged a debauch of the spirit. Gerald lit +his pipe, kissed the hand of Mila with emphasis, and parted from them. +He had not gone a hundred yards before he heard soft footsteps tracking +him. He turned and was disappointed to see that it was only Karospina, +who came up to him, breathing heavily, and in his catlike eyes the fixed +expression of monomania. He stuttered, waving his arms aloft. + +"The time is at hand and the end of all things shall be accomplished. +You shall return for the great night. You shall hear of it in the world. +Tell K. that I said _no!_ He must be with us at the transfiguration of +all things, when mankind shall go up the spiral road of perfection." + +Gerald Shannon fairly ran to escape knowing more about the universal +panacea. And when he turned for the last time the sea and tower and man +were blotted out by wavering mists of silver. + + +III + +THE FIERY CHARIOT + +The young man soon heard of Karospina's project. A week before the event +the newspapers began describing the experiments of the new Russian +wonder-worker, but treated the matter with calm journalistic +obliviousness to any but its most superficial aspects. A scientific +pyrotechnist was a novelty, particularly as the experimentings were to +be given with the aid of a newly discovered gas. Strange rumours of +human levitations, of flying machines seen after dark at unearthly +heights, were printed. This millionnaire, who had expended fortunes in +trying to accomplish what Maxim and Langley had failed in achieving, +was a good peg upon which to hang thrilling gossip. He promised to +convince the doubting ones that at last man would come into the empire +of the air, and by means of fireworks. In searching carefully all the +published reports Gerald was relieved not to encounter the name of Mila. + +That celebrated afternoon he found himself, after the distressingly +crowded cars, in company with many thousands, all clamouring and +jostling on the road to the tower. This time there were vehicles and +horses, though not in any degree commensurate with the crowd; but the +high tax imposed by the speculators gave him an opportunity of securing +a seat with a few others in a carriage drawn by four horses. Gingerly +they made their way down the narrow road--time was not gained, for the +packed mass of humans refused to separate. Fuming at the delay, he was +forced to console himself with smoking and listening to the stories told +of Karospina and his miracles. They were exaggerated. Karospina here, +Karospina there--the name of this modern magician was hummed everywhere +in the brisk October air. A little man who occupied the seat with +Shannon informed him that he knew some one who had worked for Karospina. +He declared that it was no uncommon sight for the conjurer--he was +usually called by that name--to float like a furled flag over his house +when the sun had set. Also he had been seen driving in the sky a span +of three fiery horses in a fiery chariot across the waters of the bay, +while sitting by his side was the star-crowned Woman of the Apocalypse +clothed with the sun and the moon under her feet. Gerald held his +counsel; but the grandeur of the spectacle he had witnessed still shook +his soul--if he had not been the victim of a hallucination! The journey +seemed endless. + +At last the strand came into view with the squat tower, the rusting +machinery, and the reservoir back of the house. There were, however, +changes in the scene. Within a quarter of a mile of the beach tents were +set and booths erected. Seemingly all the city had rushed to this place, +and the plain, with its swampy surfaces, was dotted by masses of noisy +men and women. Gerald, finding that approach to the house was impossible +from the land side, made a wide detour, and on reaching the shore he was +gratified to find it empty. The local constabulary, powerless to fight +off the mob near the house, had devoted their energies to clearing the +space about the gas retorts. After much bother, and only by telling his +name, did he pass the police cordon. Once inside, he rushed to the back +door and found, oh! great luck--Mila. Dressed in white, to his taste she +was angelic. He had great difficulty in keeping his arms pinioned to his +side; but his eyes shone with the truth beating at the bars of his +bosom, and Mila knew it. He felt this and was light-headed in his +happiness. + +They greeted. Mila's face wore a serious expression. + +"I'm very glad you have come down. I think uncle will be glad also. I am +_happy_ to see you again; I have missed you these past weeks. But my +happiness is nothing just now, Gerald! [He started.] My uncle, you must +speak with him. From brooding so much over the Holy Scriptures, and the +natural excitement of his discoveries--they are so extraordinary, dear +friend, that he means always to keep them to himself, for he rightly +believes that the governments of the world would employ them for wicked +purposes, war, the destruction of weaker nations--he has become +overwrought. You may not know it, he has a very strong, sane head on his +shoulders; but this scheme for lifting up the masses, I suspect, may +upset his own equilibrium. And his constant study of the Apocalypse and +the Hebraic revelations--it has filled him with strange notions. +Understand me: a man who can swim in the air like a fish in the sea is +apt to become unstrung. He has begun to identify himself with the +prophets. He insists on showing biblical pictures,--worse still, +appearing in them himself." + +"How 'appearing in them'?" asked Gerald, wonderingly. + +"In actual person. I, too, have promised to go with him." + +"In a transparency of fire, you mean? Isn't it dangerous?" She hung her +head. + +"No, in mid air, in a fiery chariot," she murmured. + +"The Woman of the Apocalypse!" he cried. "Oh! Princess Mila, dearest +Mila Georgovics, promise me that you will not risk such a crazy +experiment." Gerald pressed his fingers to his throbbing temples. + +"It is no experiment at all," she said, in almost inaudible tones; +_"last night we flew over the house."_ He stared at her, his hands +trembling, and no longer able to play the incredulous. + +"But, dear friend, I fear one other thing; the gas which uncle has +discovered is so tenuous that it is a million times lighter than air; +but it is ever at a terrible tension--I mean it is dangerous if not +carefully treated. Last summer, one afternoon, a valve broke and a large +quantity escaped from the reservoir, luckily on the ocean side. It +caused a storm and water-spouts, and destroyed a few vessels. The +coruscating gas creates a vacuum into which the air rushes with +incredible velocity. So promise me that while we are flying you will +stay with the police at the gas machines and keep off the crowd. +Promise!" + +"But I shan't permit you to go up with this renegade to the +revolutionary cause--" he began impetuously. She put warning fingers to +her lips. In the white flowing robes of an antique priest, Karospina +came out to them and took Gerald by the hand. He was abstracted and +haggard, and his eyes glared about him. He chanted in a monotone:-- + +"The time is at hand. Soon you will see the Angels of the Seals. I shall +show the multitude Death on the Pale Horse and the vision of Ezekiel. +And you shall behold the star called Wormwood, the great star of the +third angel, which shall fall like a burning lamp upon the waters and +turn them bitter. And at the last you will see the chariot of Elijah +caught up to heaven in a fiery whirlwind. In it will be seated the +Princess Mila--we, the conquerors of the wicked world." + +"Yes, but only as an image, an illusion," ejaculated the unhappy lover, +"not in reality." + +"As she is," imperiously answered Karospina, and seizing Mila by the +arm, said, "Come!" She threw a kiss to Gerald and in her eyes were +tears. He saw them and could have wept himself. He followed the +sacrificial pair as far as the reservoir, muttering warnings in which +were mixed the fates of Phaethon and Simon Magus--that heretic who +mimicked the miracles of the apostles. + + * * * * * + +It was now dark; the order to extinguish all lights on the moor had been +obeyed. Only a panting sound as if from a wilderness of frightened +animals betrayed the presence of thousands. As long as the sun shone +there had been a babel of sound; at the disappearance of our parent +planet, a hushed awe had fallen with the night. Gone the rude joking and +wrangling, the crying of children, and the shrill laughter of the women. +A bitter breeze swept across from the waters, and the stars were mere +twinkling points. + +Then from the vault of heaven darted a ribbon of emerald fire. It became +a luminous spiral when it touched the sea of glass, which was like unto +a floor of crystal. This was the sign of Karospina's undertaking, his +symbol of the road to moral perfection. Gerald recalled Whistler's +pyrotechnical extravaganzas. Following this came a pale moon which +emerged from the north; a second, a third, a fourth, started up from the +points of the compass, and after wabbling in the wind like gigantic +balloons, merged overhead in an indescribable disk which assumed the +features of Michael Angelo's Moses. Here is a new technique, indeed, +thought Gerald; yet he could not detect its moral values. + +A golden landscape was projected on land and sea. A central aisle of +waters, paved by the golden rays of a lyric sun high overhead, was +embellished on either side by the marmoreal splendours of stately +palaces. An ilex inclined its graceful head to its liquid image; men +moved the blocks that made famous in the mouth of the world Queen Dido's +Carthage. Clouds of pearl-coloured smoke encircled the enchanting +picture. And the galleys came and went in this symphonic, glittering +spectacle. + +"Turner would have died of envy," said Gerald aloud. There was a +remarkable vibration of life, not as he had seen it in mechanical +bioscopes, but the vivid life of earth and sunshine. + +The scenes that succeeded were many: episodes from profane and sacred +histories; simulacra of the great saints. A war between giants and +pygmies was shown with all its accompanying horrors. The firmament +dripped crimson. The four cryptic creatures of Ezekiel's vision came out +of the north, a great cloud of "infolding fire" and the colour was +amber. A cyclopean and dazzling staircase thronged by moving angelic +shapes, harping mute harps, stretched from sea to sky, melting into the +milky way like the tail of a starry serpent. Followed the opening of the +dread prophetic seals; but, after an angel had descended from heaven, +his face as the sun and at his feet pillars of fire, the people, +prostrate like stalks of corn beaten by a tempest, worshipped in fear. +These things were supernatural. The heavens were displaying the glory of +God. + +Not knowing whether the signs in the skies might be construed as +blasphemous, and lost in fathomless admiration for the marvellous power +of the wizard, Gerald sought to get closer to Karospina and Mila. But +wedged in by uniformed men, and the darkness thick as an Egyptian +plague, he despairingly awaited the apotheosis. His eyes were sated by +the miracles of harmonies--noiseless harmonies. It _was_ a new art, and +one for the peoples of the earth. Never had the hues of the universe +been so assembled, grouped, and modulated. And the human eye, adapting +itself to the new synthesis of arabesque and rhythm, evoked order and +symbolism from these novel chords of colour. There were solemn mountains +of opalescent fire which burst and faded into flaming colonnades, and in +an enchanting turquoise effervescence became starry spears and scimiters +and sparkling shields, and finally the whole mass would reunite and +evaporate into brilliant violet auroras or seven-tailed, +vermilion-coloured comets. There were gleaming rainbows of unknown +tints--strange scales of chromatic pigments; "a fiery snow without +wind;" and once a sun, twice the size of our own, fell into the ocean; +and Gerald could have sworn that he felt a wave of heated air as if from +a furnace; that he heard a seething sound, as if white-hot metal had +come in contact with icy water. Consumed by anxiety for Mila's safety, +he wished that these soundless girandoles, this apocalypse of +architectural fire and weaving flame, would end. + +He had not long to wait. A shrewd hissing apprised him that something +unusual was about to occur. Like the flight of a great rocket a black +object quickly mounted to the zenith. It did not become visible for +several seconds; Gerald's nerves crisped with apprehension. The +apparition was an incandescent chariot; in it sat Karospina, and beside +him--oh! the agony of her lover--Mila Georgovics. As the fiery horses +swooped down, he could see her face in a radiant nimbus of meteors, +which encircled the equipage. Karospina proudly directed its course over +the azure route, and once he passed Gerald at a dangerously low curve +earthward, shouting:-- + +"The Spiral! The Spiral!" + +It was his last utterance; possibly through some flaw in the mechanism, +the chariot zig-zagged and then drove straight upon the reservoir. To +the reverberation of smashed steel and blinding fulguration the big +sphere was split open and Mila with Karospina vanished in the nocturnal +gulf. + +Gerald, stunned by the catastrophe, threw himself down, expecting a +mighty explosion; the ebon darkness was appalling after the +scintillating rain of fire. But the liberated gas in the guise of an +elongated cloud had rushed seaward, and there gathering density and +strength, assumed the shape of a terrific funnel, an inky spiral, its +gyrating sides streaked with intermittent flashes. Its volcanic roaring +and rapid return to land was a signal for vain flight--the miserable +lover knew it to be the flamboyant ether of the pyromaniac transformed +into a trumpeting tornado. And he hoped that it would not spare him, as +this phantasm twirled and ululated in the heavens, a grim portent of the +iron wrath of the Almighty. In a twinkling it had passed him, high in +the dome of heaven, only to erase in a fabulous blast the moaning +multitude. And prone upon the strand between the stormy waters and the +field of muddy dead, Gerald Shannon prayed for a second cataclysm which +might bring oblivion to him alone. + + + + +VI + +A MOCK SUN + + Where are the sins of yester-year? + + +I + + +The grating of the carriage wheels awoke her from the dream which had +lightly brushed away the night and the vision of the Arc de +Triomphe--looming into the mystery of sky and stars, its monumental +flanks sprawling across the Place de l'Étoile. She heard her name called +by Mrs. Sheldam as their coachman guided his horses through the gateway +of the Princesse de Lancovani's palace. + +"Now, Ermentrude! Wake up, dear; we are there," said Mrs. Sheldam, in +her kind, drawling tones. Mr. Sheldam sighed and threw away the +unlighted cigar he had bitten during the ride along the Champs Élysées. +Whatever the evening meant for his wife and niece, he saw little +entertainment in store for himself; he did not speak French very well, +he disliked music and "tall talk"; all together he wished himself at the +Grand Hôtel, where he would be sure to meet some jolly Americans. Their +carriage had halted in front of a spacious marble stairway, lined on +either side with palms, and though it was a June night, the glass doors +were closed. + +Ermentrude's heart was in her throat, not because of the splendour, to +which she was accustomed; but it was to be her first meeting with a +noble dame, whose name was historic, at whose feet the poets of the +Second Empire had prostrated themselves, passionately plucking their +lyres; the friend of Liszt, Wagner, Berlioz, of Manet, Degas, Monet; the +new school--this wonderful old woman knew them all, from Goncourt and +Flaubert to Daudet and Maupassant. Had she not, Ermentrude remembered as +she divested herself of her cloak, sent a famous romancer out of the +house because he spoke slightingly of the Pope? Had she not cut the +emperor dead when she saw him with a lady not his empress? What a night +this would be in the American girl's orderly existence! And _he_ was to +be there, he had promised the princess. + +Her heart was overflowing when she was graciously received by the great +lady who stood in the centre of a group at the back of the +drawing-room--a lofty apartment in white and gold, the panels painted by +Baudry, the furniture purest Empire. She noted the height and majestic +bearing of this cousin of kings, noted the aquiline nose drooped over a +contracted mouth--which could assume most winning curves, withal shaded +by suspicious down, that echoed in hue her inky eyebrows. The eyes of +the princess were small and green and her glance penetrating. Her white +hair rolled imperially from a high, narrow forehead. + +Ermentrude bore herself with the utmost composure. She adored the Old +World, adored genius, but after all she was an Adams of New Hampshire, +her sister the wife of a former ambassador. It was more curiosity than +_gaucherie_ that prompted her to hold the hand offered her and +scrutinize the features as if to evoke from the significant, etched +wrinkles the tremendous past of this hostess. The princess was pleased. + +"Ah, Miss Adams," she said, in idiomatic English, "you have candid eyes. +You make me feel like telling stories when you gaze at me so +appealingly. Don't be shocked"--the girl had coloured--"perhaps I shall, +after a while." + +Mr. Sheldam had slipped into a corner behind a very broad table and +under the shaded lamps examined some engravings. Mrs. Sheldam talked in +hesitating French to the Marquis de Potachre, an old fellow of venerable +and burlesque appearance. His fierce little white mustaches were curled +ceilingward, but his voice was as timid as honey. He flourished his +wizened hand toward Miss Adams. + +"Charming! Delightful! She has something English in her _insouciant_ +pose, and is wholly American in her cerebral quality. And what +colouring, what gorgeous brown hair! What a race, madame, is yours!" + +Mrs. Sheldam began to explain that the Adams stock was famous, but the +marquis did not heed her. He peered at her niece through a gold-rimmed +monocle. The princess had left the group near the table and with two +young men slowly moved down the salon. Miss Adams was immediately +surrounded by some antiquated gentlemen wearing orders, who paid her +compliments in the manner of the eighteenth century. She answered them +with composure, for she was sure of her French, sure of herself--the +princess had not annihilated her. Her aunt, accompanied by the marquis, +crossed to her, and the old nobleman amused her with his saturnine +remarks. + +"Time was," he said, "when one met here the cream of Parisian wit and +fashion: the great Flaubert, a noisy fellow at times, I vow; Dumas +_fils_; Cabanel, Gérôme, Duran; ever-winning Carolus--ah, what men! Now +we get Polish pianists, crazy Belgians, anarchistic poets, and +Neo-impressionists. I have warned the princess again and again." + +"_Bécasse!_" interrupted the lady herself. "Monsieur Rajewski has +consented to play a Chopin nocturne. And here are my two painters, Miss +Adams--Messieurs Bla and Maugre. They hate each other like the Jesuits +and Jansenists of the good old days of Pascal." + +"She likes to display her learning," grumbled the marquis to Mrs. +Sheldam. "That younger man, Bla, swears by divided tones; his neighbour, +Maugre, paints in dots. One is always to be recognized a half-mile away +by his vibrating waterscapes--he calls them Symphonies of the Wet; the +other goes in for turkeys in the grass, fowls that are cobalt-blue +daubs, with grass a scarlet. It's awful on the optic nerves. +_Pointillisme_, Maugre names his stuff. Now, give me Corot--" + +"Hush, hush!" came in energetic sibilants from the princess, who rapped +with her Japanese walking-stick for silence. Mr. Sheldam woke up and +fumbled the pictures as Rajewski, slowly bending his gold-dust aureole +until it almost grazed the keyboard, began with deliberate accents a +nocturne. Miss Adams knew his playing well, but its poetry was not for +her this evening; rather did the veiled tones of the instrument form a +misty background to the human tableau. So must Chopin have woven his +magic last century, and in a salon like this--the wax candles burning +with majestic steadiness in the sculptured sconces; the huge fireplace, +monumental in design, with its dull brass garnishing; the subdued +richness of the decoration into which fitted, as figures in a frame, the +various guests. Even the waxed floor seemed to take on new +reverberations as the pianoforte sounded the sweet despair of the Pole. +To her dismay Ermentrude caught herself drifting away from the moment's +hazy charm to thoughts of her poet. It annoyed her, she sharply +reminded herself, that she could not absolutely saturate herself with +the music and the manifold souvenirs of the old hôtel; perhaps this may +have been the spell of Rajewski's playing.... + +The music ceased. A dry voice whispered in her ear:-- + +"Great artist, that chap Rajewski. Had to leave Russia once because he +wouldn't play the Russian national hymn for the Czar. Bless me, but he +was almost sent to Siberia--and in irons too. Told me here in this very +room that he was much frightened. They lighted fires in Poland to honour +his patriotism. He acknowledged that _he_ would have played twenty +national hymns, but he couldn't remember the Russian one, or never knew +it--anyhow, he was christened a patriot, and all by a slip of the +memory. Now, that's luck, isn't it?" + +She began to dislike this cynical old man with his depreciating tales of +genius. She knew that her idols often tottered on clay feet, but she +hated to be reminded of that disagreeable reality. She went to Monsieur +Rajewski and thanked him prettily in her cool new voice, and again the +princess nodded approval. + +"She is _chic_, your little girl," she confided in her deep tones to +Mrs. Sheldam, whose tired New England face almost beamed at the +compliment. + +"We were in Hamburg at the Zoölogical Garden; I always go to see +animals," declaimed the princess, in the midst of a thick silence. "For +you know, my friends, one studies humanity there in the raw. Well, I +dragged our party to the large monkey cage, and we enjoyed +ourselves--immensely! And what do you think we saw! A genuine novelty. +Some mischievous sailor had given an overgrown ape a mirror, and the +poor wretch spent its time staring at its image, neglecting its food and +snarling at its companions. The beast would catch the reflection of +another ape in the glass and quickly bound to a more remote perch. The +keeper told me that for a week his charge had barely eaten. It slept +with the mirror held tightly in its paws. Now, what did the mirror mean +to the animal! I believe"--here she became very vivacious--"I really +believe that it was developing self-consciousness, and in time it would +become human. On our way back from Heligoland, where we were entertained +on the emperor's yacht at the naval manœuvres, we paid another visit to +our monkey house. The poor, misguided brute had died of starvation. It +had become so vain, so egotistical, so superior, that it refused food +and wasted away in a corner, gazing at itself, a hairy Narcissus, or +rather the perfect type of your modern Superman, who contemplates his +ego until his brain sickens and he dies quite mad." + +Every one laughed. Mrs. Sheldam wondered what a Superman was, and +Ermentrude felt annoyed. Zarathustra was another of her gods, and this +brusquely related anecdote did not seem to her very spirituelle. But +she had not formulated an answer when she heard a name announced, a name +that set her heart beating. At last! The poet had kept his word. She was +to meet in the flesh the man whose too few books were her bibles of art, +of philosophy, of all that stood for aspiration toward a lovely ideal in +a dull, matter-of-fact world. + +"Now," said the princess, as if smiling at some hidden joke, "now you +will meet _my_ Superman." And she led the young American girl to Octave +Kéroulan and his wife, and, after greeting them in her masculine manner, +she burst forth:-- + +"Dear poet! here is one of your adorers from overseas. Guard your +husband well, Madame Lys." + +So he was married. Well, that was not such a shocking fact. Nor was +Madame Kéroulan either--a very tall, slim, English-looking blonde, who +dressed modishly and evidently knew that she was the wife of a famous +man. Ermentrude found her insipid; she had studied her face first before +comparing the mental photograph of the poet with the original. Nor did +she feel, with unconscious sex rivalry, any sense of inferiority to the +wife of her admired one. He was nearly forty, but he looked older; gray +hairs tinged his finely modelled head. His face was shaven, and with the +bulging brow and full jaw he was more of the German or Belgian than +French. Black hair thrown off his broad forehead accented this +resemblance; a composer rather than a prose-poet and dramatist, was the +rapid verdict of Ermentrude. She was not disappointed, though she had +expected a more fragile type. The weaver of moonshine, of mystic +phrases, of sweet gestures and veiled sonorities should not have worn +the guise of one who ate three meals a day and slept soundly after his +mellow incantations. Yet she was not--inheriting, as she did, a modicum +of sense from her father--disappointed. + +The conversation did not move more briskly with the entrance of the +Kéroulans. The marquis sullenly gossiped with Mr. Sheldam; the princess +withdrew herself to the far end of the room with her two painters. +Rajewski was going to a _soirée_, he informed them, where he would play +before a new picture by Carrière, as it was slowly undraped; no one less +in rank than a duchess would be present! A little stiffly, Ermentrude +Adams assured the Kéroulans of her pleasure in meeting them. The poet +took it as a matter of course, simply, without a suspicion of posed +grandeur. Ermentrude saw this with satisfaction. If he had clay +feet,--and he must have them; all men do,--at least he wore his genius +with a sense of its responsibility. She held tightly her hands and +leaned back, awaiting the precious moment when the oracle would speak, +when this modern magician of art would display his cunning. But he was +fatuously commonplace in his remarks. + +"I have often told Madame Kéroulan that my successes in Europe do not +appeal to me as those in far-away America. Dear America--how it must +enjoy a breath of real literature!" + +Mrs. Sheldam sat up primly, and Ermentrude was vastly amused. With a +flash of fun she replied:-- + +"Yes, America does, Monsieur Kéroulan. We have so many Europeans over +there now that our standard has fallen off from the days of Emerson and +Whitman. And didn't America give Europe Poe?" She knew that this boast +had the ring of the amateur, but it pleased her to see how it startled +him. + +"America is the Great Bribe," he pursued. "You have no artists in New +York." + +"Nor have we New Yorkers," the girl retorted. "The original writing +natives live in Europe." + +He looked puzzled, but did not stop. "You have depressed literature to +the point of publication," he solemnly asserted. This was too much and +she laughed in mockery. Husband and wife joined her, while Mrs. Sheldam +trembled at the audacity of her niece--whose irony was as much lost on +her as it was on the poet. + +"But _you_ publish plays and books, do you not?" Ermentrude naïvely +asked. + +Madame Kéroulan interposed in icy tones:-- + +"Mademoiselle Adams misunderstands. Monsieur Kéroulan is the Grand +Disdainer. Like his bosom friend, Monsieur Mallarmé, he cares little for +the Philistine public--" + +He interrupted her: "Lys, dear friend, you must not bore Miss Adams with +my theories of art and life. _She_ has read me--" + +Ermentrude gave him a grateful glance. He seemed, despite his +self-consciousness, a great man--how great she could not exactly define. +His eyes--two black diamonds full of golden reflections, the eyes of a +conqueror, a seer--began to burn little bright spots into her +consciousness, and, selfishly, she admitted, she wished the two women +would go away and leave her to interrogate her idol in peace. There were +so many things to ask him, so many difficult passages in The Golden +Glaze and Hesitations, above all in that great dramatic poem, The +Voices, which she had witnessed in Paris, with its mystic atmosphere of +pity and terror. She would never forget her complex feelings, when at a +Paris theatre, she saw slowly file before her in a Dream-Masque the +wraith-like figures of the poet, their voices their only corporeal gift. +Picture had dissolved into picture, and in the vapours of these crooning +enchantments she heard voices of various timbres enunciating in +monosyllables the wisdom of the ages, the poetry of the future. This +play was, for her, and for Paris, too, the last word in dramatic art, +the supreme _nuance_ of beauty. Everything had been accomplished: +Shakespeare, Molière, Ibsen; yet here was a new evocation, a fresh peep +at untrodden paths. In bliss that almost dissolved her being, the +emotional American girl reached her hotel, where she tried to sleep. +When her aunt told her of the invitation tendered by the princess, a +rare one socially, she was in the ninth heaven of the Swedenborgians. +Any place to meet Octave Kéroulan! + +And now he sat near her signalling, she knew, her sympathies, and as the +fates would have it two dragons, her aunt and his wife, guarded the +gateway to the precious garden of his imagination. She could have cried +aloud her chagrin. Such an inestimable treasure was genius that to see +it under lock and key invited indignation. The time was running on, and +her great man had said nothing. He could, if he wished, give her a +million extraordinary glimpses of the earth and the air and the waters +below them, for his eyes were mirrors of his marvellous and +many-coloured soul; but what chance had he with a conjugal iceberg on +one side, a cloud of smoke--poor Aunt Sheldam--on the other! She felt in +her fine, rhapsodic way like a young priestess before the altar, ready +to touch with a live coal the lips of the gods, but withheld by a +malignant power. For the first time in her life Ermentrude Adams, +delicately nurtured in a social hothouse, realized in wrath the major +tyranny of caste. + +The evening wore away. Mrs. Sheldam aroused her husband as she cast a +horrified glance at the classic prints he had been studying. The +princess dismissed her two impressionists and came over to the poet. +She, too plainly, did not care for his wife, and as the party broke up +there was a sense of relief, though Ermentrude could not conceal her +dissatisfaction. Her joy was sincere when Madame Kéroulan asked Miss +Adams and her aunt to call. It was slightly gelid, the invitation, +though accepted immediately by Ermentrude. The _convenances_ could look +out for themselves; she would not go back to America without an +interview. The princess raised her hand mockingly. + +"What, I go to one of your conferences! Not I, _cher poète_. Keep your +mysteries for your youthful disciples." She looked at Ermentrude, who +did not lower her eyes--she was triumphant now. Perhaps _he_ might say +something before they parted. He did not, but the princess did. + +"Beware, young America, of my Superman! You remember the story of the +ape with the mirror!" + +Ermentrude flushed with mortification. This princess was decidedly rude +at times. But she kept her temper and thanked the lady for a unique +evening. Her exquisite youth and grace pleased the terrible old woman, +who then varied her warning. + +"Beware," she called out in comical accents as they slowly descended the +naked marble staircase, "of the Sleeping Princess!" + +The American girl looked over her shoulder. + +"I don't think your Superman has a mirror at all." + +"Yes, but his princess holds one for him!" was the jesting reply. + +The carriage door slammed. They rolled homeward, and Ermentrude suffered +from a desperate sense of the unachieved. The princess had been +impertinent, the Kéroulans rather banal. Mrs. Sheldam watched her +charge's face in the intermittent lights of the Rue de Rivoli. + +"I think your poet a bore," she essayed. Then she shook her +husband--they had reached their hôtel. + + +II + +It was the garden of a poet, she declared, as, with the Kéroulans and +her aunt, Ermentrude sat and slowly fanned herself, watching the Bois de +Boulogne, which foamed like a cascade of green opposite this pretty +little house in Neuilly. The day was warm and the drive, despite the +shaded, watered avenues, a dusty, fatiguing one. Mrs. Sheldam had, +doubtfully, it is true, suggested the bourgeois comfort of the +Métropolitain, but she was frowned on by her enthusiastic niece. What! +ride underground in such weather? So they arrived at the poet's not in +the best of humour, for Mrs. Sheldam had quietly chidden her charge on +the score of her "flightiness." These foreign celebrities were well +enough in their way, but--! And now Ermentrude, instead of looking +Octave Kéroulan in the face, preferred the vista of the pale blue sky, +awash with a scattered, fleecy white cloud, the rolling edges of which +echoed the dazzling sunshine. The garden was not large, its few trees +were of ample girth, and their shadows most satisfying to eyes weary of +the city's bright, hard surfaces. There were no sentimental plaster +casts to disturb the soft harmonies of this walled-in retreat, and if +Ermentrude preferred to regard with obstinacy unusual in her mobile +temperament the picture of Paris below them, it was because she felt +that Kéroulan was literally staring at her. + +A few moments after their arrival and with the advent of tea, he had +accomplished what she had fervently wished for the night she had met +him--he succeeded, by several easy moves, in isolating her from her +aunt, and, notwithstanding her admiration, her desire to tap with her +knuckles the metal of her idol and listen for a ring of hollowness, she +was alarmed. Yet, perversely, she knew that he would not exhibit his +paces before his wife--naturally a disinterested spectator--or before +her aunt, who was hardly "intimate" enough. The long-desired hour found +her disquieted. She did not have many moments to analyze these mixed +emotions, for he spoke, and his voice was agreeably modulated. + +"You, indeed, honour the poor poet's abode with your youth and your +responsive soul, Miss Adams. I thank you, though my gratitude will seem +as poor as my hospitality." She looked at him now, a little fluttered. +"You bring to me across seas the homage of a fresh nation, a fresh +nature." She beat a mental retreat at these calm, confident phrases; +what could he know of her homage? "And if Amiel has said, 'Un paysage +est un état de l'âme,' I may amend it by calling _my_ soul a state of +landscape, since it has been visited by your image." This was more +reassuring, if exuberant. + +"Man is mere inert matter when born, but his soul is his own work. +Hence, I assert: the Creator of man is--man." _Now_ she felt at ease. +This wisdom, hewn from the vast quarry of his genius, she had +encountered before in his Golden Glaze, that book which had built +temples of worship in America wherein men and women sought and found the +pabulum for living beautifully. He was "talking" his book. Why not? It +was certainly delightful plagiarism! + +"You know, dear young lady," he continued, and his eyes, with their +contracting and expanding disks, held her attention like a clear flame, +"do you know that my plays, my books, are but the drama of my conscience +exteriorized? Out of the reservoirs of my soul I draw my inspiration. I +have an æsthetic horror of evidence; like Renan, I loathe the deadly +heresy of affirmation; I have the certitude of doubt, for are we poets +not the lovers of the truth decorated? When I built my lordly palace of +art, it was not with the ugly durability of marble. No; like the +Mohammedan who constructed his mosque and mingled with the cement +sweet-smelling musk, so I dreamed my mosque into existence with music +wedded to philosophy. Music and philosophy are the twin edges of my +sword. Ah! you smile and ask, Where is Woman in this sanctuary? She is +not barred, I assure you. My music--is Woman. Beauty is a promise of +happiness, Stendhal says. I go further: Life--the woman one has; +Art--the woman one loves!" + +She was startled. Her aunt and Madame Kéroulan had retired to the end of +the garden, and only a big bee, brumming overhead, was near. He had +arisen with the pontifical air of a man who has a weighty gospel to +expound. He encircled with his potent personality the imagination of his +listener; the hypnotic quality of his written word was carried leagues +farther in effect by his trained, soothing voice. Flattered, no longer +frightened, her nerves deliciously assaulted by this coloured rhetoric, +Ermentrude yielded her intellectual assent. She did not comprehend. She +felt only the rhythms of his speech, as sound swallowed sense. He held +her captive with a pause, and his eloquent eyes--they were of an +extraordinary lustre--completed the subjugation of her will. + +"Only kissed hands are white," he murmured, and suddenly she felt a +velvety kiss on her left hand. Ermentrude did not pretend to follow the +words of her aunt and Madame Kéroulan as they stopped before a bed of +June roses. Nor did she remember how she reached the pair. The one vivid +reality of her life was the cruel act of her idol. She was not conscious +of blushing, nor did she feel that she had grown pale. His wife treated +her with impartial indifference, at times a smile crossing her face, +with its implication--to Ermentrude--of selfish reserves. But this +hateful smile cut her to the soul--one more prisoner at his chariot +wheels, it proclaimed! Kéroulan was as unconcerned as if he had written +a poetic line. He had expected more of an outburst, more of a rebuff; +the absolute snapping of the web he had spun surprised him. His choicest +music had been spread for the eternal banquet, but the invited one +tarried. Very well! If not to-day, to-morrow! He repeated a verse of +Verlaine, and with his wife dutifully at his side bowed to the two +Americans and told them of the pleasure experienced. Ermentrude, her +candid eyes now reproachful and suspicious, did not flinch as she took +his hand--it seemed to melt in hers--but her farewell was conventional. +In the street, before they seated themselves in their carriage, Mrs. +Sheldam shook her head. + +"Oh, my dear! What a woman! What a man! I have _such_ a story to tell +you. No wonder you admire these people. The wife is a genius--isn't she +handsome?--but the man--he is an angel!" + +"I didn't see his wings, auntie," was the curt reply. + + +III + +The Sheldams always stayed at the same hôtel during their annual visits +to Paris. It was an old-fashioned house with an entrance in the Rue +Saint-Honoré and another in the Rue de Rivoli. The girl sat on a small +balcony from which she could view the Tuileries Gardens without turning +her head; while looking farther westward she saw the Place de la +Concorde, its windy spaces a chessboard for rapid vehicles, whose +wheels, wet from the watered streets, ground out silvery fire in the +sun-rays of this gay June afternoon. Where the Avenue des Champs Élysées +began, a powdery haze enveloped the equipages, overblown with their +summer toilets, all speeding to Longchamps. It was racing day, and +Ermentrude, feigning a headache, had insisted that her uncle and aunt go +to the meeting. It would amuse them, she knew, and she wished to be +alone. Nearly a week had passed since the visit to Neuilly, and she had +been afraid to ask her aunt what Madame Kéroulan had imparted to +her--afraid and also too proud. Her sensibility had been grievously +wounded by the plainly expressed feelings of Octave Kéroulan. She had +reviewed without prejudice his behaviour, and she could not set down to +mere Latin gallantry either his words or his action. No, there was too +much intensity in both,--ah, how she rebelled at the brutal +disillusionment!--and there were, she argued, method and sequence in his +approach and attack. If she had been the average coquetting creature, +the offence might not have been so mortal. But, so she told herself +again and again,--as if to frighten away lurking darker thoughts, ready +to spring out and devour her good resolutions,--she had worshipped her +idol with reservations. His poetry, his philosophy, were so inextricably +blended that they smote her nerves like the impact of some bright +perfume, some sharp chord of modern music. Dangerously she had filed at +her emotions in the service of culture and she was now paying the +penalty for her ardent confidence. His ideas, vocal with golden +meanings, were never meant to be translated into the vernacular of life, +never to be transposed from higher to lower levels; this base betrayal +of his ideals she felt Kéroulan had committed. Had he not said that love +should be like "un baiser sur un miroir"? Was he, after all, what the +princess had called him? And was he only a mock sun swimming in a +firmament of glories which he could have outshone? + +A servant knocked and, not receiving a response, entered with a letter. +The superscription was strange. She opened and read:-- + + DEAR AND TENDER CHILD: I know you were angry with me when + we parted. I am awaiting here below your answer to come to you and + bare my heart. Say yes! + +"Is the gentleman downstairs?" she asked. The servant bowed. The blood +in her head buzzing, she nodded, and the man disappeared. Standing there +in the bright summer light, Ermentrude Adams saw her face in the oval +glass, above the fireplace, saw its pallor, the strained expression of +the eyes, and like a drowning person she made a swift inventory of her +life, and, with the insane hope of one about to be swallowed up by the +waters, she grasped at a solitary straw. Let him come; she would have an +explanation from him! The torture of doubt might then be brought to an +end.... + +Some one glided into the apartment. Turning quickly, Ermentrude +recognized Madame Kéroulan. Before she could orient herself that lady +took her by both hands, and uttering apologetic words, forced the amazed +girl into a chair. + +"Don't be frightened, dear young lady. I am not here to judge, but to +explain. Yes, I know my husband loves you. But do not believe in him. He +is a _terrific_ man." This word she emphasized as if doubtful of its +meaning. "Ah, if you but knew the inferno of my existence! There are so +many like you--stop, do not leave! You are not to blame. I, Lillias +Kéroulan, do not censure your action. My husband is an evil man and a +charlatan. Hear me out! He has only the gift of words. He steals all his +profundities of art from dead philosophers. He is not a genuine poet. He +is not a dramatist. I swear to you that he is now the butt of artistic +Paris. The Princesse de Lancovani made him--she is another of his sort. +He _was_ the mode; now he is desperate because his day has passed. He +knows you are rich. He desires your money, not _you_. I discovered that +he was coming here this day. Oh, I am cleverer than he. I followed. Here +I am to save you from him--and from yourself--he is not now below in the +salon." + +"Please go away!" indignantly answered Ermentrude. She was furious at +this horrible, plain-spoken, jealous creature. Save her from herself--as +if ever she had wavered! The disinterested adoration she had entertained +for the great artist--what a hideous ending was this! The tall, blond +woman with the narrow, light blue eyes watched the girl. How could any +one call her handsome, Ermentrude wondered! Then her visitor noticed the +crumpled letter on the table. With a gesture of triumph she secured it +and smiling her superior smile she left, closing the door softly behind +her. + +Only kissed hands are white! Ermentrude threw herself on the couch, her +cheeks burning, her heart tugging in her bosom like a ship impatient at +its anchorage. And was this the sordid end of a beautiful dream?... + +"Do you know, dearest, we have had such news!" exclaimed Mrs. Sheldam as +she entered, and so charged with her happiness that she did not notice +the drawn features of her niece. "Charlie, Charlie will be here some +time next week. He arrives at Havre. He has just cabled his father. Let +us go down to meet the boy." Charlie was the only son of the Sheldams +and fonder of his cousin than she dare tell herself. She burst into +tears, which greatly pleased her aunt. + +In the train, eight days later, Ermentrude sat speechless in company +with her aunt and uncle. But as the train approached Havre she +remembered something. + +"Aunt Clara," she bravely asked, "do you recall the afternoon we spent +at the Kéroulans'? What did Madame Kéroulan tell you then? Is it a +secret?" She held tightly clenched in her hand the arm-rest at the side +of the compartment. + +"Oh, dear, no! The madame was very chatty, very communicative. It's +funny I've not told you before. She confessed that she was the happiest +woman on earth; not only was she married to a grand genius,--for the +life of me I can't see where _that_ comes in!--but he was a good man +into the bargain. It appears that his life is made weary by women who +pester him with their attentions. Even our princess--yes, _the_ +princess; isn't it shocking?--was a perfect nuisance until Mr. Kéroulan +assured her that, though he owed much of his success in the world to +her, yet he would never betray the trust reposed in him by his wife. +What's the matter, dear, does the motion of the car affect you? It +_does_ rock! And _he_ shows her all the letters he gets from silly women +admirers--oh, these foreign women and their queer ways! And he tells her +the way they make up to him when he meets them in society." + +Ermentrude shivered. The princess also! And with all her warning about +the Superman! Now she understood. Then she took the hand of Mrs. +Sheldam, and, stroking it, whispered:-- + +"Auntie, I'm so glad I am going to Havre, going to see Charlie soon." +The lids of her eyes were wet. Mrs. Sheldam had never been so motherly. + +"You _are_ a darling!" she answered, as she squeezed Ermentrude's arm. +"But there is some one who doesn't seem to care much for Havre." She +pointed out Mr. Sheldam, who, oblivious of picturesque Normandy through +which the train was speeding, slept serenely. Ermentrude envied him his +repose. He had never stared into the maddening mirror which turned poets +into Supermen and--sometimes monsters. Had she herself not gazed into +this distorting glass? The tune of her life had never sounded so +discouragingly faint and inutile. Perhaps she did not posses the higher +qualities that could extort from a nature so rich and various as Octave +Kéroulan's its noblest music! Perhaps his wife had told the truth to +Mrs. Sheldam and had lied to her! And then, through a merciful mist of +tears, Ermentrude saw Havre, saw her future. + + + + +VII + +ANTICHRIST + + To wring from man's tongue the denial of his existence is proof of + Satan's greatest power.--PÈRE RAVIGNAN. + + +The most learned man and the most lovable it has been my good fortune to +know is Monsignor Anatole O'Bourke--alas! I should write, was, for his +noble soul is gathered to God. I met him in Paris, when I was a music +student. He sat next to me at a Pasdeloup concert in the Cirque d'Hiver, +how many years ago I do not care to say. A casual exclamation betrayed +my nationality, and during the intermission we drifted into easy +conversation. Within five minutes he held me enthralled, did this +big-souled, large-brained Irishman from the County Tipperary. We +discussed the programme--a new symphonic poem by Rimski-Korsakoff, +Sadko, had been alternately hissed and cheered--and I soon learned that +my companion mourned a French mother and rejoiced in the loving presence +of a very Celtic father. From the former he must have inherited his +vigorous, logical intellect; the latter had evidently endowed him with a +robust, jovial temperament, coupled with a wonderful perception of +things mystical. + +After the concert we walked slowly along the line of the boulevards. It +was early May, and the wheel of green which we traversed, together with +the brilliant picture made by the crowds, put us both in a happy temper. +It was not long before Monsignor heard the confession of my ideals. He +smiled quickly when I raved of music, but the moment I drifted into the +theme of mysticism--the transposition is ever an easy one--I saw his +interest leap to meet mine. + +"So, you have read St. John of the Cross?" I nodded my head. + +"And St. Teresa, that marvellous woman? The Americans puzzle me," he +continued. "You are the most practical people on the globe and yet the +most idealistic. When I hear of a new religion, I am morally certain +that it is evolved in America." + +"A new religion!" I started. This phrase had often assailed me, both in +print and in the depths of my imagination. He divined my thought--ah! he +was a wonder-worker in the way he noted a passing _nuance_. + +"When we wear out the old one, it will be time for a new religion," he +blandly announced; "you Americans, because of your new mechanical +inventions, fancy you have free entry into the domain of the spiritual. +But come, my dear young friend. Here is my hôtel. Can't I invite you to +dinner?" We had reached the Boulevard Malsherbe and, as I was miles out +of my course, I consented. The priest fascinated me with his erudition, +which swam lightly on the crest of his talk. He was, so I discovered +during the evening, particularly well versed in the mystical writers, in +the writings of the Kabbalists and the books of the inspired Northman, +Swedenborg. As we sat drinking our coffee at one of the little tables in +the spacious courtyard, I revived the motive of a new religion. + +"Monsignor, have you ever speculated on the possible appearance of a +second Mahomet, a second Buddha? What if, from some Asiatic jungle, +there sallied out upon Europe a terrible ape-god, a Mongolian with +exotic eyes and the magnetism of a religious madman--" + +"You are speaking of Antichrist?" he calmly questioned. + +"Antichrist! Do you really believe in the Devil's Messiah?" + +"Believe, man! why, I have _seen_ him." + +I leaned back in my chair, wondering whether I should laugh or look +solemn. He noted my indecision, and his eyes twinkled--they were the +blue-gray of the Irish, the eyes of a seer or an amiable ironist. + +"Listen! but first let us get some strong cigars. Garçon!" As we smoked +our panatelas he related this history:-- + +"You ask me if I believe in an Antichrist, thereby betraying your +slender knowledge of the Scriptures--you will pardon the liberty! I may +refer you not only to John's Epistles, to the revelations of the +dreamer of Patmos, but to so many learned doctors of the faith that it +would take a week merely to enumerate the titles of their works all +bearing on the mysterious subject. Our Holy Mother the Church has held +aloof from any doctrinal pronouncements. The Antichrist has been +predicted for the past thousand years. I recall as a boy poring over the +map of the world which a friend of my mother had left with her. This +lady my father called 'the angel with the moulting wings,' because she +was always in an ecstatic tremor over the second coming of the Messiah. +She would go to the housetop at least once every six months, and there, +with a band of pious deluded geese dressed in white flowing robes, would +inspect the firmament for favourable signs. Nothing ever happened, as we +know, yet the predictions sown about the borders of that strange-looking +chart have in a measure come true. + +"There were the grimmest and most resounding quotations from the +Apocalypse. 'Babylon is fallen, is fallen!' hummed in my ears for many a +day. And the pale horse also haunted me. What would I have given to hear +the music of that 'voice from heaven, as the voice of many waters, and +as the voice of great thunder.' I mean the 'harpers harping with their +harps' the 'new song before the throne, before the four beasts and the +elders.' It is recorded that 'no man could learn that song but the +hundred and forty _and_ four thousand, which were redeemed from the +earth.' That is a goodly multitude. Let us hope we shall be of it. +Learned Sir Thomas Browne asked what songs the sirens sang. I prefer to +hear that wonderful 'harpèd' song. + +"But I wander. The fault lies in that wondrous map of the world, with +its pictured hordes of Russians sweeping down upon Europe and America +like a plague of locusts, the wicked unbaptized Antichrist at the head +of them, waving a cross held in reversed fashion. Don't ask me the +meaning of this crazy symbolism. The sect to which my mother's friend +belonged--God bless her, for she was a dear weak-minded lady--must have +set great store by these signs. I admit that as a boy they scared me. +Sitting here now, after forty years, I can still see those cryptograms. +However, to my tale. About ten years ago I was in Paris, and in my +capacity as Monsignor I had to attend a significant gathering at the +embassy of the Russian ambassador in this city of light." He waved his +left hand, from which I caught the purple fire of amethyst. + +"It was a notable affair, and I don't mind telling you now that it was +largely political. I had just returned from a secret mission at Rome, +and I was forced to mingle with diplomatic people. Prince Wronsky was +the representative of the Czar at that time in France, a charming man +with a flavour of _diablerie_ in his speech. He was a fervent Greek +Catholic, like most of his countrymen, and it pleased him to fence +mischievously with me on the various dogmas of our respective faiths. +He called himself _the_ Catholic; I was only a Roman Catholic. I told +him I was satisfied. + +"On this particular night he was rather agitated when I made my +salutations. He whispered to me that madame the princess had that very +day presented him with a son and heir. Naturally I congratulated him. +His restlessness increased as the evening wore on. At last he beckoned +to me--we were very old friends--to follow him into his library. There +he hesitated. + +"'I want you to do me a favour, an odd one; but as you are known to me +so long I venture to ask it. Do go upstairs and see my boy--' His tone +was that of entreaty. I smiled. + +"'Dear prince, I am, as a priest, hardly a judge of children. But if you +wish it--is there anything wrong with the little chap's health?' + +"'God forbid!' he ejaculated and piously crossed himself. We went to the +first _étage_ of his palace--he was gorgeously housed--and there he +said:-- + +"'Madame is in another wing of our apartments--go in here--the child is +attended by the nurse.' With that he pushed me through a swinging door +and left me standing in a semi-lighted chamber. I was very near ill +temper, I assure you, for my position was embarrassing. The room was +large and heavily hung with tapestries. A nurse, a hag, a witch, a dark +old gypsy creature, came over to me and asked me, in Russian:-- + +"'Do you wish to see his Royal Highness the King of Earth and Heaven?' +Thinking she was some stupid _moujik's_ wife, I nodded my head +seriously, though amused by the exalted titles. She put up a thin hand +and I tiptoed to a cradle of gold and ivory--it certainly seemed so to +my inexperienced eyes--the nurse parted the curtains, and there I saw--I +saw--but my son, you will think I exaggerate--I saw the most exquisite +baby in the universe. You laugh at an old bachelor's rhapsody! In +reality I don't care much for children. But that child, that supreme +morsel of humanity, was too much for me. I stood and stared and stood +and stared, and all the while the tiny angel was smiling in my eyes, oh! +such a celestial smile. From his large blue eyes, like flowers, he +smiled into my very soul. I was chained to the floor as if by lead. +Every fibre of my soul, heart, and brain went out to that little +wanderer from the infinite. It was a pathetic face, full of suppressed +sorrow--_Dieu_! but he was older than his father. I found my mind +beginning to wander as if hypnotized. I tried to divert my gaze, but in +vain. Some subtle emanation from this extraordinary child entered my +being, and then, as if a curtain were being slowly lowered, a mist +encompassed my soul; I was ceding, I felt, the immortal part of me to +another, and all the time I was smiling at the baby and the baby +smiling back. I remember his long blond hair, parted in the middle and +falling over his shoulders; but even that remarkable trait for an infant +a few hours old did not puzzle me, for my sanity was surely being +undermined by the persistent gaze of the boy. I vaguely recall passing +my hand across my breast as if to stop the crevice through which my +personality was filtering; I was certain that my soul was about to be +stolen by that damnable child. Then the nurse dropped something, and my +thoughts came back,--they were surely on the road to hell, for they were +red and flaming when I got hold of them,--and the spell, or whatever it +was, snapped. + +"I looked up and noticed the woman maliciously smiling--if it had been +in the days of the inquisition, I would have sent her to the faggots, +for she was a hell-hag. The child had fallen back in his cradle as if +the effort of holding my attention had exhausted him. Then it struck me +that there was something unholy about this affair, and I resolutely +strode to the crib and seized the baby. + +"'What changeling is this?' I demanded in a loud voice, for the being +that twisted in my grip was two or two hundred years old. + +"'Lay him down, you monster!' clamoured the nurse, as I held the +squirming bundle by both hands. It was a task--and I'm very strong. A +superhuman strength waged against my muscles; but I was an old football +half-back at the university, so I conquered the poor little devil. It +moaned like a querulous old man; the nurse, throwing her weight upon me, +forced me to let go my hold. As I did so the baby turned on its face, +its dainty robe split wide open, and to my horror I saw on its back, +between its angelically white shoulders, burnt in as if by branding +irons, the crucifix--and _upside down_!" + +I shuddered. I knew. He lowered his voice and spoke in detached phrases. + +"It was--oh! that I live to say it--it was the dreaded Antichrist--yes, +this Russian baby--it was predicted that he would be born in Russia--I +trembled so that my robes waved in an invisible wind. The reversed +cross--the mark of the beast--the sign by which we are to know the Human +Satan--the last opponent of Christianity. I confess that I was +discomposed at the sight of this little fiend, for it meant that the red +star, the baleful star of the north, would rise in the black heavens and +bloody war spread among the nations of the earth. It also meant that +doomsday was not far off, and, good Christian as I believe myself to be, +a shiver ran down my spine at the idea of Gabriel's trump and the +resurrection of the dead. Yes, I shan't deny it--so material are the +sons of men, I among them! And the very thought of Judgment Day and its +blasting horrors withered my heart. Still something had to be done, +prophecy or no prophecy. To fulfil the letter of the law this infernal +visitor was let loose from hell. There was one way, so I grasped--" + +"Great God, Monsignor, you didn't strangle the demon?" I cried. + +"No, no--something better. I rushed over to a marble wash-basin and +seized a ewer of water, and, going back to the crib, despite the frantic +remonstrances of the old sorceress, I baptized the Antichrist in the +name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Before my eyes I +saw the inverted cross vanish. Then I soundly spanked the presumptuous +youngster and, running down the staircase, I sought the prince and said +to him:-- + +"'Your boy is now a Roman, not a Greek Catholic. We are quits!'" + +The idea of a spanked Antichrist disconsolately roaming the earth, +unwilling to return to his fiery home for fear of a scolding, his guns +of evil spiked, his virus innocuous, his mission of spiritual +destruction a failure--for what could a baptized devil's child do but +pray and repent?--all this dawned upon me, and I burst into laughter, +the worthy Monsignor discreetly participating. His bizarre recital +proved to me that, despite his Gallic first name, Monsignor Anatole +O'Bourke hailed from the County Tipperary. + + + + +VIII + +THE ETERNAL DUEL + + What is the sorriest thing that enters Hell? + + --D.G. ROSSETTI, _Vain Virtues_. + + +The face set him to a strange wondering; he sat at the coffin and +watched it. His wife's face it was, and above the sorrow of irrevocable +parting floated the thought that she did not look happy as she lay in +her bed of death. Monross had seen but two dead faces before, those of +his father and mother. Both had worn upon the mask which death models an +expression of relief. But this face, the face of his wife, of the woman +with whom he had lived--how many years! He asked himself why he +shuddered when he looked down at it, shuddered and also flushed with +indignation. Had she ever been happy? How many times had she not voiced +her feelings in the unequivocal language of love! Yet she seemed so +hideously unhappy as she stretched before him in her white robes of +death. Why? What secret was this disclosed at the twelfth hour of life, +on the very brink of the grave? Did death, then, hold the solution to +the enigma of the conquering Sphinx! + +Monross, master of psychology, tormented by visions of perfection, a +victim to the devouring illusion of the artist,--Monross asked himself +with chagrin if he had missed the key in which had sounded the symphony +of this woman's life. This woman! His wife! A female creature, +long-haired, smiling, loquacious--though reticent enough when her real +self should have flashed out signals of recognition at him--this wife, +the Rhoda he had called day and night--what had she been? + +She had understood him, had realized his nobility of ideal, his gifts, +his occasional grandeur of soul,--like all artistic men he was desultory +in the manifestation of his talent,--and had read aloud to him those +poems written for another woman in the pitch-hot passion of his +youth--before he had met her. To her he had been always, so he told +himself, a cavalier in his devotion. Without wealth, he had kept the +soles of her little feet from touching the sidewalks of life. Upon her +dainty person he had draped lovely garments. Why then, he wondered, the +vindictive expression etched, as if in aqua fortis, upon her carved +features? + +Some Old World superstition held him captive as he gazed. Death is the +grand revealer, he thought; death alone stamps upon the crumbling canvas +of mortality the truth. Rhoda was dead. Yet her face was alive for the +first time. He saw its truth; and he shuddered, for he also discerned +the hate that had lurked a life long in its devious and smiling +expressions--expressions like a set of scenery pushed on and off as the +order of the play demanded. Oh, the misery of it all! He, Monross, poet, +lover, egoist, husband, to be confronted by this damnable defiance, this +early-born hate! What had he done! And in the brain cells of the man +there awakened a processional fleet of pictures: Rhoda wooed; Rhoda +dazzled; Rhoda won; Rhoda smiling before the altar; Rhoda resigned upon +that other altar; Rhoda, wife, mother; and Rhoda--dead! + +But Rhoda loved--again he looked at the face. The brow was virginally +placid, the drooping, bitter mouth alone telling the unhappy husband a +story he had never before suspected. Rhoda! Was it possible this tiny +exquisite creature had harboured rancour in her soul for the man who had +adored her because she had adored him? Rhoda! The shell of his egoism +fell away from him. He saw the implacable resentment of this tender girl +who, her married life long, had loathed the captain that had invaded the +citadel of her soul, and conqueror-like had filched her virgin zone. The +woman seemingly stared at the man through lids closed in death--the +woman, the sex that ages ago had feared the barbarian who dragged her to +his cave, where he subdued her, making her bake his bread and bear his +children. + +In a wide heaven of surmise Monross read the confirmation of his +suspicions--of the eternal duel between the man and the woman; knew +that Rhoda hated him most when most she trembled at his master bidding. +And now Rhoda lay dead in her lyre-shaped coffin, saying these ironic +things to her husband, when it was too late for repentance, too early +for eternity. + + + + +IX + +THE ENCHANTED YODLER + + +A MARIENBAD ELEGY + +I + +The remorseless rain had washed anew the face of the dark blue sky that +domed Marienbad and its curved chain of hills. Hugh Krayne threw open +his window and, leaning out, exclaimed, as he eagerly inhaled the soft +air of an early May morning:-- + +"At last! And high time!" For nine days he had waded through the wet +streets, heavily leaping the raging gutters and stopping before the door +of every optician to scrutinize the barometer. And there are many in +this pretty Bohemian health resort, where bad weather means bad temper, +with enforced confinement in dismal lodgings or stuffy _restaurations_, +or--last resort of the bored--the promenade under the colonnade, while +the band plays as human beings shuffle ponderously over the cold stones +and stare at each other in sullen desperation. + +But this day was a glorious one; in high spirits the Englishman left the +house on the Oberkreuzbrunnenstrasse and moved slowly toward the +springs. He was not thirty, but looked much older, for his weight was +excessive. An easy-going temperament, a good appetite, a well-filled +purse, and a conscience that never disturbed his night's slumber +contributed to this making of flesh. He waddled, despite his great +height, and was sufficiently sensitive to enjoy Marienbad as much for +its fat visitors as for its curative virtues. Here at least he was not +remarkable, while in London or Paris people looked at him sourly when he +occupied a stall at the theatre or a seat in a café. Not only had he +elbow room in Marienbad, but he felt small, positively meagre, in +comparison with the prize specimens he saw painfully progressing about +the shaded walks or puffing like obese engines up the sloping roads to +the Rübezahl, the Egerländer, the Panorama, or the distant Podhorn. + +The park of the Kreuzbrunnen was crowded, though the hour of six had +just been signalled from a dozen clocks in the vicinity. The crowd, +gathered from the four quarters of the globe, was in holiday humour, as, +glass in hand, it fell into line, until each received the water doled +out by uniformed officials. Occasionally a dispute as to precedence +would take place when the serpentine procession filed up the steps of +the old-fashioned belvedere; but quarrels were as rare as a lean man. A +fat crowd is always good-tempered, irritable as may be its individual +members. Hugh Krayne kept in position, while two women shoved him about +as if he were a bale of hay. He heard them abusing him in Bohemian, a +language of which he did not know more than a few words; their +intonations told him that they heartily disliked his presence. Yet he +could not give way; it would not have been Marienbad etiquette. At last +he reached the spring and received his usual low bow from the man who +turned the polished wheel--the fellow had an eye tuned for gratuities. +With the water in his glass three-fourths cold and one-fourth warm, a +small napkin in his left hand, the Englishman moved with the jaunty +grace of a young elephant down the smooth terraced esplanade that has +made Marienbad so celebrated. The sun was riding high, and the tender +green of the trees, the flashing of the fountains, and the music of the +band all caused Hugh to feel happy. He had lost nearly a pound since his +arrival the week before, and he had three more weeks to stay. What might +not happen! + +Just where the promenade twists under the shaded alleys that lead to the +Ferdinandsbrunnen, he saw four women holding hands. They were dressed in +Tyrolean fashion--pleated skirts, short enough to show white, plump +stockings, feet in slippers, upon the head huge caps, starched and +balloony; their massive white necks, well exposed, were encircled by +collars that came low on bodices elaborately embroidered. Behind them +marched several burly chaps, in all the bravery of the Austrian +Tyrol--the green alpine hat, with the feather at the back, the short +gray jacket, the bare knees, and the homespun stockings. Krayne regarded +curiously this strolling band of singers. Their faces seemed familiar to +him, and he rapidly recalled souvenirs of Salzburg and an open-air +concert. But this morning there was something that arrested his +attention in the group. It was a girl of eighteen or twenty, with a +brilliant complexion, large blue eyes, and a robust, shapely figure. As +she passed she gave him such an imploring look, such an appealing look, +that all his chivalric instincts rushed into the field of his +consciousness. He awkwardly dropped his tumbler. He turned around, half +expecting to see the big child still looking at him. Instead he gazed +upon the athletic backs of her male companions and to the unpleasant +accompaniment of hearty feminine laughter. Were these women laughing at +him? No fool like a fat one, he merrily thought, as he bought a new +glass at a bazaar, which a grinning, monkey-faced creature sold him at +the regular price redoubled. + +Before his meagre breakfast of one egg and a dry rusk, Krayne +endeavoured to evoke the features of the pretty creature who had so +strongly attracted him. He saw a tangle of black hair, a glance that +touched his heart with its pathos, a pair of soft, parted red lips, and +dazzling teeth. It was an impression sufficiently powerful to keep him +company all the forenoon. Fat men, he reasoned on the steep pass that +conducts to the Café Forstwarte, are always sentimental, by no means +always amiable, and, as a rule, subject to sudden fancies. Ten years of +his sentimental education had been sown with adventures that had begun +well, caprices that had no satisfactory endings. He had fallen in love +with the girl who played Chopin on the piano, the girl who played +Mendelssohn on the violin, the girl who played Goltermann on the +violoncello. Then followed girls who painted, poetized, botanized, and +hammered metal. Once--an exception--he had succumbed to the charms of an +actress who essayed characters in the dumps--Ibsen soubrettes, +Strindberg servants, and Máxim Górky tramps. Yet he had, somehow or +other, emerged heart whole from his adventures among those masterpieces +of the cosmos--women. + +Certainly this might be another romance added to the long list of his +sentimental fractures. He ate his dinner, the one satisfactory meal of +the day allowed him by a cruel doctor, with the utmost deliberation. He +had walked three hours during the morning, and now, under the spacious +balconies of the Forstwarte, he knew that his beef and spinach would be +none the worse for a small bottle of very dry, light Vöslauer. Besides, +his physician had not actually forbidden him a little liquid at the +midday meal. Just before bedtime he was entitled--so his dietetic +schedule told him--to one glass of Pilsner beer. Not so bad, after all, +this banting at Marienbad, he reflected. Anyhow, it was better than the +existence of those fellows at sea-shore and mountain, who gorged and +guzzled their summer away. Then he tried to remember among his London +club friends any who were as heavy as he, but he could not. Idly +smoking, he regarded the piazzas, with their tables and groups of obese +humanity, eating, drinking, and buzzing--little fat flies, he thought, +as he drew his waistcoat in, feeling quite haughty and slender. + +He read on a placard that the "Präger Bavarian Sextet" would give a +"grand" concert at the Hotel Bellevue this very afternoon. "Ah ha!" said +Krayne aloud, "that's the girl I saw!" Then he wasted several hours more +loitering about the beautiful park on the Kaiserstrasse and looking in +the shop windows at views of Marienbad on postal cards, at +yellow-covered French, German, and Russian novels, at pictures of kings, +queens, and actresses. He also visited the houses wherein Goethe, +Chopin, and Wagner had dwelt. It was four o'clock when he entered the +garden of the Bellevue establishment and secured a table. The waiter at +his request removed the other chairs, so he had a nook to himself. Not a +very large crowd was scattered around; visitors at Marienbad do not care +to pay for their diversions. In a few minutes, after a march had been +banged from a wretched piano--were pianos ever tuned on the Continent, +he wondered?--the sextet appeared, looking as it did in the morning, and +sang an Austrian melody, a capella. It was not very interesting. + +The women stood in front and yelled with a hearty will; the men roared +in the background. Krayne saw his young lady, holding her apron by the +sides, her head thrown back, her mouth well opened; but he could not +distinguish her individual voice. How pretty she was! He sipped his +coffee. Then came a zither solo--that abominable instrument of plucked +wires, with its quiver of a love-sick clock about to run down; this +parody of an æolian harp always annoyed Krayne, and he was glad when the +man finished. A stout soprano in a velvet bodice, her arms bare and +brawny, the arms of a lass accustomed to ploughing and digging potatoes, +sang something about turtle doves. She was odious. Odious, too, was her +companion, in a duo through which they screamed and rumbled--"Verlassen +bin i." At last she came out and he saw by the programme that her name +was Röselein Gich. What an odd name, what an attractive girl! He +finished his coffee and frantically signalled his waitress. It was +against the doctor's orders to take more than one cup, and then the +sugar! Hang the doctor, he cried, and drank a second cup. + +She sang. Her voice was an unusually heavy, rich contralto. That she was +not an accomplished artiste he knew. He did not haunt opera houses for +naught, and, like all fat men who wear red ties in the forenoon, he was +a trifle dogmatic in his criticism. The young woman had the making of an +opera singer. What a Fricka, Brangaene, Ortrud, Sieglinde, Erda, this +clever girl might become! She was musical, she was dramatic in +temperament--he let his imagination run away with him. She only sang an +Oberbayerische yodel, and, while her voice was not very high, she +contrived a falsetto that made her English listener shiver. This yodel +seemed to him as thrilling as the "_Ho yo to ho!_" of Brunnhilde as she +rushes over the rocky road to Valhall. _La la liriti! La la lirita! +Hallali!_ chirped Röselein, with a final flourish that positively +enthralled Hugh Krayne. He applauded, beating with his stick upon the +table, his face flushed by emotion. Decidedly this girl was worth the +visit to Marienbad. + +And he noted with delight that Fräulein Gich had left the stage. Basket +in hand, she went from table to table, selling pictures and programmes +and collecting admission fees. At last he would be able to speak with +the enchantress, for he prided himself on the purity of his German. +Smiling until she reached his table, she suddenly became serious when +she saw this big Englishman in the plaid suit and red necktie. Again he +felt the imploring glance, the soft lips parted in childish +supplication. It was too much for his nerves. He tossed into her basket +a gold piece, grabbed at random some pictures, and as her beseeching +expression deepened, her eyes moist with wonder and gratitude, he tugged +at a ring on his corpulent finger, and, wrenching it free, presented it +to her with a well-turned phrase, adding:-- + +"Thou hast the making of a great singer in thee, Fräulein Röselein. I +wish I could help thee to fame!" + +The girl gave him an incredulous stare, then reddening, the muscles on +her full neck standing out, she ran like a hare back to her companions. +Evidently he had made an impression. The honest folk about him who +witnessed the little encounter fairly brimmed over with gossip. The +stout basso moved slowly to Krayne, who braced himself for trouble. Now +for it! he whispered to himself, and grasped his walking-stick firmly. +But, hat in hand, his visitor, a handsome blond man, approached and +thanked Hugh for his generosity. He was a lover of music, the yodler +assured him, and his wife and himself felt grateful for the interest he +displayed in Fräulein Röselein, his wife's sister. Yes, she had a +remarkable voice. What a pity--but wouldn't the gentleman attend the +concert to be given that evening up at the Café Alm? It was, to be sure, +rather far, the café, but the moon would be up and if he could find his +way there he might do the company the honour of coming back with them. + +The Fräulein would sing a lot for him--Bohemian, Tyrolean, French, and +German songs. Ah, she was versatile! The man did not speak like a +peasant, and seemed a shrewd, pleasant fellow. Hugh Krayne, in excellent +though formal German, assured the other of his pleasure and accepted the +invitation. Then he looked over at Röselein, who stood on the stage, +and as he did so she waved a crimson handkerchief at him as a friendly +sign. He took off his hat, touched significantly his own tie to indicate +a reciprocity of sentiment, and all aglow he ordered a third cup of +coffee. + +The cure could take care of itself. _Man lebt nur einmal!_ + + +II + +On his way to the Alm he met the fattest man in Marienbad, a former chef +of the German emperor, and gave him a friendly salute. He liked to see +this monster, who made the scales groan at six hundred pounds, more than +double his own weight, for it put him at ease with himself. But this +evening he felt uncomfortable. What if he were to reach such a climax in +adiposity What if in the years to come he should be compelled, as was +the unfortunate man from Berlin, to sit on a chair every five minutes, a +chair carried by an impudent boy! What--here his heart sank--if the +Fräulein should mock his size! He walked so rapidly at this idea that +other victims of rotundity stopped to look at his tall figure and nodded +approval. Ach! Marienbad was wonderful! + +After he had found a seat at the Alm next to the low wall, across which +he could see a vast stretch of undulating country, lighted by a moon +that seemed to swing like a silver hoop in the sky, Krayne ordered +Pilsner. He was fatigued by the hilly scramble and he was thirsty. Oh, +the lovely thirst of Marienbad--who that hath not been within thy +hospitable gates he knoweth it not! The magic of the night was making of +him a poet. He could see his Tyrolean friends behind the glass partition +of the little hall. There would they sing, not in the open. It was +nearly the same, for presently the windows were raised and their voices +came floating out to him, the bourdon of Röselein's organ easily +distinguishable. Love had sharpened his ears. He drained his glass and +sent for another. He felt that he was tumbling down an abyss of passion +and that nothing in the world could save him. + +The intermission! He stood up to attract the attention of Herr Johan +Präger. Röselein saw him and at once neared him, but without the basket. +This delicacy pleased Krayne very much. It showed him that he was not on +the same footing as the public. He made the girl take a seat, and though +he felt the eyes of the crowd upon him, he was not in the least +concerned. London was far away and the season was too young for the +annual rush of his compatriots. Would the Fräulein take something? She +accepted coffee, which she drank from a long glass with plenty of milk +and sugar. She again gazed at him with such a resigned expression that +he felt his starched cuffs grow warm from their contiguity to his +leaping pulses. + +"Yes, Fräulein," he said, employing the familiar _du_, "thou hast +overcome me. Why not accept my offer?" Was this the prudent Hugh Krayne +talking? She smiled sweetly and shook her head. Her voice was delicious +in colour and intonation, nor did it betray humble origin. + +"I fear, dear sir, that what you offer is impossible. My sister, the +soprano, would never hear of such a thing. My brother, her husband, +would not allow it. And I owe them my living, my education. How could I +repay them if I left them now?" she hesitated. + +"Simply enough. You would be a singer at the opera some day, and take +them all to live with you. Is there no other reason?" He recollected +with a vivid sense of the disagreeable the lively antics of a lithe +youth in the company, who, at the close of the concert, executed with +diabolic dexterity what they called a _Schuhplattltanz_. This dance had +glued Krayne's attention, for Röselein was the young tenor singer's +partner. With their wooden sabots they clattered and sang, waving wildly +their arms or else making frantic passages of pretended love and +coquetry. It upset the Englishman to see the impudence of this common +peasant fellow grasping Röselein by the waist, as he whirled her about +in the boorish dance. Hence the clause to his question. She endured his +inquiring gaze, as she simply answered:-- + +"No, there is no other reason." She put her hand on the arm of her +companion and the lights suddenly became misty, for he was of an +apoplectic tendency. They talked of music, of the opera in Vienna and +Prague. She was born in Bavaria, not more than a day's ride from +Marienbad. You could almost see her country from the top of the +Podhornberg, in the direction of the Franconian Mountains, not far from +Bayreuth. The place was called Schnabelwaid, and it was very high, very +windy. Since her tenth year she had been singing--yes, even in the +chorus at the Vienna opera, with her sister and brother. They were no +common yodlers. They could sing all the music of the day. The yodling +was part of their business, as was the costume. Later, when she had +enough saved, she would study in Vienna for grand opera! + +He was enraptured. How romantic it all was! A free-born maiden--he was +certain she was reared in some old castle--wandering about earning money +for her musical education. What a picture for a painter! What a story +for a novelist! They were interrupted. The dancer, a young man with a +heavy shock of hair growing low on his forehead, under which twinkled +beady black eyes, had been sent to tell Fräulein Röselein that her +colleagues were waiting for her. With a courtesy she went away. Krayne +now thoroughly hated the dancer. + +It was long after eleven when the concert was over and the party started +on its homeward trip. Krayne and Röselein walked behind the others, and +soon the darkness and the narrowness of the road forced him to tread +after the girl. The moon's rays at intervals pierced the foliage, +making lacelike patches of light in the gloom. At times they skirted the +edges of a circular clearing and saw the high pines fringing the +southern horizon; overhead the heavens were almost black, except where +great streams of stars swept in irregular bands. It was a glorious +sight, Krayne told Röselein--too sublime to be distracted by mere mortal +love-making, he mentally added. Nevertheless he was glad when they were +again in the woods; he could barely distinguish the girl ahead of him, +but her outline made his heart beat faster. Once, as they neared the +town, he helped her down a declivity into the roadway, and he could not +help squeezing her hand. The pressure was returned. He boldly placed her +arm within his, and they at last reached the streets, but not before, +panting with mingled fright and emotion, he solemnly kissed her. She did +not appear surprised. + +"Call me Rösie--thou!" she murmured, and her naïveté brought the ready +tears to his eyes. They made a rendezvous for the next morning on the +Promenade Platz. The only thing he did not like was the scowling face of +the dancer when he said good night to the others under the electric +lights of the Kreuzbrunnen. He was correct, then, in his premonition. + +That night Hugh Krayne dreamed he was a very skeleton for thinness--not +an unusual vision of fat men--and also a Tyrolean yodler, displaying +himself before a huge audience of gigantic human beings, who laughed so +loudly that he could not open his lips to frame the familiar words of +his song. In the despair of a frantic nightmare, his face streaming with +anguished tears, he forced his voice:-- + +_La, la, liriti! La, la, larita! Hallali!_ Then he awoke in triumph. Was +he not a yodler? + + +III + +He told her of his dream and strange ambition. She did not discourage +him. It could be settled easily enough. Why not join the company and +take a few lessons? "With such a teacher?" he had exclaimed, and his +gesture was so impassioned that the promenaders, with their shining +morning goblets of water, were arrested by the spectacle. Wonderful, +wonderful Marienbad! was the general comment! But Krayne was past +ridicule. He already saw Röselein his bride. He saw himself a yodler. +The cure? Ay, there was the rub. He laid bare his heart. She aided him +with her cool advice. She was very sensible. Her brother-in-law and her +sister would welcome him in their household, for he was a lover of music +and his intentions were honourable. Of course, he sighed, of course, and +fingered his red tie. Why not, she argued, remain at Marienbad for three +weeks more and complete his cure? Anyhow, he was not so stout! She +looked up at him archly. Again he saw mist. + +That settled it. For another three weeks he lived in a cloud of +expectation, of severe training, long walks, dieting, and Turkish baths. +No man worked harder. And he was rewarded by seeing his flesh melt away +a pound or two daily. When the company returned after its itinerary in +the neighbourhood Rösie was surprised to meet a man who did not weigh +much over two hundred pounds, healthy, vigorous, and at least five years +younger in appearance. She was very much touched. So was her sister. +There was a family consultation, and despite the surly opposition of the +dancer, Hugh Krayne was welcomed as a member of the Präger Bavarian +Sextette company. Forgetting the future he had arranged for Rösie, he +began his vocal lessons immediately. + +In July he sang for the first time in public at Eger. He was extremely +frightened, but as it was only a duo he managed fairly well. Then he +sang at Tepl, this time alone. His voice broke badly in the yodel and he +was jeered by a rude audience. He had grown very much thinner. His +doctor warned him against continuing the waters, and advised rice, +potatoes, and ale, but he did not listen. He now paid the bills of the +company while travelling. Rösie had confessed with tears that they were +fearfully poor. From that time he handed her his purse. He even placated +the jealous dancer with a gold watch and a box of hair pomade. Ah! how +he loathed the fellow's curly locks, his greasy familiarities! Rösie +told him this acrobat was necessary in the company until he could be +replaced. Already Hugh--she called him "Ü"--could yodel better. Some day +he might, when thinner, dance better. Perhaps--again that appealing +glance, the corner of her lips faintly touched by the mysterious smile +of a Monna Lisa. Krayne redoubled his arduous training, practised +yodling in the forests, danced jigs on the pine-needles, and doubled his +allowance of the waters. + +They went to Carlsbad. He yodled. He was applauded. The dancer was in a +fine rage. Although Krayne had asked Rösie to buy a first-class +compartment on the railroad trip over and back, they went in a +third-class car. Präger declared that it was good enough for him, and he +didn't wish to spoil his troupe! His wife now held the purse-strings, as +Rösie was too engrossed with her art and Hugh too absorbed in his love +to notice such mere sublunary matters. The girl had promised nothing +positive for the future. She kept him on the brittle edge of nervous +expectation. The opposition of the dancer had been successfully met by +threats of dismissal; Hugh continued to lose flesh and gain in vocal and +pedal agility. + +He danced for the first time at Königswart, not far from the château of +the Metternichs. It was August. So great was the applause that the +younger dancer was discharged. He left with muttered threats of +vengeance. The next day Krayne turned over all his business affairs to +the able hand of Frau Präger; he lived only for Rösie and his art.... + +September was at hand. The weather was so warm and clear, that the king +of England deferred his departure for a few days. One afternoon, just +before the leaves began to brown on the hills, there was a concert at +the garden of the Hotel Bellevue. The royal party attended. The yodling +was much praised, especially that of a good-looking young woman and her +escort, a very tall man of cadaverous aspect, his shanks like the wooden +stilts of the shepherds on the Bordeaux Landes. His face, +preternaturally emaciated and fatigued, opened to emit an amazing yodel. +When the _Schuhplattltanz_ was reached he surprised the audience by an +extraordinary exhibition. He threw his long legs about like billiard +cues, while his arms flapped as do windmills in a hard gale. He was +pointed out as a celebrity--once a monster Englishman, who had taken the +_Kur_; who was in love, but so poor that he could not marry. The girl +with him was certain to make a success in grand opera some day. Yes, +Marienbad was proud of Krayne. He was one of her show sons, a witness to +her curative powers. Proud also of the Bavarian Präger Sextette. Herr +Präger was reputed a rich man.... + +The night of that concert Marienbad saw the last of the Bavarian +sextette, which at midnight, joined by its old dancer with the tenor +voice, left in a third-class carriage for Vienna. Hugh Krayne, not +possessing enough to pay his passage, had not been invited; nor was he +informed of the sudden departure until a day later.... + + * * * * * + +On the road to the Alm, of moonlight nights, toiling visitors catch +glimpses of a human, almost a skeleton, dressed in rags, his head bare +as his feet, about his neck a flaming crimson handkerchief. He is known +to Marienbäders as "The Man Who Stayed Too Long." He never addresses +passers-by; but as they lose sight of him they hear the woods resound +with his elegiac howl:-- + +_La la liriti! La la lirita! Hallali!_ + + + + +X + +THE THIRD KINGDOM + + +I + +A DOUBTER + +Brother Hyzlo sat in his cell and read. The gentle stillness of a rare +spring morning enveloped him with its benison. And the clear light fell +upon the large pages of a book in his hand,--the window through which it +streamed was the one link between the young recluse and the life of the +world. From it he could see the roofs of the city beneath him; when he +so wished, he might, without straining his gaze, distinguish the +Pantheon at the end of that triumphal avenue which spanned the Seine and +had once evoked for him visions of antique splendour. But Brother Hyzlo +no longer cared for mundane delights. His doubting soul was the +battle-field over which he ranged day and night searching for diabolic +opponents. Exterior existence had become for him a shadow; the only life +worth living was that of the spirit. + +In his book that fresh spring morning he read as if in the flare of a +passing meteor these disquieting words:-- + +"How were it if, some day or night, a demon stole after thee into thy +most solitary solitude, and said to thee: 'This life, as thou livest it +now, and hast lived it, thou shalt have to live over again, and not once +but innumerable times; and there will be nothing new in it, but every +pain and every pleasure and every thought and sigh, and everything in +thy life, the great and the unspeakably petty alike, must come again to +thee, and all in the same series and succession; this spider, too, and +this moonlight betwixt the trees and this moment likewise and I myself. +The eternal sand-glass of time is always turned again, and thou with it, +thou atom of dust'? Wouldst thou not cast thyself down and with gnashing +of teeth curse the demon who thus spoke? Or, hast thou ever experienced +the tremendous moment in which thou wouldst answer him: 'Thou art a god +and never heard I anything more divine'?" + +The book slipped from his hands. "Why not?" he murmured, "why not? There +is no such thing as chance. The law of probabilities is not a mere +fancy, but an austere need. Matter is ever in evolution. Energy alone is +indestructible. Radium has revealed this to us. In eternity when the +Infinite throws the dice, double-sixes are sure to come up more than +once. Miracles? But why miraculous? Infinity of necessity must repeat +itself, and then I, sitting here now, will sit here again, sit and doubt +the goodness of God, ay, doubt His existence.... How horrible!" He +paused in the whirl of his thoughts. + +"Yet how beautiful, for if the eternal recurrence be truth, then must +the great drama of the Redemption be repeated. Then will our foes be +convinced of Christianity and its reality. But shall we be conscious in +that far-off time of our anterior existence? Ah! hideous, coiling doubt. +What a demon is this Nietzsche to set whirring in the brains of poor, +suffering humanity such torturing questions! Better, far better for the +world to live and not to think. Thought is a disease, a morbid secretion +of the brain-cells. Ah! materialist that I am, I can no longer think +without remembering the ideas of Cabanis, that gross atheist. Why am I +punished so? What crimes have I committed in a previous +existence--Karma, again!--that I must perforce study the writings of +impious men? Yet I submitted myself as a candidate for the task, to save +my brethren in Christ from soiling their hearts. Heaven preserve me from +the blight of spiritual pride, but I believe that I am now a scapegoat +for the offences of my fellow-monks, and, thus, may redeem my own +wretched soul. Ah! Nietzsche--Antichrist." + +He arose and threw the volume across his cell. Then going to the window +regarded with humid gaze the world that sprawled below him in the +voluptuous sunshine. But so sternly was the inner eye fixed on the +things of the spirit that he soon turned away from the delectable +picture, and as he did so his glance rested upon a crucifix. He started, +his perturbed imagination again touched. + +"What if Nietzsche were right? The first Christian, the only Christian, +died on the cross, he has said. What an arraignment of our precious +faith, Jesus Christ, our Lord God! What sweet names are Thine! How could +Nietzsche not feel the music of that Hebrew-Greek combination? Perhaps +he did; perhaps he masked a profound love behind his hatred. Jesus our +Lord! Hebrew-Greek. But why Greek? Why ...?" Another pause in this +sequestered chamber where the buzzing of an insect could assume a +thunderous roar. "The eternal return. Why should Christ return? Must the +earth be saved again and again and a billion times again? Awful thought +of a God descending to a horrible death to cleanse the nameless myriads +from sins which they seek ever as flies treacle. More ghastly still is +the thought that the atheist Scandinavian put into the mouth of his +Julian the Apostate: When our Christ is not saving this earth from +eternal damnation then he may be visiting remote planets or inaccessible +stars, where coloured double suns of blinding brilliancy revolve +terrifically in twin harness. There, too, are souls to be rescued. What +a grand idea! It is Ibsen's, as is the interpretation of the Third +Kingdom. It should have been Nietzsche's. Why this antinomianism? Why +this eternal conflict of evil and good, of night and day, of sweet and +sour, of God and devil, of Ormuzd and Ahriman?" + +The exotic names transposed his thoughts to another avenue. If Christ is +to come again, and the holy word explicitly states that He will, why not +Buddha? Why not Brahma? Why not ...? Again a hiatus. This time something +snapped in his head. He sank back in his chair. Buddha! Was there ever a +Buddha? And if there was not, was there ever such a personality as +Christ's? Scholar that he was he knew that myth-building was a pastime +for the Asiatic imagination, great, impure, mysterious Asia--Asia the +mother of all religions, the cradle of the human race. To deny the +objective existence of Christ would set at rest all his doubts, one +overwhelming doubt swallowing the minor doubts. He had never speculated +at length upon the Christ legend, for did not Renan, yes, that silky +heretic, believe in the personality of Jesus, believe and lovingly +portray it? The Nietzsche doctrine of the eternal recurrence had so +worked upon his sensitive mental apparatus that he could have almost +denied the existence of Christ rather than deny that our universe +repeats itself infinitely. Eternity is a wheel, earthly events are the +spokes of this whirring wheel. It was the seeming waste of divine +material that shocked his nerves. One crucifixion--yes; but two or two +quintillions and infinitely more! + +Brother Hyzlo stared at the crucifix. Was it only a symbol, as some +learned blasphemers averred? The human figure so painfully extended +upon it was a God, a God who descended from high heaven to become a +shield between the wrath of His Father and humanity. Why? Why should the +God who created us grow angry with our shortcomings? We are His +handiwork. Are we then to blame for our imperfections? Is not Jesus, +instead of a mediator, rather a votive offering to the wounded vanity of +the great Jehovah? Was not Prometheus--a light broke in upon Hyzlo. +Prometheus, a myth, Buddha a myth. All myths. There were other +virgin-born saviours. Krishna, Mithra, Buddha. Vishnu had not one but +nine incarnations. Christianity bears alarming resemblances to +Mithraism. Mithra, too, was born in a cave. The dates of Christ's birth +and death may be astronomical: the winter and vernal equinoxes. But the +conflict of the authorities regarding these dates is mortifying. The +four gospels are in reality four witnesses warring against each other. +They were selected haphazard at a human council. They were not composed +until the latter part of the second century, and the synoptic gospels +are compilations from unknown writers, while the fourth gospel is a much +later work. And how colourless, imitative, is the New when compared to +the Old Testament,--echoing with the antiphonal thunders of Jehovah and +his stern-mouthed Prophets! The passage in Josephus touching on Christ +is now known to have been interpolated. Authentic history does not +record the existence of Christ. Not one of His contemporaries mentions +him. That tremendous drama in Galilee was not even commented upon by the +Romans, a nation keen to notice any deviation from normal history. The +Jewish records are doubtful, written centuries after His supposed death. +And they are malicious. What cannot happen in two centuries? Hyzlo +reflected sadly upon Moslemism, upon Mormonism, upon the vagaries of a +strange American sect at whose head was said to be a female pope. + +The similarity of circumstances in the lives of Buddha and Christ also +annoyed him. Both were born of virgins, both renounced the world, both +were saviours. There were the same temptations, the same happenings; +prophecies, miracles, celestial rejoicings, a false disciple, the seven +beatitudes--a reflection of the Oriental wisdom--an expiatory death and +resurrection. The entire machinery of the Christian church, its saints, +martyrs, festivals, ritual, and philosophies are borrowed from the +mythologies of the pagans. Sun-worship is the beginning of all +religions. To the genius of the epileptic Paul, or Saul,--founders of +religions are always epilepts,--a half Greek and disciple of the +Pharisee Gamaliel, who saw visions and put to the sword his enemies, to +Paul, called a saint, a man of overwhelming personal force, to this +cruel anarchist, relentless, half-mad fanatic and his theological +doctrines we owe the preservation and power of the Christian Church. At +first the Christians were the miserable offscourings of society, slaves, +criminals, and lunatics. They burrowed in the Catacombs, they fastened +themselves upon a decaying and magnificent civilization like the +parasites they were. A series of political catastrophes, a popular +uprising against the rotten emperors of decadent Rome, and the wide +growth of the socialist idea--these things and an unscrupulous man, +Constantine the Great, put the Christians firmly in the saddle. And soon +came cataracts of blood. If the tales of the imperial persecutions are +true, then hath Christianity been revenged a million fold; where her +skirt has trailed there has been the cruel stain of slaughter. It must +not be forgotten, too, that immorality of the grossest sort was promised +the deluded sectarians, compared with which the Mahometan paradise is +spiritual. And the end of the world was predicted at the end of every +century, and finally relegated to the millennial celebration of +Christianity's birth. When, in 1000 A.D., this catastrophe did +not occur, the faith received its first great shock. + +He summoned to his memory a cloud of witnesses, all contradictory. +Josephus was barred. Philo Judæus, who was living near the centre of +things, an observer on the scent of the spiritual, a man acquainted with +the writings of Rabbi Hillel, and the father of Neoplatonism--never +mentions Jesus, nor does he speak of any religious uprising in Judea. +The passage in Virgil, which has through the doubtful testimony of +monkish writers been construed into a prophecy of a forthcoming Messiah, +Hyzlo, who was a scholar, knew to have been addressed to a son of +Virgil's intimate friend. Tacitus, too, has been interpolated. Seneca's +ideal man is not Jesus, for Jesus is Osiris, Horus, Krishna, Mithra, +Hercules, Adonis,--think of this beautiful young god's death!--Buddha. +Such a mock trial and death could not have taken place under the Roman +or Jewish laws. The sacraments derive from the Greeks, from the +Indians--the mysteries of Ceres and Bacchus, from the _Haoma_ sacrifice +of the Persians, originally Brahmanic. The Trinity, was it not a relic +of that ineradicable desire for polytheism implanted in the human bosom? +Was the crucifixion but a memory of those darker cults and blood +sacrifices of Asia, and also of the expiating goats sent out into the +wilderness? What became of that Hosanna-shouting crowd which welcomed +Christ on Palm Sunday? And there never were such places as Gethsemane +and Calvary. Alas! the Son of Man had indeed no spot to lay his head. +And why had He made no sign when on earth! Brother Hyzlo wept bitter +tears. + +But he wiped them away as he considered the similarity of the massacre +of the Innocents in Judea and the massacre of the male children ordered +by the wicked Indian Rajah of Madura, who feared the Krishna, just +conceived by divine agency. Yes, the chronicles were full of these gods +born of virgins, of crucifixions,--he could remember sixteen,--of these +solar myths. He caught tripping in a thousand cases the translations of +our holy books. The Ox and Ass legend at the Nativity he realized was +the Pseudo-Matthew's description to Habakkuk of the literal presence: +"In the midst of two animals thou shalt be known;" which is a +mistranslated Hebrew text in the Prayer ascribed to Habakkuk. It got +into the Greek Septuagint version of the Prophet made by Egyptian Jews +before 150 B.C. It should read, "in the midst of the years," +not "animals." "Ah!" cried Hyzlo, "in this as in important cardinal +doctrines have the faithful been the slaves of the learned and +unscrupulous pious forgers. Even the notorious Apollonius of Tyana +imitated the miracles of Christ--all of them. And what of that wicked +wizard, Simon Magus?" + +The very repetition of these miracles in all races, at all epochs, +pointed to the doctrine of recurrence. But back of all the negations, +back of the inexpugnable proof that no such man or God as Christ +existed, or was known to his contemporaries, Jewish and Roman, there +must have been some legend which had crystallized into a mighty +religion. Was He an agitator who preferred His obscurity that His glory +might be all the greater? There _must_ have been a beginning to the +myth; behind the gospels--though they are obviously imitated from the +older testaments, imitated and diluted--were unknown writings; previous +to these there was word of mouth and--and ...? + +The day had advanced, the sun was very warm. A shaft of light fell upon +the cold stone floor, and in its fiery particles darted myriads of +motes. Hyzlo followed their spiral flights, thinking all the while of +humanity which flashes from out the dark void, plays madly in the light, +only to vanish into the unknown night. His gaze was held by the +smoothness of the flagging at his feet. Then it became transformed into +marble, the walls of his cell widened, and he closed his eyes, so +blinding were the long ladders of light.... + + +II + +TWO DREAMERS + +He opened them ... the harbour with its army of galleys and pleasure +craft lay in the burning sunshine, its surface a sapphire blue. Overhead +the sky echoed this tone, which modulated into deeper notes of purple on +the far-away hills whose tops were wreathed in mist. Under his sandalled +feet was marble, back of him were the gleaming spires and towers of the +great city, and at his left was a mountain of shining marble, the +Pharos. + +"Alexandria?" he called out as he was jostled by a melon-seller, and +startled by the fluted invitations of a young girl--an antique statue +come to life. + +"Of course it is Alexandria," replied a deep, harsh voice at his elbow. +He turned. It was his friend Philo. + +"You have at last emerged from your day-dream, Hyzlo! I thought, as our +bark clove the water, that you were enjoying visions." And it seemed to +Hyzlo that he had just awakened from a bizarre dream of a monastic cell, +to more beautiful sights and shapes and sounds. The pair now traversed +the quay, past the signal masts, the fortified towers, pushing through +the throng of sailors, courtesans, philosophers, fruitsellers, soldiers, +beggars, and idle rich toward the spacious city. Past the palace to the +wall of the Canal, along the banks of the Royal Port, they finally +struck into a broad, deserted avenue. At its head was a garden wall. +Philo introduced himself and his companion through a low door and +presently they were both in an apartment full of parchments, glittering +brass and gold instruments all reposing on a wide, long table. + +"Hyzlo," said the Jewish philosopher, in his slightly accented Greek, "I +have long promised you that I would reveal to you my secret, my life +work. I am downcast by sadness. Rome is full of warring cults, Greek, +African, Babylonian, Buddhistic; the writings of the great teachers, the +masters, Heraclitus, Zeno, Anaxagoras, Plato, Socrates, Epictetus, +Seneca, are overlaid with heretical emendations. The religion of my +fellow-countrymen is a fiery furnace, Jerusalem a den of warring +thieves. The rulers of earth are weary and turn a deaf ear on their +peoples. The time is ripe for revolt. Sick of the accursed luxury and +debauchery, fearful of the threatening barbarians from Asia and the +boreal regions, who are hemming the civilized world, waiting like +vultures for the first sign of weakness to destroy everything, the +slaves in revolt--all these impending terrors assure me that the end of +the old order is at hand. But what will become of the new if there is no +central belief to steady the ensanguined hands of furious mobs? For +years I have bethought me of a drama, a gigantic world-drama which shall +embody all the myths of mankind, all the noblest thoughts of the +philosophers. I shall take the Buddha myth, surely the supreme myth, and +transpose its characters to Jerusalem. A humble Jew shall be _my_ +Buddha. He shall be my revenge on our conquerors; for my people have +been trampled upon by the insolent Romans, and who knows--a Jewish God, +a crucified God, may be worshipped in the stead of Jupiter and his vile +pantheon of gods and goddesses! _One_ God, the son of Jahveh who comes +upon earth to save mankind, is crucified and killed, is resurrected and +like Elijah is caught up to heaven in a fiery chariot. But you know the +usual style of these Asiatic legends! They are all alike; a virgin +birth, a miraculous life, and transfiguration. That sums up myths from +Adonis to Krishna, from Krishna to Buddha; though Monotheism comes from +the Hebrews, the Trinity from the Indians, and the _logos_ was +developed by Plato. Where I am original is that I make my hero a +Jew--the Jews are still half-cracked enough to believe in the coming of +a Messiah. And to compass a fine dramatic moment I have introduced an +incident I once witnessed in Alexandria at the landing of King Agrippa, +when the populace dressed up a vagabond named Karabas as a mock king and +stuck upon his head papyrus leaves for a crown, in his hand a reed for a +sceptre, and then saluted him as king. I shall make my Jew-God seized by +the Jews, his own blood and kin, given over to the Romans, mocked, +reviled, and set aside for some thief who shall be called Karabas. Then, +rejected, he shall be crucified, he a god born of a virgin, by the very +people who are looking for their Messiah. He is their Messiah; yet they +know it not. They shall never know it. That shall be their tragedy, the +tragedy of my race, which, notwithstanding the prophecies, turned its +back upon the Messiah because he came not clothed in the purple of +royalty. Is that not a magnificent idea for a drama?" + +"Excellent," answered Hyzlo, in a critical tone; "but continue!" + +"You seem without enthusiasm, Hyzlo. I tell you that Æschylus, +Sophocles, or Euripides never conceived a story more infinitely dramatic +or pathetic, or--thanks to my Hebraic blood--so suffused with tragic +irony. I shall make a very effective tableau at the death; on some +forbidding stony hill near Jerusalem I shall plant my crucified hero, +and near him a converted courtesan--ah! what a master of the theatre I +am!--in company with a handful of faithful disciples. The others have +run away to save their cowardly skins in the tumult. The mobs that +hailed him as King of the Jews now taunt him, after the manner of all +mobs. His early life I shall borrow outright from the Buddha legends. He +shall be born of a virgin; he shall live in the desert; as a child he +shall confute learned doctors in the temple; and later in the desert he +shall be tempted by a demon. All this is at hand. My chief point is the +philosophies in which I shall submerge my characters. + +"My hero shall be the _logos_ of Heraclitus with the superadded +authority of the Hebrew high priest. You may recall the fact that I +greatly admire the Essenes and their system. My deity is a pure essence; +not Jehovah the protector or avenger. The _logos_, or mediator, I have +borrowed from the writings of the Greek philosophers. This _logos_ +returns to the bosom of God after the sacrifice. Greek philosophy +combined with Hebraic moral principles! Ah! it is grand synthesis; +Seneca with his conception of a perfected humanity, Lucretius, +Manlius--who called, rightfully too, Epicurus a god--and Heraclitus with +the first idea of a _logos_: all these ancient ideas I have worked into +my romantic play, including the old cult of the Trinities; the +Buddhistic: Buddha, Dharma, and Saingha; the Chinese: Heaven, Earth, +and Emperor; the Babylonian: Ea, the father, Marduk, the son, and the +Fire God, Gibil, who is also the Paraclete. So my philosophy is merely a +continuation and modification of that taught by Heraclitus and Plato, +but with a Jewish background--for _mine_ is the only moral nation. The +wisdom of the Rabbis, their Monotheism and ethics, are all there." His +eyes were ablaze. + +"You are very erudite, Philo Judæus!" exclaimed his listener; "but, tell +me, is there no actual foundation for your Jewish god?" Hyzlo eagerly +awaited a reply, though he could not account for this curiosity. + +"Yes," answered Philo, lightly, "there is, I freely acknowledge, a +slight foundation. Some years ago in Jerusalem they arrested a +poverty-stricken fanatic, the son of a Jewess. His father was said to +have been an indigent and aged carpenter. This Joshua, or Ieshua, was +driven out of Jerusalem, and he took refuge among a lot of poor +fishermen on Lake Gennesareth. There he joined a sect called the +Baptists, because their founder, a socialist named Ioakanaan, poured +water on the heads of the converted. Ieshua never married and was +suspected of idolatrous practices, which he had absorbed from hermits of +the Egyptian Thebaïd. Josephus, a wise friend and companion of my youth, +wrote me these details. He said that Ieshua disappeared after his mad +attempt to take Jerusalem by storm, riding--as is depicted the Bona +Dea--on the back of a humble animal. Yet, if you wish to appeal to the +common folk, make your hero a deposed king or divinity, who walks +familiarly among the poor, as walked the gods at the dawn of time with +the daughters of men. I depict my protagonist as a half-cracked Jew. I +call him Iesus Christos--after Krishna; and this poor man's god proposes +to redeem the world, to place the lowly in the seats of the mighty--he +is an Anarchos, as they would say in Athens. He promises the Kingdom of +God to those who follow him; but only a few do. He is the friend of +outcasts, prostitutes, criminals. And though he does not triumph on +earth, nevertheless he is the spiritual ruler of earth; he is the Son of +the Trinity which comprises the Father and Holy Ghost. The contending +forces to my hero will be incarnated by Pontius Pilatus, the Roman +governor, and Judas of Kerioth, a very dangerous and powerful Hebrew +politician--a man of very liberal ideas, one who believed in the +supremacy of the West. What a glorious play it will make! I have named +it The Third Kingdom, Hyzlo. What a glorious idea it is, Hyzlo--the +greatest drama the world has ever witnessed!" + + +III + +THE DOVE + +"The greatest drama the world has ever witnessed" ... mumbled his +disciple.... The sun still shone on the cold stone flagging, and upon +the wall facing him hung the crucifix. But the motes no longer danced +merrily in the light. Evening was setting in apace, and Hyzlo, accepting +one dream as equal in veracity with the other, crossed to the embrasure +and, his elbows on the sill, watched the sun--looking like a +sulphur-coloured cymbal--sink behind the sky-line. He was still in the +same attitude when the blue of the heavens--ah! but not that gorgeous, +hard Alexandrian blue--melted into peacock and cool saffron hues. He +mused aloud:-- + +"By the very nature of his mental organs man can never grasp reality. It +is always the sensation, never the real thing, he feels. The +metaphysicians are right. We can never know the actual world outside of +ourselves. We are imprisoned in a dream cage; the globe itself is a cage +of echoes. Science, instead of contradicting religion, has but affirmed +its truths. Matter is radiant energy--matter is electric phenomenon. The +germ-plasma from which we stem--the red clay of Genesis--is eternal. The +individual is sacrificed to the species. The species never dies. And how +beautifully logical is the order of our ancestry as demonstrated by the +science of embryology. Fish, batrachians, reptiles, mammals; in which +latter are included the marsupials as well as lemurs, primates, Man. And +after what struggles Man assumed an erect position and looked into the +eyes of his mate! After Man? Nietzsche preaches that man is a link +between the primate and Superman; Superman--the angels! But intelligence +in man may be an accident caused by over-nutrition, the brain developing +from rich phosphors. If this were so--how would fall to earth our house +of pride! Are we so close to the animal? But Quinton proves that _after_ +man in the zoölogical series comes the bird. Birds--half reptiles, half +angels. Angels! Do evolution and revelation meet here on common ground? +Or was Joachim, the Abbot of Flores, inspired when he wrote of the Third +Kingdom, that Kingdom in which the empire of the flesh is swallowed up +in the empire of the spirit; that Third Kingdom in which the +twin-natured shall reign, as Ibsen declares; the Messiah--neither +Emperor nor Redeemer, but the Emperor-God. The slime shall become sap +and the sap become spirit! From gorilla to God! Man in the coming Third +Kingdom may say: "I, too, am a god." But is this not blasphemous? And +after the wheel of the universe has again revolved, will I see, as +foresaw Nietzsche, the selfsame spider, the same moonlight? There is +nothing new under the sun, says Ecclesiastes. Wretched man is never to +know the entire truth but will be always at daggers drawn with his +destiny. After classic Paganism came romantic Christianity; after the +romantic will the pendulum swing back--or--alas! is there coming another +horde of atheists with a new Attila at their head?" + +He threw himself before the crucifix and sobbed. + +"Lord Jesus, Our Christ! Thou art the real Christ and not the fiction of +that supersubtle Greek-Jewish and boastful philosopher in Alexandria! +Make for me, O God, a sign! Give me back in all its purity my faith; +faith, noblest gift of all! Oh! to hear once more the thrilling of the +harps divine, whereon the dawn plays, those precursors of the Eternal +Harmony! _Gloria in Excelsis_." He remained prostrate, his heart no +longer battered by doubts and swimming in blissful love for his +crucified God. The celestial hurricane subsided in his bosom; he arose +and again interrogated the heavens. The stars in the profound splendours +of the sky stared at him like the naked eyes of _houris_. Suddenly a +vast white cloud sailed over the edge of the horizon and as it +approached his habitation assumed the shape of a monstrous dove, its +fleecy wings moving in solemn rhythms. In the resurgence of his hopes +this apparition was the coveted sign from the Almighty. + +And flat upon the floor of his cell, his face abased in the dust, Hyzlo +worshipped in epileptic frenzy, crying aloud, after the manner of the +sad-tongued Preacher:-- + +"The thing that hath been, it _is_ that which shall be!" + + + + +XI + +THE HAUNTED HARPSICHORD + +[In the Style of Mock-Mediæval Fiction] + + +I told Michael to look sharply to his horse. It was dusk; a few bits of +torn clouds, unresolved modulations of nebulous lace, trembled over the +pink pit in the west, wherein had sunk the sun; and one evening star, +silver pointed, told the tale of another spent day. + +Michael was surly, I was impatient, and the groom, who lagged in the +rear, whistled softly; but I knew that both men were tired and hungry, +and so were the horses. The road, hard and free from dust, echoed the +resilient hoof-falls of our beasts. The early evening was finely cool, +for it was the month of September. We had lost our way. Green fields on +either side, and before us the path declined down a steep slope, that +lost itself in huddled foliage. + +Michael spoke up:-- + +"We are astray. I knew this damnable excursion would lead to no good." + +I gently chided him. "Pooh, you braggart! Even Arnold, who rides a brute +a world too wide for him, has not uttered a complaint. Brave Michael, if +her ladyship heard you now!" + +His face grew hard as he muttered:-- + +"Her ladyship! may all the saints in the calendar watch over her +ladyship! But I wish she had never taken you at your hot-headed word. +Then we would not have launched upon this madcap adventure." + +I grew stern. "Her ladyship, I bid you remember, my worthy man, is our +mistress, and it ill behooves you to question her commands, especially +in the presence of a groom." + +Michael growled, and then the sudden turn in the road startled our +horses on a gallop, and for a quarter of an hour we thrashed our way +ahead in the twilight. We had entered a small thicket when an +ejaculation from Arnold--who had been riding abreast--brought us all up +to a sharp standstill. + +"There's a light," said the groom, in a most tranquil manner, pointing +his heavy crop stick to the left. How we had missed seeing the inn from +the crest of the hill was strange. A hundred yards away stood a low, +red-tiled house, with lights burning downstairs, and an unmistakable air +of hostlery for man and beast. We veered at once in our course, and in a +few minutes were hallooing for the host or the hostler. + +"Now I hope that you are satisfied, my friend," I said exultantly to +Michael, who only grunted as he swung off his animal. Arnold followed, +and soon we were chatting with an amiable old man in a white cap and +apron, who had run out of the house when we shouted. + +"Amboise?" he answered me when I told him of our destination. "Amboise; +why, sirrah, you are a good five leagues from Amboise! Step within and +remain here for the night. I have plenty of convenience for you and your +suite." + +I glanced at Michael, but he was busily employed in loosening his +pistols from the holster, and Arnold, in company with a lame man, led +the horses to the stable. There was little use in vain regrets. The +_other_ had the start of the half-day, and surely we could go no further +that night. I gritted my teeth as the little fat landlord led us into +the house. + +In half an hour we were smoking our pipes before a lively fire--the +night had grown chilly--and enjoying silent recollections of a round of +beef and several bottles of fortifying burgundy. + +Our groom had gone to bed, and I soon saw that I could get nothing out +of Michael for the present. He stared moodily into the fire. I noticed +that his pistols were handy. The host came in and asked my permission to +join us. He felt lonely, he explained, for he was a widower, and his +only son was away in the world somewhere. I was very glad to ease myself +with gossip; my heart was not quite at peace with this expedition of +ours. I knew what her ladyship asked of us was much, so much that only a +bold spirit and a thirst for the unknown could pardon the folly of the +chase. + +I bade the innkeeper to take a seat at the fire, and soon we fell to +chatting like ladies' maids. He was a Norman and curious as a cat. He +opened his inquiries delicately. + +"You have ridden far and fast to-day, my sir. Your horses were all but +done for. Yet there is no cloud of war in the sky and you are too far +from Paris to be honourable envoys. I hope you like our country?" + +I dodged his tentative attempt at prying by asking him a question +myself. + +"You don't seem to have many guests, good host? Yet do I hardly wonder +at it. You are all but swallowed up in the green and too far from the +main travelled road." + +The little man sighed and said in sad accents: "Too true, yet the +Scarlet Dragon was once a thriving place, a fine money-breeding house. +Before my son went away--" + +I interrupted him. "Your son, what is he, and where is he now?" + +The other became visibly agitated and puffed at his pipe some minutes +before replying. + +"Alas! worthy sir," he said at last in a lower key, "my son dare not +return here for reasons I cannot divulge. Indeed, this was no cheerful +house for the boy. He had his ambitions and he left me to pursue them." + +"What does he do, this youngster?" interrupted Michael, in his gruffest +tones. The landlord started. + +"Indeed, good sir, I could not tell you, for I know not myself." + +"Humph!" grunted my sullen companion; but I observed his suspicious +little eyes fixed persistently on the man of the inn. + +I turned the talk, which had threatened to languish. The old man did not +relish the questions about his son, and began deploring the poor crops. +At this juncture an indefinable feeling that we were losing time in +stopping at this lonely place came over me. I am not superstitious, but +I swear that I felt ill at ease and confused in my plans. + +On bended knee I had sworn to my lady that I would bring back to her the +fugitive unharmed, and I would never return to her empty-handed, +confessing failure. Michael's queer behaviour disconcerted me. From the +outset of the chase he had turned sour and inaccessible, and now he was +so ill-tempered that I feared he would pick a quarrel at the slightest +provocation with our host. + +With a strange sinking at the heart I asked about our horses. + +"They will be attended to, my sirs; my servant is a good boy. He is +handy, although he can't get about lively, for he was thrown in a turnip +field from our only donkey." + +I was in no mood for this sort of chatter and quizzed the fellow as to +our beds. + +"We must be off early in the morning; we have important business to +transact at Amboise before the sun sets to-morrow," I testily remarked. + +"At Amboise--h'm, h'm! Well, I don't mind telling you that you can reach +Amboise by stroke of noon; and so you have business at Amboise, eh?" + +I saw Michael's brow lower at this wheedling little man's question, and +answered rather hastily and imprudently:-- + +"Yes, business, my good man, important business, as you will see when we +return this road to-morrow night with the prize we are after." + +Michael jumped up and cried "Damnation!" and I at once saw my mistake. +The landlord's manner instantly altered. He looked at me triumphantly +and said:-- + +"Beds, beds! but, my honoured sirs, I have no beds in the house. I +forgot to tell you that no guest has been upstairs in years, for certain +reasons. Indeed, sirs, I am so embarrassed! I should have told you at +once I have only a day trade. My regular customers would not dare to +stop here over night, as the house,"--here a cunning, even sinister, +look spread over the fellow's fat face--"the house bears an evil +reputation." + +Michael started and crossed himself, but not I. I suspected some deep +devilry and determined to discover it. + +"So ho? Haunted, eh? Well, ghosts and old women's stories shan't make me +budge until dawn. Go fetch more wine and open it here, mine host of the +Scarlet Dragon," I roared. The little man was nonplussed, hesitated a +moment, and then trotted off. + +I saw that Michael was at last aroused. + +"What diabolical fooling is this? If the place is haunted, I'm off." + +"I'm damned if I am," I said quite bravely, and more wine appeared. We +both sat down. + +The air had become nipping, and the blaze on the hearth was reassuring. +Besides, the wind was querulous, and I didn't fancy a ride at midnight, +even if my lady's quest were an urgent one. + +Michael held his peace as the wine was poured out, and I insisted on the +landlord drinking with us. We finished two bottles, and I sent for more. +I foresaw that sleep was out of the question, and so determined to make +a night of it. + +"Touching upon this ghost," I began, when the other bade me in God's +name not to jest. There were some things, he said, not to be broached in +honest Christian company. + +"A fig for your scruples!" I cried, emptying my glass; my head was hot +and I felt bold. "A fig, I say, for your bogie-man nonsense! Tell me at +what time doth this phantom choose to show itself." The landlord +shivered and drew his seat closer to the fire. + +"Oh, sir, do not jest! What I tell you is no matter for rude laughter. +Begging your pardon for my offer, if you will be patient, I will relate +to you the story, and how my misfortune came from this awful visitant." + +Even Michael seemed placated, and after I nodded my head in token of +assent the landlord related to us this story:-- + + * * * * * + +Once upon a time, sirs, when the great and good Louis, sixteenth of his +name, was King of France, this domain was the property of the Duke of +Langlois. The duke was proud and rich, and prouder and haughtier was his +duchess, who was born Berri. Ah! they were mighty folk then, before the +Revolution came with its sharp axes to clip off their heads. This inn +was the stable of the château, which stood off yonder in the woods. +Alas! nothing remains of it to-day but a few blackened foundations, for +it was burned to the earth by the red devils in '93. But at the time I +speak of, the château was a big, rich palace, full of gay folk; all the +nobility came there, and the duchess ruled the land. + +She was crazy for music, and to such lengths did she go in her madness +that she even invited as her guests celebrated composers and singers. +The duke was old-fashioned and hated those crazy people who lived only +to hum and strum. He would have none of them, and quarrels with his +duchess were of daily occurrence. Indeed, sirs, so bad did it become +that he swore that he would leave the house if Messire Gluck, or Messire +Piccini, or any of the other strolling vagabonds--so the duke called +them--entered his château. And he kept his word, did the duke. The +Chevalier Gluck, a fine, shapely man, was invited down by the duchess +and amused her and her guests by playing his wonderful tunes on the +beautiful harpsichord in the great salon. + +The duke would have none of this nonsense and went to Paris, where he +amused himself gambling and throwing gold into his mistresses' laps. The +duchess kept right on, and then the gossips of the neighbourhood began +to wag their busy tongues. The lady of the château was getting very fine +pleasure from the company of the handsome Austrian chevalier. It was +whispered that the Queen Marie Antoinette had looked with favourable +eyes upon the composer, and, furthermore, had lent him certain moneys to +further his schemes for reforming the stage. + +Reform, forsooth! all he cared for was the company of the duchess, and +he vowed that he could make better music at the château than up in noisy +Paris. On a fine afternoon it is said that it was no uncommon sight to +see the chevalier, all togged up in his bravest court costume, sword and +all, sitting at his harpsichord, playing ravishing music. This was out +in the pretty little park back of the château, and the duchess would sit +at Gluck's side and pour out champagne for him. All this may have been +idle talk, but at last the duke got wind of the rumours, and one night +he surprised the pair playing a duo at the harpsichord, and stabbed them +both dead. + +Since then the château was burned down, but the place has been haunted. +I, myself, good gentlemen, have heard ghostly music, and I swear to +you-- + +"Oh, my God, listen, listen!" + +"What pagan nonsense!" blurted out Michael. + +I cautioned silence, and we all listened. The old man had slid off his +chair, and his face was chalky white. Michael's ugly mouth was half +opened in his black beard, and I confess that I felt rather chilly. + +Music, faint, tinkling, we certainly heard. It came with the wind in +little sobs, and then silence settled upon us. + +"It's the Chevalier Gluck, and he is playing to his duchess out in the +fields. See, I will open the door and show you," whispered the fat +landlord. + +He went slowly to the door, and we followed him breathlessly. The door +was pushed open, and we peered out. The wind was still high, and the +moon rode among rolling boulders of yellow, fleecy clouds. + +"There, there, over yonder, look; Mother of Christ, look at the ghost!" +the old man pointed a shaking hand. + +Just then the moonlight was blackened by a big cloud, and we heard the +tinkling music of a harpsichord again, but could see naught. The sounds +were plainer now, and presently resolved into the rhythmic accents of a +gavotte. But it seemed far away and very plaintive! + +"Hark," said Michael, in a hoarse voice. "That's the gavotte from +Pagliacci. Listen! Don't you remember it?" + +"Pshaw!" I said roughly, for my nerves were all astir. "It's the Alceste +music of Gluck." + +"Look, look, gentlemen!" called our host, and as the moon glowed again +in the blue we saw at the edge of the forest a white figure, saw it, I +swear, although it vanished at once and the music ceased. I started to +follow, but Michael and the old man seized my arms, the door was closed +with a crash, and we found ourselves staring blankly into the fire, all +feeling a bit shaken up. + +It was Michael's turn to speak. "You may do what you please, but I stay +here for the night, no sleep for me," and he placed his pistols on his +knee. + +I looked at the landlord and I thought I saw an expression of +disappointment on his face, but I was not sure. He made some excuse +about being tired and went out of the room. We spent the rest of the +night in gloomy silence. We did not speak five words, for I saw that +conversation only irritated my companion. + +At dawn we walked into the sweet air and I called loudly for Arnold, who +looked sleepy and out of sorts when he appeared. The fat old man came to +see us off and smilingly accepted the silver I put into his hand for our +night's reckoning. + +"Au revoir, my old friend," I said as I pressed the unnecessary spur +into my horse's flank. "Au revoir, and look out for the ghost of the +gallant Chevalier Gluck. Tell him, with my compliments, not to play +such latter-day tunes as the gavotte from Pagliacci." + +"Oh, I'll tell him, you may be sure," said he, quite dryly. + +We saluted and dashed down the road to Amboise, where we hoped to +capture our rare prize. + +We had ridden about a mile when a dog attempted to cross our path. We +all but ran the poor brute down. + +"Why, it's lame!" exclaimed Arnold. + +"Oh, if it were but a lame man, instead of a dog!" fervently said the +groom, who was in the secret of our quest. + +A horrid oath rang out on the smoky morning air. Michael, his wicked +eyes bulging fiercely, his thick neck swollen with rage, was cursing +like the army in Flanders, as related by dear old Uncle Toby. + +"Lame man! why, oddsbodkins, that hostler was lame! Oh, fooled, by God! +cheated, fooled, swindled and tricked by that scamp and scullion of the +inn! Oh, we've been nicely swindled by an old wives' tale of a ghost!" + +I stared in sheer amazement at Michael, wondering if the strangely spent +night had upset his reason. He could only splutter out between his awful +curses:-- + +"Gluck, the rascal, the ghost, the man we're after! That +harpsichord--the lying knave--that tune--I swear it wasn't Gluck--oh, +the rascal has escaped again! The ghost story--the villain was told to +scare us out of the house--to put us off the track. A thousand devils +chase the scamp!" And Michael let his head drop on the pommel of his +saddle as he fairly groaned in the bitterness of defeat. + +I had just begun a dignified rebuke, for Michael's language was +inexcusable, when it flashed upon me that we had been, indeed, duped. + +"Ah," I cried, in my fury, "of course we were taken in! Of course his +son was the lame hostler, the very prize we expected to bag! O Lord! +what will we say to my lady? We are precious sharp! I ought to have +known better. That stuff he told us! Langlois, pshaw, Berri--pouf! A +Berri never married a Langlois, and I might have remembered that Gluck +wasn't assassinated by a jealous duke. What shall we do?" + +We all stood in the middle of the road, gazing stupidly at the lame dog +that gave us the clue. Then Arnold timidly suggested:-- + +"Hadn't we better go back to the inn?" + +Instantly our horses' heads were turned and we galloped madly back on +our old tracks. Not a word was uttered until we reined up in front of +the lonely house, which looked more haunted by daylight than it did the +night before. + +"What did I tell you?" suddenly cried Michael. + +"What do you mean?" I asked. + +"Over there, you blind bat!" he said, coarsely and impatiently; and +pulling out his pistol he fired thrice, and a low, melodious sound +followed the reports of his weapon. When the smoke cleared away I saw +that he had hit an old harpsichord which stood against a tree, facing +the house. + +"The ghost!" we yelled, and then we laughed consumedly. But the shots +that winged the old-fashioned instrument had a greater result. The fat +host appeared on the edge of the forest, and he waved a large napkin as +a flag of truce. With him was the lame hostler. + +"Mercy, gentlemen, mercy, we beseech you!" he cried, and we soon +surrounded both and bound them securely. + +"You will pay dearly for the trick you put upon us, my man," said +Michael, grimly, and, walking our horses, we went by easy stages toward +the castle, towing our prisoners along. + +When I fetched the lame man to my lady, her face glowed with joy, and +her Parisian eyes grew brilliant with victory. + +"So you tried to escape?" she cruelly asked of the poor, cowering +wretch. "You will never get another chance, I'll warrant me. Go, let the +servants put you to work in the large music room first. Begin with the +grands, then follow with the uprights. Thank you, gentlemen both, for +the courage and finesse you displayed in this desperate quest. I'll see +that you are both suitably rewarded." I fancied that Michael regarded +me sardonically, but he held his peace about the night's adventures. + +We had indeed reason to feel flattered at the success of the dangerous +expedition. Had we not captured, more by sheer good luck than strategy, +the only piano-tuner in mediæval France? + + + + +XII + +THE TRAGIC WALL + + +I + +BY THE DARK POOL + +It was not so high, the wall, as massive, not so old as moss-covered. +After Rudolph Côt, the painter, had achieved celebrity with his +historical canvas, The Death of the Antique World, now in the Louvre, he +bought the estate of Chalfontaine, which lies at the junction of two +highroads: one leading to Ecouen, the other to Villiers-le-Bel. Almost +touching the end of the park on the Ecouen side there is a little lake, +hardly larger than a pool, and because of its melancholy +aspect--sorrowful willows hem it about, drooping into stagnant +waters--Monsieur Côt had christened the spot: The Dark Tarn of Auber. He +was a fanatical lover of Poe, reading him in the Baudelaire translation, +and openly avowing his preference for the French version of the great +American's tales. That he could speak only five words of English did not +deter his associates from considering him a profound critic of +literature. + +After his death his property and invested wealth passed into the hands +of his youthful widow, a charming lady, a native of Burgundy, and--if +gossip did not lie--a former model of the artist; indeed, some went so +far as to assert that her face could be seen in her late husband's +masterpiece--the figure of a young Greek slave attired as a joyous +bacchante. But her friends always denied this. Her dignified bearing, +sincere sorrow for her dead husband, and her motherly solicitude for her +daughter left no doubt as to the value of all petty talk. It was her +custom of summer evenings to walk to the pool, and with her daughter +Berenice she would sit on the broad wall and watch the moon rise, or +acknowledge the respectful salutations of the country folk with their +bran-speckled faces. In those days Villiers-le-Bel was a dull town a +half-hour from Paris on the Northern Railway, and about two miles from +the station. + +The widow was not long without offers. Her usual answer was to point out +the tiny Berenice, playing in the garden with her nurse. Then a +landscape painter, one of the Barbizon group, appeared, and, as a former +associate of Rudolph Côt, and a man of means and position, his suit was +successful. To the astonishment of Villiers-le-Bel, Madame Valerie Côt +became Madame Théophile Mineur; on the day of the wedding little +Berenice--named after a particularly uncanny heroine of Poe's by his +relentless French admirer--scratched the long features of her +stepfather. The entire town accepted this as a distressing omen and it +was not deceived; Berenice Côt grew up in the likeness of a determined +young lady whose mother weakly endured her tyranny, whose new father +secretly feared her. + +At the age of eighteen she had refused nearly all the young painters +between Ecouen and Domaine de Vallières; and had spent several summers +in England, and four years at a Lausanne school. She feared neither man +nor mouse, and once, when she saw a famous Polish pianist walking on his +terrace at Morges, she took him by the hand, asked for a lock of his +hair, and was not refused by the amiable virtuoso. After that Berenice +was the acknowledged leader of her class. The teachers trembled before +her sparkling, wrathful black eyes. At home she ruled the household, and +as she was an heiress no one dared to contradict her. Her contempt for +her stepfather was only matched by her impatience in the company of +young men. She pretended--so her intimates said--to loathe them. +"Frivolous idiots" was her mildest form of reproof when an ambitious boy +would trench upon her pet art theories or attempt to flirt. She called +her mother "the lamb" and her stepfather "the parrot"--he had a long +curved nose; all together she was very unlike the pattern French girl. +Her favourite lounging place was the wall, and after she had draped it +with a scarlet shawl and perched herself upon it, she was only too +happy to worry any unfortunate man who presented himself. + +The night Hubert Falcroft called at Chalfontaine Mademoiselle Élise +Evergonde told him that her cousin, Madame Mineur, and Berenice had gone +in the direction of the pool. He had walked over from the station, +preferring the open air to the stuffy train. So a few vigorous steps +brought to his view mother and daughter as they slowly moved, encircling +each other's waist. The painter paused and noted the general loveliness +of the picture; the setting sun had splashed the blue basin overhead +with delicate pinks, and in the fretted edges of some high floating +cloud-fleece there was a glint of fire. The smooth grass parquet swept +gracefully to the semicircle of dark green trees, against the foliage of +which the virginal white of the gowns was transposed to an ivory tone by +the blue and green keys in sky and forest. + +"By Jove!" he exclaimed, "paint in the foreground a few peacocks +languidly dragging their gorgeous tails, and you have a Watteau or a +Fragonard--no, a Monticelli! Only, Monticelli would have made the +peacocks the central motive with the women and trees as an arabesque." + +He was a portraitist who solemnly believed in the principle of +decoration--character must take its chances when he painted. Falcroft +was successful with women's heads, which he was fond of depicting in +misty shadows framed by luxurious accessories. They called him the +Master of Chiffon, at Julien's; when he threw overboard his old friends +and joined the new crowd, their indignation was great. His title now was +the Ribbon Impressionist, and at the last salon of the Independents, +Falcroft had the mortification of seeing a battalion of his former +companions at anchor in front of his picture, The Lady with the Cat, +which they reviled for at least an hour. He was an American who had +lived his life long in France, and only showed race in his nervous, +brilliant technic and his fondness for bizarre subjects.... + +He had not stood many minutes when a young voice saluted him:-- + +"Ah, Monsieur Falcroft. Come, come quickly. Mamma is delighted to see +you!" His mental picture was decomposed by the repeated waving of the +famous shawl, which only came into view as Berenice turned. Hubert +regretted that she had not worn it--the peacocks could have been +exchanged for its vivid note of scarlet. Pretending not to have heard +her speech, he gravely saluted the mother and daughter. But Berenice was +unabashed. + +"Mamma was wondering if you would visit us to-night, Monsieur Falcroft, +when I saw you staring at us as if we were ghosts." A burst of malicious +laughter followed. + +"Berenice, Berenice," remonstrated her mother, "when will you cease such +tasteless remarks!" She blushed in her pretty matronly fashion and put +her hand on her daughter's mouth. + +"Don't mind her, Madame Mineur! I like to meet a French girl with a +little unconventionality. Berenice reminds me now of an English girl--" + +"Or one of your own countrywomen!" interrupted Berenice; "and +please--_Miss_, after this, I am a grown young lady." He joined in the +merriment. She was not to be resisted and he wished--no, he did not +wish--but he thought, that if he were younger, what gay days he might +have. Yet he admired her mother much more. Elaine Côt-Mineur was an +old-fashioned woman, gentle, reserved, and at the age when her beauty +had a rare autumnal quality--the very apex of its perfection; in a few +years, in a year, perhaps, the change would come and crabbed winter set +in. He particularly admired the oval of her face, her soft brown eyes, +and the harmonious contour of her head. He saw her instantly with a +painter's imagination--filmy lace must modulate about her head like a +dreamy aureole; across her figure a scarf of yellow silk; in her hands +he would paint a crystal vase, and in the vase one rose with a heart of +sulphur. And her eyes would gaze as if she saw the symbol of her +age--the days slipping away like ropes of sand from her grasp. He could +make a fascinating portrait he thought, and he said so. Instantly +another peal of irritating laughter came from Berenice:-- + +"Don't tell papa. He is _so_ jealous of the portrait he tried to make of +mamma last summer. You never saw it! It's awful. It's hid away behind a +lot of canvases in the atelier. It looks like a Cézanne still-life. I'll +show it to you sometime." Her mother revealed annoyance by compressing +her lips. Falcroft said nothing. They had skirted the pool in single +file, for the path was narrow and the denseness of the trees caused a +partial obscurity. When they reached the wall, the moon was rising in +the eastern sky. + +"_L'heure exquise_," murmured Madame Mineur. Berenice wandered down the +road and Hubert helped her mother to the wall, where he sat beside her +and looked at her. He was a big, muscular man with shaven cheeks, dark +eyes, and plenty of tumbled hair, in which flecks of gray were showing. +He had been a classmate of Théophile Mineur, for whose talents or +personality he had never betrayed much liking. But one day at a +_déjeûner_, which had prolonged itself until evening, Mineur insisted on +his old friend--the Burgundy was old, too--accompanying him to +Villiers-le-Bel, and not without a motive. He knew Falcroft to be rich, +and he would not be sorry to see his capricious and mischievous +stepdaughter well settled. But Falcroft immediately paid court to Madame +Mineur, and Berenice had to content herself with watching him and making +fun to her stepfather of the American painter's height and gestures. +The visit had been repeated. Berenice was amused by a dinner _en ville_ +and a theatre party, and then Hubert Falcroft became a friend of the +household. When Mineur was away painting, the visits were not +interrupted. + +"Listen," said Madame Mineur; "I wish to speak with you seriously, my +dear friend." She made a movement as if to place her hand on his +shoulder, but his expression--his face was in the light--caused her to +transfer her plump fingers to her coiffure, which she touched +dexterously. Hubert was disappointed. + +"I am listening," he answered; "is it a sermon, or consent--to that +portrait? Come, give in--Elaine." He had never called her by this name +before, and he anxiously awaited the result. But she did not relax her +grave attitude. + +"You must know, Monsieur Falcroft, what anxieties we undergo about +Berenice. She is too wild for a French girl, too wild for her age--" + +"Oh, let her enjoy her youth," he interrupted. + +"Alas! that youth will be soon a thing of the past," she sighed. +"Berenice is past eighteen, and her father and I must consider her +future. Figure to yourself--she dislikes young men, eligible or not, and +you are the only man she tolerates." + +"And I am hopelessly ineligible," he laughingly said. + +"Why?" asked the mother, quietly. + +"Why! Do you know that I am nearing forty? Do you see the pepper and +salt in my hair? After one passes twoscore it is time to think of the +past, not of the future. I am over the brow of the hill; I see the easy +decline of the road--it doesn't seem as long as when I climbed the other +half." He smiled, threw back his strong shoulders, and inhaled a huge +breath of air. + +"Truly you are childish," she said; "you are at the best part of your +life, of your career. Yes, Théophile, my husband, who is so chary in his +praise, said that you would go far if you cared." Her low, warm voice, +with its pleading inflections, thrilled him. He took her by the wrist. + +"And would it please _you_, if I went far?" She trembled. + +"Not too far, dear friend--remember Berenice." + +"I remember no one but you," he impatiently answered; and relaxing his +hold, he moved so that the moonlight shone on her face. She was pale. In +her eyes there were fright and hope, decision and delight. He admired +her more than ever. + +"Let me paint you, Elaine, these next few weeks. It will be a surprise +for Mineur. And I shall have something to cherish. Never mind about +Berenice. She is a child. I am a middle-aged man. Between us is the +wall--of the years. Never should it be climbed. While you--" + +"Be careful--Hubert. Théophile is your friend." + +"He is not. I never cared for him. He dragged me out here after he had +been drinking too much, and when I saw you I could not stay away. Hear +me--I insist! Berenice is nice, but the wall is too high for her to +climb; it might prove a--" + +"How do you know the wall is too steep for Berenice?" the girl cried as +she scaled the top with apish agility, where, after a few mocking steps +in the moonlight, she sank down breathless beside Hubert, and laughed so +loudly that her mother was fearful of hysteria. + +"Berenice! Berenice!" she exclaimed. + +"Oh, Berenice is all right, mamma. Master Hubert, I want you to paint my +portrait before papa returns--that's to be in four weeks, isn't it?" The +elder pair regarded her disconcertedly. + +"Oh, you needn't look so dismal. I'll not tell tales out of school. +Hubert and mamma flirting! What a glorious jest! Isn't life a jest, +Hubert? Let's make a bargain! If you paint mamma, you paint me, also. +Then--you see--papa will not be jealous, and--and--" She was near tears +her mother felt, and she leaned over Hubert and took the girl's hand. +She grazed the long fingers of the painter, who at once caught both +feminine hands in his. + +"Now I have you both," he boasted, and was shocked by a vicious tap on +the cheek--Berenice in rage pulled her left hand free. Silence ensued. +Hubert prudently began to roll another cigarette, and Madame Mineur +retreated out of the moonlight, while Berenice turned her back and soon +began to hum. The artist spoke first: + +"See here, you silly Berenice, turn around! I want to talk to you like a +Dutch uncle--as we say in the United States. Of course I'll paint you. +But I begin with your mother. And if you wish me to like you better than +ever, don't say such things as you did. It hurts your--mother." His +voice dropped into its deepest bass. She faced him, and he saw the +glitter of wet eyelashes. She was charming, with her hair in disorder, +her eyes two burning points of fire. + +"I beg your pardon, mamma; I beg your pardon, Hubert. I'll be good the +rest of this evening. Isn't it lovely?" She sniffed in the breeze with +dilating nostrils, and the wild look of her set him to wondering how +such a gentle mother could have such a gypsy daughter. Perhaps it was +the father--yes, the old man had been an Apache in his youth according +to the slang of the studios. + +"But you must paint me as I wish, not as you will," resumed Berenice. "I +hate conventional portraits. Papa Mineur chills me with his cabinet +pictures of haughty society ladies, their faces as stiff as their +starched gowns." + +"Oh, Berenice, will you never say polite things of your father?" + +"Never," she defiantly replied. "He wouldn't believe me if I did. No, +Hubert, I want to pose as Ophelia. Oh, don't laugh, please!" They could +not help it, and she leaped to the grass and called out:-- + +"I don't mean a theatrical Ophelia, singing songs and spilling flowers; +I mean Ophelia drowned--" she threw herself on the sward, her arms +crossed on her bosom, and in the moonlight they could see her eyes +closed as if by death. + +"Help me down, Hubert. That girl will go mad some day." He reached the +earth and he gave her a hand. Berenice had arisen. Sulkily she said:-- + +"Shall I step into the Dark Tarn of Auber and float for you? I'll make a +realistic picture, my Master Painter--who paints without imagination." +And then she darted into the shrubbery and was lost to view. Without +further speech the two regained the path and returned to the house. + + +II + +THE CRIMSON SPLASH + +When Éloise was asked by Berenice how long Monsieur Mineur would remain +away on his tour, she did not reply. Rather, she put a question herself: +why this sudden solicitude about the little-loved stepfather. Berenice +jokingly answered that she thought of slipping away to Switzerland for +a _vacance_ on her own account. Éloise, who was not agreeable looking, +viewed her charge suspiciously. + +"Young lady, you are too deep for me. But you'll bear watching," she +grimly confessed. Berenice skipped about her teasingly. + +"I know something, but I won't tell, unless you tell." + +"What is it?" + +"Will you tell?" + +"Yes." + +"When is he coming back, and where is he now?" she insisted. + +"Your father, you half-crazy child, expects to return in a month--by the +first of June. And if you wish to wire or write him, let me know." + +"Now I won't tell you _my_ secret," and she was off like a gale of wind. +Éloise shook her head and wondered. + +In the atelier Hubert painted. Elaine sat on a dais, her hands folded in +her lap; about her head twisted nun's-veiling gave her the old-fashioned +quality of a Cosway miniature--the very effect he had sought. It was to +be a "pretty" affair, this picture, with its subdued lighting, the face +being the only target he aimed at; all the rest, the suave background, +the gauzy draperies, he would brush in--suggest rather than state. + +"I'll paint her soul, that sensitive soul of hers which tremulously +peeps out of her eyes," he thought. Elaine was a patient subject. She +took the pose naturally and scarcely breathed during the weary sittings. +He recalled the early gossip and sought to evoke her as a professional +model. But he gave up in despair. She was hopelessly "ladylike," and to +interpret her adequately, only the decorative patterns of earlier +men--Mignard, Van Loo, Nattier, Largillière--would translate her native +delicacy. + +For nearly four weeks he had laboured on the face, painting it in with +meticulous touches only to rub it out with savage disgust. To transcribe +those tranquil, liquid eyes, their expression more naïve than her +daughter's--this had proved too difficult a problem for the usually +facile technique of Falcroft. Give him a brilliant virtuoso theme and he +could handle it with some of the sweep and splendour of the early +Carolus Duran or the brutal elegance of the later Boldini. But Madame +Mineur was a pastoral. She did not express nervous gesture. She was +seldom dynamic. To "do" her in dots like the _pointillistes_ or in +touches after the manner of the earlier impressionists would be +ridiculous. Her abiding charm was her repose. She brought to him the +quiet values of an eighteenth-century eclogue--he saw her as a divinely +artificial shepherdess watching an unreal flock, while the haze of +decorative atmosphere would envelop her, with not a vestige of real life +on the canvas. Yet he knew her as a natural, lovable woman, a mother who +had suffered and would suffer because of her love for her only child. +It was a paradox, like many other paradoxes of art. + +The daughter--ah! perhaps she might better suit his style. She was +admirable in her madcap carelessness and exotic colouring. Decidedly he +would paint her when this picture was finished--if it ever would be. + +Berenice avoided entering the studio during these sittings. She no +longer jested with her mother about the picture, and with Hubert she +preserved such an air of dignity that he fancied he had offended her. He +usually came to Villiers-le-Bel on an early train three or four times a +week and remained at Chalfontaine until ten o'clock. Never but once had +a severe storm forced him to stay overnight. Since the episode on the +wall he had not attempted any further advances. He felt happy in the +company of Elaine, and gazing into her large eyes rested his spirit. It +was true--he no longer played with ease the rôle of a soul-hunter. His +youth had been troubled by many adventures, many foolish ones, and now +he felt a calm in the midway of his life and that desire for domestic +ease which sooner or later overtakes all men. He fancied himself +painting Elaine on just such tranquil summer afternoons under a soft +light. And oh! the joys of long walks, discreet gossip, and dinners at a +well-served table with a few chosen friends. Was he, after all, longing +for the flesh-pots of the philistine--he, Hubert Falcroft, who had +patrolled the boulevards like other sportsmen of midnight! + +At last the picture began to glow with that inner light he had so +patiently pursued. Elaine Mineur looked at him from the canvas with +veiled sweetness, a smile almost enigmatic lurking about her lips. +Deepen a few lines and her expression would be one of contented +sleekness. _That_ Hubert had missed by a stroke. It was in her eyes that +her chief glory abided. They were pathetic without resignation, liquid +without humidity, indescribable in colouring and form. Their full cup +and the accents which experience had graven under them were something he +had never dreamed of realizing. It was a Cosway; but a Cosway broadened +and without a hint of genteel namby-pamby or overelaborate finesse. +Hubert was fairly satisfied. Madame Mineur had little to say. During the +sittings she seldom spoke, and if their eyes met, the richness of her +glance was a compensation for her lack of loquacity. Hubert did not +complain. He was in no hurry. To be under the same roof with this +adorable woman was all that he asked. + +The day after he had finished his picture, he returned to Chalfontaine +for the midday breakfast. Berenice was absent--in her room with a +headache, her mother explained. The weather was sultry. He questioned +Elaine during the meal. Had Berenice's temper improved? They passed out +to the balcony where their coffee was served, and when he lighted his +cigarette, Madame Mineur begged to be excused. She had promised Cousin +Éloise to pay some calls. He strolled over the lawn, watching the +hummocks of white clouds which piled up in architectural masses across +the southern sky. Then he remembered the portrait and mounted to the +atelier. As he put his hand on the knob of the door he thought he heard +some one weeping. Suddenly the door was pulled from his grasp and +Berenice appeared. Her hair hung on her shoulders. She was in a white +dressing-gown. Her face was red and her eyes swollen. She did not +attempt to move. Affectionately Hubert caught her in his arms and asked +about her headache. + +"It is better," she answered in scarcely audible accents. + +"Why, you poor child! I hope you are not going to be ill! Have you been +racing in the sun without your hat?" + +"No. I haven't been out of doors since yesterday." + +"What's the matter, little Berenice? Has some one been cross with her?" +She pushed him from her violently. + +"Hubert Falcroft, when you treat me as a woman and not as a child--" + +"But I am treating you as a woman," he said. Her dark face became +tragic. She had emerged from girlhood in a few hours. And as he held her +closer some perverse spirit entered into his soul. Her vibrating youth +and beauty forced him to gaze into her blazing eyes until he saw the +pupils contract. + +"Let me go!" she panted. "Let me free! I am not a doll. Go to your +portrait and worship it. Let me free!" + +"And what if I do not?" Something of her rebellious feeling filled his +veins. He felt younger, stronger, fiercer. He put his arms about her +neck and, after a silent battle, kissed her. Then she pushed by him and +disappeared. He could see nothing, after the shock of the adventure, for +some moments, and the semi-obscurity of the atelier was grateful to his +eyes. A picture stood on the easel, but it was not, he fancied, the +portrait. He went to the centre of the room where hung the cords that +controlled the curtains covering the glass roof. Then in the flood of +light he barely recognized the head of Elaine. It was on the easel, and +with a sharp pain at his heart he saw across the face a big crimson +splash. + + * * * * * + + +III + +MOON-RAYS + +The dewy brightness of tangled blush roses had faded in the vague +twilight; through the aisles of the little wood leading to the pool the +light timidly flickered as Hubert and Elaine walked with the hesitating +steps of perplexed persons. They had not spoken since they left the +house--there in a few hurried words he told her of the accident and +noted with sorrow the look of anguish in her eyes. Without knowing why, +they went in the direction of the wall. + +There was no moon when they reached the highroad. It would rise later, +Elaine said in her low, slightly monotonous voice. Hubert was so stunned +by the memory of his ruined picture that he forgot his earlier encounter +with Berenice--that is, in describing it he had failed to minutely +record his behaviour. But in the cool evening air his conscience became +alive and he guiltily wondered whether he dare tell his misconduct--no, +imprudence? Why not? She regarded him as a possible husband for +Berenice--but how embarrassing! He made up his mind to say nothing; when +the morrow came he would write Elaine the truth and bid her good-by. He +could not in honour continue to visit this home where resided the woman +he loved--with a jealous daughter. Why jealous? What a puzzle, and what +an absurd one! He helped Elaine to a seat on the wall and sat near her. +For several minutes neither spoke. They were again facing the pool, +which looked in the dusk like a cracked mirror. + +"It is not clear yet to me," murmured Elaine. "That the unfortunate +child has always been more or less morbid and sick-brained, I have been +aware. The world, marriage, and active existence will mend all that, I +hope. I fear she is a little spoilt and selfish. And she doesn't love me +very much. She has inherited all her father's passion for Poe's tales. +My dear friend, she is jealous--that's the only solution of this +shocking act. She disliked the idea of my portrait from the start. You +remember on this spot hardly a month ago she challenged you to paint her +as the drowned Ophelia!--and all her teasing about Monsieur Mineur and +his jealousy, and--" + +"Our flirtation," added Hubert, sadly. + +"Oh, pray do not say such a thing! She is so hot-headed, so fond of you. +Yes, I saw it from the beginning, and your talk about the insurmountable +wall of middle-age did not deceive me. I only hope that will not be a +tragic wall for her, for you--or for me...." + +Her words trailed into a mere whisper. He put his hand over hers and +again they were silent. About them the green of the forest had been +transformed by the growing night into great clumps of velvety darkness +and the vault overhead was empty of stars. June airs fanned their +discontent into mild despair, and simultaneously they dreamed of another +life, of a harmonious existence far from Paris, into which the phantom +of Théophile Mineur would never intrude. Yet they made no demonstration +of their affection--they would have been happy to sit and dream on this +moon-haunted wall, near this nocturnal pool, forever. Hubert pictured +Berenice in her room, behind bolted doors, lying across the bed weeping, +or else staring in sullen repentance at the white ceiling. Why had she +indulged in such vandalism? The portrait was utterly destroyed by the +flaring smear laid on with a brush in the hand of an enraged young +animal. What sort of a woman might not develop from this tempestuous +girl! He knew that he had mortally offended her by his rudeness. But it +was after, not before, the cruel treatment of his beloved work. Yet, how +like a man had been his rapid succumbing to transitory temptation! For +it was transitory--of that he was sure. The woman he loved, with a +reverent love, was next to him, and if his pulse did not beat as +furiously at this moment as earlier in the day, why--all the better. He +was through forever with his boyish recklessness. + +"Another peculiar thing," broke in Elaine, as if she had been thinking +aloud, "is that Berenice has been pestering Éloise for her father's +address." + +"Her father's address?" echoed her companion. + +"Yes; but whether she wrote to him Éloise could not say." + +"Why should she write to him? She dislikes him--dislikes him almost as +much--" he was about to pronounce his own name. She caught him up. + +"Yes, that is the singular part of this singular affair. She felt +slighted because you painted my portrait before hers. I confess I have +had my misgivings. You should have been more considerate of her +feelings, Hubert, my friend." She paused and sighed. For him the sigh +was a spark that blew up the magazine of his firmest resolves. He had +been touching her hands fraternally. His arm embraced her so that she +could not escape, as this middle-aged man told his passion with the +ardour of an enamoured youth. + +"You dare not tell me you do not care for me! Elaine--let us reason. I +loved you since the first moment I met you. It is folly to talk of +Mineur and my friendship for him. I dislike, I despise him. It is folly +to talk of Berenice and her childish pranks. What if she did cruelly +spoil my work, _our_ work! She will get over it. Girls always do get +over these things. Let us accept conditions as they are. Say you love +me--a little bit--and I'll be content to remain at your side, a friend, +_always_ that. I'll paint you again--much more beautifully than before." +He was hoarse from the intensity of his feelings. The moon had risen and +tipped with its silver brush the tops of the trees. + +"And--my husband? And Berenice?" + +"Let things remain as they are." He pressed her to him. A crackling in +the underbrush and a faint plash in the lake startled them asunder. They +listened with ears that seemed like beating hearts. There was no +movement; only a night bird plaintively piped in the distance and a +clock struck the quarter. + +Elaine, now thoroughly frightened, tried to get down from the wall. +Hubert restrained her, and as they stood thus, a moaning like the wind +in autumnal leaves reached them. The moon-rays began to touch the water, +and suddenly a nimbus of light formed about a floating face in the pool. +The luminous path broadened, and to their horror they saw Berenice, her +hair outspread, her arms crossed on her young bosom, lying in the little +lake. Elaine screamed:-- + +"My God! My God! It is Berenice!--Berenice, I am punished for my +wickedness to you!" Hubert, stunned by the vision, did not stir, as the +almost fainting mother gripped his neck. + +And then the eyes of the whimsical girl opened. A malicious smile +distorted her pretty face. Slowly she arose, a dripping ghost in white, +and pointing her long, thin fingers in the direction of the Ecouen road +she mockingly cried:-- + +"There is some one to see your portrait at last, dear Master Painter." +And saying this she vanished in the gloom, instantly followed by her +agitated mother. + +Hubert turned toward the wall, and upon it he recognized the stepfather +of Berenice. After staring at each other like two moon-struck wights, +the American spoke:-- + +"I swear that I, alone, am to blame for this--" The other wore the grin +of a malevolent satyr. His voice was thick. + +"Why apologize, Hubert? You know that it has been my devoted wish that +you marry Berenice." He swayed on his perch. Hubert's brain was in a +fog. + +"Berenice!" said he. + +"Yes--Berenice. Why not? She loves you." + +"Then--you--Madame Mineur--" stammered Hubert. The Frenchman placed his +finger on his nose and slyly whispered:-- + +"Don't be afraid! I'll not tell my wife that I caught Berenice with you +alone in the park--you Don Juan! Now to the portrait--I must see that +masterpiece of yours. Berenice wrote me about it." He nodded his head +sleepily. + +"Berenice wrote you about it!" was the mechanical reply. + +"I'll join you and we'll go to the house." He tried to step down, but +rolled over at Hubert's feet. + +"What a joke is this champagne," he growled as he was lifted to his +tottering legs. "We had a glorious time this afternoon before I left +Paris. Hurrah! You're to be my son-in-law. And, my boy, I don't envy +you--that's the truth. With such a little demon for a wife--I pity you, +pity you--hurrah!" + +"I am more to be despised," muttered Hubert Falcroft, as they moved away +from the peaceful moonlit wall. + + + + +XIII + +A SENTIMENTAL REBELLION + + I came not to send peace, but a sword.... I am come to send fire on + the earth. + + +I + +Her living room was a material projection of Yetta Silverman's soul. The +apartment on the north side of Tompkins Square, was small, sunny, and +comfortable. From its windows in spring and summer she could see the +boys and girls playing around the big, bare park, and when her eyes grew +tired of the street she rested them on her beloved books and pictures. +On one wall hung the portraits of Herzen, Bakounine and Kropotkin--the +Father, Son, and Holy Ghost of the anarchistic movement, as she piously +called them. Other images of the propaganda were scattered over the +walls: Netschajew--the St. Paul of the Nihilists--Ravachol, Octave +Mirbeau, Jean Grave, Reclus, Spies, Parsons, Engels, and Lingg--the last +four victims of the Haymarket affair, and the Fenians, Allen, Larkin, +and O'Brien, the Manchester martyrs. Among the philosophers, poets, and +artists were Schopenhauer, Tolstoy, Max Stirner--a rare drawing--Ibsen, +Thoreau, Emerson--the great American individualists--Beethoven, Zola, +Richard Strauss, Carlyle, Nietzsche, Gorky, Walt Whitman, Dostoiēwsky, +Mazzini, Rodin, Constantin Meunier, Shelley, Turgénieff, Bernard Shaw, +and finally the kindly face and intellectual head of the lawyer who so +zealously defended the Chicago anarchists. This diversified group, +together with much revolutionary literature, poems, pamphlets, the works +of Proudhon, Songs Before Sunrise, by Swinburne, and a beautiful etching +of Makart's proletarian Christ, completed, with an old square +pianoforte, the ensemble of an individual room, a room that expressed, +as her admirers said, the strong, suffering soul of Yetta Silverman, +Russian anarchist, agitator, and exile. + +"Come in," she cried out in her sharp, though not unpleasant, voice. A +thin young man entered. She clapped her hands. + +"Oh, so you changed your mind!" He looked at her over his glasses with +his weak, blue eyes, the white of which predominated. Simply dressed, he +nevertheless gave the impression of superior social station. He was of +the New England theological-seminary type--narrow-chested, gaunt as to +visage, by temperament drawn to theology, or, in default of religious +belief, an ardent enthusiast in sociology. The contracted temples, +uncertain gaze, and absence of fulness beneath the eyes betrayed the +unimaginative man. Art was a sealed book to him, though taxation fairly +fired his suspicious soul. He was nervous because he was dyspeptic, and +at one time of his career he mistook stomach trouble for a call to the +pulpit. And he was a millionnaire more times than he took the trouble to +count. + +"Yes," he timidly replied, "I _did_ change my wavering mind--as you call +that deficient organ of mine--and so I returned. I hope I don't disturb +you!" + +"No, not yet. I am sitting with my hands folded in my lap, like the +women of your class--_ladies_, you call them." She accented the title, +without bitterness. A cursory estimate of her appearance would have +placed her in the profession of a trained nurse, or perhaps in the +remotest analysis, a sewing woman of superior tastes. She was small, +wiry, her head too large for her body; but the abounding nervous +vitality, the harsh fire that burned in her large brown eyes, and the +firm mouth would have attracted the attention of the most careless. Her +mask, with its high Slavic cheek-bones and sharp Jewish nose, proclaimed +her a magnetic woman. In her quarter on the far East Side the children +called her "Aunt Yetta." She was a sister of charity in the guise of a +revolutionist. + +"You sit but you think, and _my_ ladies never think," he answered, in +his boyish voice. He seemed proud to be so near this distinguished +creature. Had she not been sent to Siberia, driven out of France and +Germany, and arrested in New York for her incendiary speeches? She +possessed the most extraordinary power over an audience. Once, at Cooper +Union, Arthur had seen her control a crazy mob bent on destroying the +building because a few stupid police had interfered with the meeting. +Among her brethren Yetta Silverman was classed with Louise Michel, +Sophia Perowskaia, and Vera Zassoulitch, those valiant women, true +guardian angels, veritable martyrs to the cause. He thought of them as +he watched the delicate-looking young woman before him. + +Arthur was too chilly of blood to fall in love with her; his admiration +was purely cerebral. He was unlucky enough to have had for a father a +shrewd, visionary man, that curious combination of merchant and dreamer +once to be found in New England. A follower of Fourier, a friend of +Emerson, the elder Wyartz had gone to Brook Farm and had left it in a +few months. Dollars, not dreams, was his true ambition. But he +registered his dissatisfaction with this futile attempt by christening +his only son, Arthur Schopenhauer; it was old Wyartz's way of getting +even with the ideal. Obsessed from the age of spelling by his +pessimistic middle name, the boy had grown up in a cloudy compromise of +rebellion and the church. For a few years he vacillated; he went to +Harvard, studied the Higher Criticism, made a trip abroad, wrote a +little book recording the contending impulses of his pale, harassed +soul--Oscillations was the title--and returned to Boston a mild anarch. +Emerson the mystic, transposed to the key of France, sometimes makes +bizarre music. + +She arose and, walking over to him, put her hand nonchalantly on his +shoulder. + +"Arthur, comrade, what do you mean to do with yourself--come, what will +all this enthusiasm bring forth?" He fumbled his glasses with his thumb +and index finger--a characteristic gesture--and nervously regarded her +before answering. Then he smiled at his idea. + +"We might marry and fight the great fight together like the Jenkins +crowd." + +"Marry!" she exclaimed--her guttural Russian accent manifested itself +when she became excited--"marry! You are only a baby, Arthur +Schopenhauer Wyartz--_Herrgott_, this child bears _such_ a name!--and +while I am sure the thin Yankee blood of the Jenkins family needed a +Jewish wife, and a Slav, I am not that way of thinking for myself. I am +married to the revolution." Her eyes dwelt with reverence on her new +Christian saints, those Christs of the gutter, who had sacrificed their +lives in the modern arena for the idea of liberty, who were thrown to +the wild beasts and slaughtered by the latter-day pagans of wealth, and +barbarians in purple. He followed her glance. It lashed him to jerky +enthusiasm. + +"I am not joking," he earnestly asserted, "so pardon my rashness. Only +believe in my sincerity. I am no anarch on paper. I am devoted to your +cause and to you, Yetta, to my last heart's blood. Do you need my +wealth? It is yours. You can work miracles with millions in America. +Take it all." + +"It's not money we need, but men," she answered darkly. "Your millions, +which came to you innocently enough, represent the misery of--how many? +Let the multi-millionnaires give away their money to found theological +colleges and libraries--_my_ party will have none of it. Its men are +armed by the ideas that we prefer. I don't blame the rich or the +political tyrants--the mob has to be educated, the unhappy proletarians, +who have so long submitted to the crack of the whip that they wouldn't +know what to do with their freedom if they had it. All mobs believe +alike in filth and fire, whether antique slaves free for their day's +Saturnalia, or the Paris crowds of '93. Their ideas of happiness are +pillage, bloodshed, drunkenness, revenge. Every popular uprising sinks +the _people_ deeper in their misery. Every bomb thrown discredits the +cause of liberty." + +Astonished by this concession, Arthur wondered how she had ever earned +her reputation as the Russian "Red Virgin," as an unequivocal terrorist. +Thus he had heard her hailed at all the meetings which she addressed. +But she did not notice his perturbation, she was following another +train. + +"You Americans do not love money as much as the Europeans--who hoard it +away, who worship it on their naked knees; but you do something +worse--you love it for the sake of the sport, a cruel sport for the +poor. You go into speculation as the English go after big game. It is a +sport. This sport involves food--and you gamble with wheat and meat for +counters, while starving men and women pay for the game. America is yet +rich enough to afford this sport, but some day it will become crowded +like Europe, and then, beware! Wasn't it James Hinton who said that +'Overthrowing society means an inverted pyramid getting straight'? + +"And America," she continued, "bribes us with the gilded sentimental +phrases of Rousseau, Mirabeau, and Thomas Paine woven into your national +constitution, with its presumptuous declaration that all men are born +free and equal--shades of Darwin and Nietzsche!--and that universal +suffrage is a panacea for all evils. In no country boasting itself +Christian is there a system so artfully devised for keeping the _poor_ +free and unequal, no country where so-called public opinion, as +expressed in the press, is used to club the majority into submission. +And you are all proud of this liberty--a liberty at which the despised +serf in Russia or the man of the street in London sneers--there is +to-day more _individual_ liberty in England and Germany than in the +United States. Don't smile! I can prove it. As for France or Italy--they +are a hundred years ahead of you in municipal government. But I shan't +talk blue-books at you, Arthur!" + +"Why not, why not?" he quickly interposed. "You always impress me by +your easy handling of facts. And why won't my money be of use to the +social revolution?" Scornfully she started up again and began walking. + +"Why? Because convictions can't be bought with cash! Why! Because +philanthropy is the most selfish of vices. You may do good here and +there--but you do more harm. You create more paupers, you fine +gentlemen, with your Mission houses and your Settlement workers! You are +trying to cover the ugly sores with a plaster of greenbacks. It won't +heal the sickness--it won't heal it, I tell you." Her eyes were flaming +and she stamped the floor passionately. + +"We workers on the East Side have a name for you millionnaires. We call +you the White Mice. You have pretty words and white lies, pretty ways +and false smiles. Lies! lies! lies! You are only giving back, with the +aid of your superficial fine ladies, the money stolen from the true +money earners. You have discovered the Ghetto--you and the impertinent +newspaper men. And like the reporters you come down to use us for +'copy.' You live here in comfort among us and then go away, write a book +about our wretchedness and pose as altruistic heroes in your own silly +set. How I loathe that word--altruism! As if the sacrifice of your +personality does not always lead to self-deception, to hypocrisy! It is +an excuse for the busybody-rich to advertise their charities. If they +were as many armed as Briareus or the octopus, their charity would be +known to each and every hand on their arms. These sentimental anarchs! +They even marry our girls and carry them off to coddle their conscience +with gilded gingerbread. Yet they would turn their backs on Christ if he +came to Hester Street--Christ, the first modern anarch, a +destructionist, a proletarian who preached fire and sword for the evil +rich of his times. Nowadays he would be sent to Blackwell's Island for +six months as a disturber of the peace or for healing without a license +from the County Medical Association!" + +"Like Johann Most," he ventured. She blazed at the name. + +"No jokes, please. Most, too, has suffered. But I am no worshipper of +bombs--and beer." This made him laugh, but as the laugh was not echoed +he stared about him. + +"But Yetta,--we must begin somewhere. I wish to become--to +become--something like you.--" + +She interrupted him roughly: + +"To become--you an anarch! You are a sentimental rebel because your +stomach is not strong enough for the gourmands who waste their time at +your clubs. If your nerves were sound you might make a speech. But the +New England conscience of your forefathers--they were nearly all +clergymen, weren't they?--has ruined your strength. The best thing you +can do, my boy, is to enter a seminary and later go to China as a +missionary; else turn literary and edit an American edition of Who's Who +in Hell! But leave our East Side alone. Do you know what New York +reminds me of? Its centre is a strip of green and gold between two +smouldering red rivers of fire--the East and West Sides. If they ever +spill over the banks, all the little parasites of greater parasites, the +lawyers, brokers, bankers, journalists, ecclesiastics, and middle men, +will be devoured. Oh, what a glorious day! And oh, that terrible night +when we marched behind the black flag and muffled drums down Broadway, +that night in 1887 when the four martyrs were murdered, the hero Lingg +having killed himself. What would you have done in those awful times?" + +"Try me," he muttered, as he pulled down his cuffs, "try me!" + +"Very well, I'll try you. Like Carlo Cafiero, the rich Italian anarch, +you must give your money to us--every cent of it. Come with me to-night. +I address a meeting of the brethren at Schwab's place--you know, the +saloon across the street, off the square. We can eat our supper there, +and then--" + +"Try me," he reiterated, and his voice was hoarse with emotion, his +pulse painfully irregular. + + +II + +Notwithstanding his vows of heroism, Arthur could not force himself to +like the establishment of Schwab, where the meeting was to take place. +It was a beer-saloon, not one of those mock-mediæval uptown palaces, but +a long room with a low ceiling, gaslit and shabby. The tables and chairs +of hard, coarse wood were greasy--napkins and table-cloths were not to +be mentioned, else would the brethren suspect the presence of an +aristocrat. At the upper end, beyond the little black bar, there was a +platform, upon it a table, a pianoforte, and a stool. Still he managed +to conceal his repugnance to all these uninviting things and he sipped +his diluted Rhine wine, ate his sandwich--an unpalatable one--under the +watchful eyes of his companion. By eight o'clock the room was jammed +with working-people, all talking and in a half dozen tongues. +Occasionally Yetta left him to join a group, and where she went silence +fell. She was the oracle of the crowd. At nine o'clock Arthur's head +ached. He had smoked all his Turkish cigarettes, the odour of which +caused some surprise--there was a capitalist present and they knew him. +Only Yetta prevented disagreeable comment. The men, who belonged to the +proletarian class, were poorly dressed and intelligent; the women wore +shawls on their heads and smoked bad cigarettes. The saloon did not +smell nice, Arthur thought. He had offered Yetta one of his imported +cigarettes, but she lighted a horrible weed and blew the smoke in his +face. + +At ten o'clock he wished himself away. But a short, stout man with a +lopsided face showing through his tangled beard, stood up and said in +German:-- + +"All who are not _our_ friends, please leave the house." + +No one stirred. The patron went from group to group saluting his +customers and eying those who were not. Whether any password or signal +was given Arthur could not say. When the blond, good-natured Schwab +reached him, Yetta whispered in his ear. The host beamed on the young +American and gave him a friendly poke in the back; Arthur felt as if he +had been knighted. He said this to Yetta, but her attention was +elsewhere. The doors and windows were quickly shut and bolted. She +nudged his elbow--for they were sitting six at the table, much to his +disgust; the other four drank noisily--and he followed her to the top of +the room. A babble broke out as they moved along. + +"It's Yetta's new catch. Yetta's rich fellow. Wait until she gets +through with him--poor devil." These broken phrases made him shiver, +especially as Yetta's expression, at first enigmatic, was now openly +sardonic. What did she mean? Was she only tormenting him? Was this to be +his test, his trial? His head was almost splitting, for the heat was +great and the air bad. Again he wished himself home. + +They reached the platform. "Jump up, Arthur, and help me," she +commanded. He did so. But his discomfiture only grew apace with the +increased heat--the dingy ceiling crushed him--and the rows in front, +the entire floor seemed transformed to eyes, malicious eyes. She told +him to sit down at the piano and play the Marseillaise. Then standing +before the table she drew from her bosom a scarlet flag, and accompanied +by the enthusiastic shoutings she led the singing. Arthur at the +keyboard felt exalted. Forgotten the pains of a moment before. He +hammered the keys vigorously, extorting from the battered instrument a +series of curious croakings. Some of the keys did not "speak," some gave +forth a brazen clangour from the rusty wires. No one cared. The singing +stopped with the last verse. + +"Now La Ravachole for our French brethren." This combination of +revolutionary lyrics--Ça Ira and Carmagnole--was chanted fervidly. Then +came for the benefit of the German the stirring measures from the +Scotch-German John Henry Mackay's Sturm:-- + + Das ist der Kampf, den allnächtlich + Bevor das Dunkel zerrinnt, + Einsam und gramvoll auskämpt + Des Jahrhunderts verlorenes Kind. + +Yetta waved her long and beautifully shaped hands--they were her +solitary vanity. The audience became still. She addressed them at first +in deliberate tones, and Arthur noted that the interest was genuine--he +wondered how long his fat-witted club friends could endure or +appreciate the easy manner in which Yetta Silverman quoted from great +thinkers, and sprinkled these quotations with her own biting +observations. + +"Richard Wagner--who loved humanity when he wrote Siegfried and +regretted that love in Parsifal! + +"Richard Wagner--who loved ice-cream more than Dresden's +freedom--Wagner: the Swiss family bell-ringer of '48! + +"To Max Stirner, Ibsen, and Richard Strauss belongs the twentieth +century! + +"Nietzsche--the anarch of aristocrats! + +"Karl Marx--or the selfish Jew socialist! + +"Lassalle--the Jew comedian of liberty! + +"Bernard Shaw--the clever Celt who would sacrifice socialism for an +epigram. + +"Curse all socialists!" she suddenly screamed. + +Arthur, entranced by the playful manner with which she disposed of +friend and foe, was aghast at this outbreak. He saw another Yetta. Her +face was ugly and revengeful. She sawed the air with her thin arms. + +"Repeat after me," she adjured her hearers, "the Catechism of Sergei +Netschajew, but begin with Herzen's noble motto: 'Long live chaos and +destruction!'" + +"Long live chaos and destruction!" was heartily roared. + +The terrific catechism of the apostle Netschajew made Arthur shake with +alternate woe and wrath. It was bloody-minded beyond description. Like +a diabolic litany boomed the questions and answers:-- + +"Day and night we must have but one thought--inexorable destruction." +And Arthur recalled how this pupil of Bakounine had with the assistance +of Pryow and Nicolajew beguiled a certain suspected friend, Ivanow, into +a lonely garden and killed him, throwing the body into a lake. After +that Netschajew disappeared, though occasionally showing himself in +Switzerland and England. Finally, in 1872, he was nabbed by the Russian +government, sent to Siberia, and--! + +_Ugh!_ thought Arthur, what a people, what an ending! And Yetta--why did +she now so openly proclaim destruction as the only palliative for social +crime when she had so eloquently disclaimed earlier in the day the +propaganda by force, by dagger, and dynamite?--He had hardly asked +himself the question when there came a fierce rapping of wooden clubs at +door and window. Instantly a brooding hush like that which precedes a +hurricane fell upon the gathering. But Yetta did not long remain silent. + +"Quick, Arthur, play the Star-Spangled Banner! It's the police. I want +to save these poor souls--" she added, with a gulp in her throat; +"quick, you idiot, the Star-Spangled Banner." But Arthur was almost +fainting. His ringers fell listlessly on the keys, and they were too +weak to make a sound. The police! he moaned, as the knocking deepened +into banging and shouting. What a scandal! What a disgrace! He could +never face his own world after this! To be caught with a lot of crazy +anarchists in a den like this!--Smash, went the outside door! And the +newspapers! They would laugh him out of town. He, Arthur Schopenhauer +Wyartz, the Amateur Anarch! He saw the hideous headlines. Why, the very +daily in which some of his fortune was invested would be the first to +mock him most! + +The assault outside increased. He leaped to the floor, where Yetta was +surrounded by an excited crowd. He plucked her sleeve. She gazed at him +disdainfully. + +"For God's sake, Yetta, get me out of this--this awful scrape. My +mother, my sisters--the disgrace!" She laughed bitterly. + +"You poor chicken among hawks! But I'll help you--follow me." He reached +the cellar stairs, and she showed him a way by which he could walk +safely into the alley, thence to the street back of their building. He +shook her hand with the intensity of a man in the clutches of the ague. + +"But you--why don't you go with me?" he asked, his teeth chattering. + +The brittle sound of glass breaking was heard. She answered, as she took +his feverish hand:-- + +"Because, you brave revolutionist, I must stick to my colours. +Farewell!" And remounting the stairs, she saw the bluecoats awaiting +her. + +"I hope the police will catch him anyhow," she said. It was her one +relapse into femininity, and as she quietly surrendered she did not +regret it. + + +III + +Old Koschinsky's store on the avenue was the joy of the neighbourhood. +For hours, their smeary faces flattened against the glass, the children +watched the tireless antics of the revolving squirrels; the pouter +pigeons expand their breasts into feathered balloons; the goldfish, as +they stolidly swam, their little mouths open, their eyes following the +queer human animals imprisoned on the other side of the plate-glass +window. Canary birds by the hundreds made the shop a trying one for +sensitive ears. There were no monkeys. Koschinsky, whose heart was as +soft as butter, though he was a formidable revolutionist--so he swore +over at Schwab's--declared that monkeys were made in the image of +tyrannical humans. He would have none of them. Parrots? There were +enough of the breed around him, he told the gossiping women, who, with +their _scheitels_, curved noses, and shining eyes, lent to the quarter +its Oriental quality. + +It was in Koschinsky's place that Arthur first encountered Yetta. He was +always prowling about the East Side in search of sociological prey, and +the modest little woman with her intelligent and determined face +attracted him strongly. They fell into easy conversation near a cage of +canaries, and the acquaintance soon bloomed into a friendship. A week +after the raid on Schwab's, Arthur, very haggard and nervous, wandered +into Koschinsky's. The old man greeted him:-- + +"Hu! So you've just come down from the Island! Well--how did you like it +up there? Plenty water--eh?" The sarcasm was too plain, and the young +man, mumbling some sort of an answer, turned to go. + +"Hold on there!" said Koschinsky. "I expect a very fine bird soon. You'd +better wait. It was here only last night; and the bird asked whether you +had been in." Arthur started. + +"For me? Miss Silverman?" + +"I said a bird," was the dogged reply. And then Yetta walked up to +Arthur and asked:-- + +"Where have you been? Why haven't you called?" He blushed. + +"I was ashamed." + +"Because you were so, so--frightened, that night?" + +"Yes." + +"But nothing came of the affair. The police could get no evidence. We +had no flags--" + +"That scarlet one I saw you with--what of it?" She smiled. + +"Did you look in your pockets when you got home? I stuffed the flag in +one of them while we were downstairs." He burst into genteel laughter. + +"No, I threw off my clothes in such disgust that night that I vowed I +would never get into them again. I gave the suit to my valet." + +"Your valet," she gravely returned; "he may become _one of us_." + +"Fancy, when I reached the house--I went up in a hansom, for I was +bareheaded--my mother was giving the biggest kind of a ball. I had no +end of trouble trying to sneak in unobserved." + +She regarded him steadily. "Isn't it strange," she went on, "how the +bull-dog police of this town persecute us--and they _should_ be +sympathetic. They had to leave their own island because of tyranny. Yet +as soon as they step on this soil they feel themselves self-constituted +tyrants. Something of the sort happened with your own ancestors--" she +looked at him archly--"the Pilgrim Fathers were not very tolerant to the +Quakers, the Jews, Catholics, or any sect not their own. Now you do not +seem to have inherited that ear-slicing temperament--" + +"Oh, stop, Yetta! Don't make any more fun of me. I confess I am +cowardly--I hate rows and scandals--" + +"'What shall it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his +liberty?'" + +"Yes, I know. But this was such a nasty little affair. The newspapers +would have driven me crazy." + +"But suppose, for the sake of argument," she said, "that the row would +not have appeared in the newspapers--what then?" + +"What do you mean? By Jove, there was nothing in the papers, now that I +come to think of it. I went the next morning out to Tuxedo and +forgot--what do you mean by this mystery, Yetta?" + +"I mean this--suppose, for the sake of further argument, I should tell +you that there was no row, no police, no arrests!" He gasped. + +"O-h, what an ass I made of myself. So that was your trial! And I +failed. Oh, Yetta, Yetta--what shall I say?" The girl softened. She took +both his hands in her shapely ones and murmured:-- + +"Dear little boy, I treated you roughly. Forgive me! There was a real +descent by the police--it was no deception. That's why I asked you to +play the Star-Spangled Banner--" + +"Excuse me, Yetta; but why did you do that? Why didn't you meet the +police defiantly chanting the Marseillaise? That would have been +braver--more like the true anarchist." She held down her head. + +"Because--because--those poor folks--I wanted to spare them as much +trouble with the police as possible," she said in her lowest tones. + +"And why," he pursued triumphantly, "why did you preach bombs after +assuring me that reform must come through the spiritual propaganda?" She +quickly replied:-- + +"Because our most dangerous foe was in the audience. You know. The man +with the beard who first spoke. He has often denounced me as lukewarm; +and then you know words are not as potent as deeds with the +proletarians. One assassination is of more value than all the philosophy +of Tolstoy. And that old wind-bag sat near us and watched us--watched +me. That's why I let myself go--" she was blushing now, and old +Koschinsky nearly dropped a bird-cage in his astonishment. + +"Yetta, Yetta!" Arthur insisted, "wind-bag, you call your comrade? Were +you not, just for a few minutes, in the same category? Again she was +silent. + +"I feel now," he ejaculated, as he came very close to her, "that we must +get outside of these verbal entanglements. I want you to become my +wife." His heart sank as he thought of his mother's impassive, high-bred +air--with such a figure for a Fifth Avenue bride! The girl looked into +his weak blue eyes with their area of saucer-like whiteness. She shook +her stubborn head. + +"I shall never marry. I do not believe in such an institution. It +degrades women, makes tyrants of men. No, Arthur--I am fond of you, +perhaps--" she paused,--"so fond that I might enter into any relation +but marriage,--that never!" + +"And I tell you, Yetta, anarchy or no anarchy, I could never respect the +woman if she were not mine legally. In America we do these things +differently--" he was not allowed to finish. + +She glared at him, then she strode to the shop door and opened it. + +"Farewell to you, Mr. Arthur Schopenhauer Wyartz, amateur anarchist. +Better go back to your mother and sisters! _Mein Gott_, Schopenhauer, +too!" He put his Alpine hat on his bewildered head and without a word +went out. She did not look after him, but walked over to the old +bird-fancier and sat on his leather-topped stool. Presently she rested +her elbows on her knees and propped her chin with her gloveless hands. +Her eyes were red. Koschinsky peeped at her and shook his head. + +"Yetta--you know what I think!--Yetta, the boy was right! You shouldn't +have asked him for the Star-Spangled Banner! The Marseillaise would have +been better." + +"I don't care," she viciously retorted. + +"I know, I know. But a nice boy--_so_ well fixed." + +"I don't care," she insisted. "I'm married to the revolution." + +"Yah, yah! the revolution, Yetta--" he pushed his lean, brown forefinger +into the cage of an enraged canary--"the revolution! Yes, Yetta +Silverman, the revolution!" She sighed. + + + + +XIV + +HALL OF THE MISSING FOOTSTEPS + + So I saw in my dream that the man began to run. + + --_Pilgrim's Progress_. + + +I + +As the first-class carriage rolled languidly out of Balak's only railway +station on a sultry February evening, Pobloff, the composer, was not +sorry. + +"I wish it were Persia instead of Ramboul," he reflected. Luga, his +wife, he had left weeping at the station; but since the day she +disappeared with his orchestra for twenty-four hours, Pobloff's +affection had gradually cooled; he was leaving the capital without a +pang on a month's leave of absence--a delicate courtesy of the king's +extended to a brother ruler, though a semi-barbarous one, the khedive of +Ramboul. + +Pobloff was not sad nor was he jubilantly glad. The journey was an easy +one; a night and day and the next night would see him, God willing,--he +crossed himself,--in the semi-tropical city of Nirgiz. From Balak to +Nirgiz, from southeastern Europe to Asia Minor! + +The heir-apparent was said to be a music-loving lad, very much under +the cunning thumb of his grim old aunt, who, rumour averred, wore a +black beard, and was the scourge of her little kingdom. All that might +be changed when the prince would reach his majority; his failing health +and morbid melancholy had frightened the grand vizier, and the king of +Balakia had been petitioned to send Pobloff, the composer, designer of +inimitable musical masques, Pobloff, the irresistible interpreter of +Chopin, to the aid of the ailing youth. + +So this middle-aged David left his nest to go harp for a Saul yet in his +adolescence. What his duties were to be Pobloff had not the slightest +idea. He had received no special instructions; a member of the royal +household bore him the official mandate and a purse fat enough to soothe +his wife's feelings. After appointing his first violin conductor of the +Balakian Orchestra during his absence, the fussy, stout, good-natured +Russian (he was born at Kiew, 1865, the biographical dictionaries say) +secured a sleeping compartment on the Ramboul express, from the windows +of which he contemplated with some satisfaction the flat land that +gradually faded in the mists of night as the train tore its way noisily +over a rude road-bed. + + +II + +Pobloff slept. He usually snored; but this evening he was too fatigued. +He heard not the sudden stoppages at lonely way stations where hoarse +voices and a lantern represented the life of the place; he did not heed +the engine as it thirstily sucked water from a tank in the heart of the +Karpakians; and he was surprised, pleased, proud, when a hot February +sun, shining through his window, awoke him. + +It was six o'clock of a fine morning, and the train was toiling up a +precipitous grade to the spine of the mountain, where the down-slope +would begin and air-brakes rule. Pobloff looked about him. He scratched +his long nose, a characteristic gesture, and began wondering when coffee +would be ready. He pressed the bell. The guard entered, a miserable +bandit who bravely wore his peaked hat with green plumes à la Tyrol. He +spoke four tongues and many dialects; Pobloff calculated his monthly +salary at forty roubles. + +"No, Excellency, the coffee will be hot and refreshing at Kerb, where we +arrive about seven." He cleared his throat, put out his hand, bowed low, +and disappeared. The composer grumbled. Kerb!--not until that wretched +eyrie in the clouds! And such coffee! No matter. Pobloff never felt in +robuster health; his irritable nerves were calmed by a sound night's +sleep. The air was fresher than down in the malarial valley, where stood +the shining towers of Balak; he could see them pinked by the morning sun +and low on the horizon. All together he was glad.... + +Hello, this must be Kerb! A moment later Pobloff bellowed for the +guard; he had shattered the electric annunciator by his violence. Then, +not waiting to be served, he ran into the vestibule, and soon was on the +station platform, inhaling huge drafts of air into his big chest. Ah! It +was glorious up there. What surprised him was the number of human beings +clambering over the steps, running and gabbling like a lot of animals +let loose from their cages. The engineer beside his quivering machine +enjoyed his morning coffee. And there were many turbaned pagans and some +veiled women mixed with the crowd. + +The sparkling of bright colours and bizarre costumes did not disturb +Pobloff, who had lived too long on anonymous borders, where Jew, +Christian, Turk, Slav, African, and outlandish folk generally melted +into a civilization which still puzzled ethnologists. + +A negro, gorgeously clad, guarding closely a slim female, draped from +head to foot in virginal white, attracted the musician. The man's face +was monstrous in its suggestion of evil, and furthermore shocking, +because his nose was a gaping hole. Evidently a scimiter had performed +this surgical operation, Pobloff mused. + +The giant's eyes offended him, they so stared, and threateningly. + +Pobloff was not a coward. After his adventure in Balak, he feared +neither man nor devil, and he insolently returned the black fellow's +gaze. They stood about a buffet and drank coffee. The young woman--her +outlines were girlish--did not touch anything; she turned her face in +Pobloff's direction, so he fancied, and spoke at intervals to her +attendant. + +"I must be a queer-looking bird to this Turk and her keeper--probably +some Georgian going to a rich Mussulman's harem in company with his +eunuch," Pobloff repeated to himself. + +A gong was banged. Before its strident vibrations had ceased troubling +the thin morning air, the train began to move slowly out of Kerb. +Pobloff again was glad. + +He remained on the rear platform of his car as long as the white +station, beginning to blister under a tropical sun, was in sight. Then +he sought his compartment. His amazement and rage were great when he +found the two window seats occupied by the negro and the mysterious +creature. Pobloff's bag was tumbled in a corner, his overcoat, hat, and +umbrella tossed to the other end of the room. The big black man bared +his teeth smilingly, the shrouded girl shrank back as if in fear. + +"Well, I'll be--!" began the composer. Then he leaned over and pushed +the button, the veins in his forehead like whipcords, his throat parched +with wrath. But to no avail--the bell was broken. Pobloff's first +impulse was to take the smiling Ethiopian by the neck and pitch him out. +There were several reasons why he did not: the giant looked dangerous; +he plainly carried a brace of pistols, and at least one dagger, the +jewelled handle of which flashed over his glaring sash of many tints. +And then the lady--Pobloff was very gallant, too gallant, his wife said. +The bell would not ring! What was he to do? He soon made up his mind, +supple Slav that he was. With a muttered apology he sank back and closed +his eyes in polite despair. + +His consternation was overwhelming when a voice addressed him in +Russian, a contralto voice of some indefinable timbre, the voice of a +female, yet not without epicene intonations. His eyes immediately +opened. From her gauze veiling the young woman spoke:-- + +"We are sorry to derange you. The guard made a mistake. Pardon!" The +tone was slightly condescending, as if the goddess behind the cloud had +deigned to notice a mere mortal. Her attendant was smiling, and to +Pobloff his grin resembled a newly sliced watermelon. But her voice +filled him with ecstasy. His ear, as sensitive as the eye of a Claude +Monet, noted every infinitesimal variation in tone-colour, and each +shade was a symbol for the fantastic imagination of this poetic +composer. The girlish voice affected him strangely. It pierced his soul +like a poniard. It made his spine chilly. It evoked visions of white +women languorously moving in processional attitudes beneath the chaste +rays of an implacable moon. The voice modulated into crisp morning +inflections:-- + +"You are going far, Excellency?" She knew him! And the slave who +grinned and grinned and never spoke--what was _he_? She seemed to follow +Pobloff's thought. + +"Hamet is dumb. His tongue was cut at the same time he lost his nose. It +all happened at the siege of Yerkutz." + +Pobloff at last found words. + +"Poor fellow!" he said sympathetically, and then forgot all about the +mutilated one. "You are welcome to this compartment," he assured her in +his oiliest manner. "What surprises me is that I did not see your Serene +Highness when we left Balak." She started at the title that he bestowed +upon her, and he inwardly chuckled. Clever dog, Pobloff, clever dog! Her +eyes were brilliant despite obstructing veils. + +"I was _en route_ to Balak yesterday, but my servant became ill and I +stopped over night at Kerb." Pobloff was entranced. She was undoubtedly +a young dame of noble birth and her freedom, the freedom of a European +woman, delighted him. It also puzzled. + +"How is it--?" he asked. + +But they had begun that fearful descent, at once the despair and delight +of engineers. The mountain fell away rapidly as the long, clumsy train +raced down its flank at a breakneck pace. Pobloff shivered and clutched +the arms of his seat. He saw nothing but deep blue sky and the tall top +of an occasional tree. The racket was terrific, the heat depressing. She +sat in her corner, apparently sleeping, while the giant smiled, always +smiled, never removing his ugly eyes from the perspiring countenance of +Pobloff. + +As they neared earth's level, midday was over. Pobloff hungered. Before +he could go in search of the ever absent guard, the woman suddenly sat +up, clapped her hands, and said something; but whether it was Turkish, +Roumanian, or Greek, he couldn't distinguish. A hamper was hauled from +under the seat by the servant, and to his joy Pobloff saw white rolls, +grapes, wine, figs, and cheese. He bowed and began eating. The others +looked at him and for a moment he could have sworn he heard faint +laughter. + +"I am so hungry," he said apologetically. "And you, Serenity, won't you +join me?" He offered her fruit. It was declined with a short nod. He was +dying to smoke, and, behold! priceless Turkish tobacco was thrust into +his willing hand. He rolled a stout cigarette, lighted it. Then a sigh +reached his ears. "The lady smokes," he thought, and slyly chuckled. + +A sound of something tearing was heard, and a pair of beautiful hands +reached for the tobacco. In a few moments the slender fingers were +pressing a cigarette; the slave lighted a wax fusee; the lady took it, +put the cigarette in a rent of her veil, and a second volume of odorous +vapour arose. Pobloff leaned back, stupefied. A Mohammedan woman smoking +in a Trans-Caucasian railway carriage before a Frank! Stupendous! He +felt unaccountably gay. + +"This is joyful," he said aloud. She smoked fervently. "Western manners +are certainly invading the East," he continued, hoping to hear again +that voice of marvellous resonance. She smoked. "Why, even Turkish women +have been known to study music in Paris." + +"I am not a Turk," she said in her deepest chest tones. + +"Pardon! A Russian, perhaps? Your accent is perfect. I am a Russian." +She did not reply. + +The day declined, and there was no more conversation. As the train +devoured leagues of swampy territory, villages were passed. The +journey's end was nearing. Soon meadows were seen surrounding +magnificent villas. A wide, shallow river was crossed, the Oxal; Pobloff +knew by his pocket map that Nirgiz was nigh. And for the first time in +twenty-four hours he sorrowed. Despite his broad invitations and +unmistakable hints, he could not trap his travelling companion into an +avowal of her identity, of her destination. Nothing could be coaxed from +the giant, and it was with a sinking heart--Pobloff was very +sentimental--that he saw the lights of Nirgiz; a few minutes later the +train entered the Oriental station. In the heat, the clamour of half a +thousand voices, yelling unknown jargons, his resolution to keep his +companions in view went for naught. Beset by jabbering porters, he did +not have an opportunity to say farewell to the veiled lady; with her +escort she had disappeared when the car stopped--and without a word of +thanks! Pobloff was wretched. + + +III + +It was past nine o'clock as he roamed the vast garden surrounding the +Palace of a Thousand Sounds--thus named because of the tiny bells +tinkling about its marble dome. He had eaten an unsatisfying meal in a +small antechamber, waited upon by a stupid servant. And worse still, the +food was ill cooked. On presenting his credentials, earlier in the +evening, the grand vizier, a sneaky-appearing man, had welcomed him +coldly, telling him that her Serene Highness was too exhausted to +receive so late in the day; she had granted too many audiences that +afternoon. + +"And the prince?" he queried. The prince was away hunting by moonlight, +and could not be seen for at least a day. In the interim, Pobloff was +told to make himself at home, as became such a distinguished composer +and artistic plenipotentiary of Balakia's king. Then he was bowed out of +the chamber, down the low malachite staircase, into his supper room. It +was all very disturbing to a man of Pobloff's equable disposition. + +He thought of Luga, his little wife, his dove; but not long. She did not +appeal to his heart of hearts; she was a coquette. Pobloff sighed. He +was midway in his mortal life, a dangerous period for susceptible +manhood. He lifted moist eyes to the stars; the night was delicious. He +rested upon a cushioned couch of stone. About him the moonlight painted +the trees, until they seemed like liquefied ermine; the palace arose in +pyramidal surges of marble to the sky, meeting the moonbeams as if in +friendly defiance, and casting them back to heaven with triumphant +reflections. And the stillness, profound as the tomb, was punctuated by +glancing fireflies. Pobloff hummed melodiously. + +"A night to make music," whispered a deep, sweet voice. Before he could +rise, his heart bounding as if stung to its centre, a woman, swathed in +white, sat beside him, touched him, put such a pressure upon his +shoulder that his blood began to stir. It was she. He stumbled in his +speech. She laughed, and he ground his teeth, for this alone saved him +from foolishness, from mad behaviour. + +"Maestro--you could make music this lovely night?" Pobloff started. + +"In God's name, who are you, and what are you doing here? Where did you +go this evening? I missed you. Ah! unhappy man that I am, you will drive +me crazy!" + +She did not smile now, but pressed close to him. + +"I am a prisoner--like yourself," she replied simply. + +"A prisoner! How a prisoner? I am not a prisoner, but an envoy from my +king to the sick princeling." + +She sighed. + +"The poor, mad prince," she said, "he is in need of your medicine, +sadly. He sent for me a year ago, and I am now his prisoner for life." + +"But I saw you on the train, a day's journey hence," interrupted the +musician. + +"Yes, I had escaped, and was being taken back by black Hamet when we +met." + +Pobloff whistled. So the mystery was disclosed. A little white slave +from the seraglio of this embryo tyrant had flown the cage! No wonder +she was watched, little surprise that she did not care to eat. He +straightened himself, the hair on his round head like porcupine quills. + +"My dear young lady," he exclaimed in accents paternal, "leave all to +me. If you do not wish to stay in this place, you may rely on me. When I +see this same young man,--he must be a nice sprig of royalty!--I propose +to tell him what I think of him." Pobloff threw out his chest and +snorted with pride. Again he fancied that he heard suppressed laughter. +He darted glances in every direction, but the fall of distant waters +smote upon his ears like the crepuscular music of Chopin. His companion +shook with ill-suppressed emotion. It was some time before she could +speak. + +"Pobloff," she begged, in her dangerous contralto, a contralto like the +medium register of a clarinet, "Pobloff, let me adjure you to be +careful. Your coming here has caused political disturbances. The aunt of +the prince hates music as much as he adores it. She is no party to your +invitation. So be on your guard. Even now there may be spies in the +shrubbery." She put her hand on his arm. It was too much. In an instant, +despite her feeble struggle, the ardent musician grasped the creature +that had tantalized him since morning, and kissed her a dozen times. His +head whirled. Pobloff! Pobloff! a voice cried in his brain--and only +yesterday you left your Luga, your pretty pigeon, your wife! + +The girl was dragged away from him. In the moonshine he saw the grinning +Hamet, suspiciously observing him. The runaway stood up and pressed +Pobloff's hand desperately, uttering the cry of her forlorn heart:-- + +"Don't play in the great hall; don't play in that accursed place. You +will be asked, but refuse. Make any excuse, but do not set foot on its +ebon floors." + +He was so confused by the strangeness of this adventure, so confused by +the admonition of the unknown when he saw her white draperies disappear, +that his jaw fell and his courage wavered. A moment later two oddly +caparisoned soldiers, bearing lights, approached, and in the name of her +Highness invited him make midnight music in the Palace of a Thousand +Sounds. + + +IV + +Seated before a Steinway grand pianoforte, an instrument that found its +way to this far-away province through the caprice of some artistic +potentate, Pobloff nervously preluded. Notwithstanding the warning of +the girl, he had allowed himself to be convoyed to the great Hall of +Ebony, and there, quite alone, he sat waiting for some cue to begin. +None came. He glanced curiously about him. For all the signs of humanity +he might as well have been on the heights of Kerb, out among its thorny +groves, or in its immemorial forests. He preluded as he gazed around. He +could see, by the dim light of two flambeaux set in gold sconces, column +after column of blackness receding into inky depths of darkness. A +fringe of light encircled his instrument, and beside him was a gallery, +so vast that it became a gulf of the infinite at a hundred paces. Now, +Pobloff was a brave man. He believed that once upon a time he had peered +into strange crevices of space; what novelty could existence hold for +him after that shuddering experience? Again he looked into the tenebrous +recesses of the hall. He saw nothing, heard nothing. + +His fingers went their own way over the keyboard. Finally, following +some latent impulse, they began to shape the opening measures of +Chopin's Second Ballade, the one of the enigmatic tonalities, sometimes +called _The Lake of the Mermaids_. It began with the chanting, childish +refrain, a Lithuanian fairy-tale of old, and as its naïve, drowsy, +lulling measures--the voices of wicked, wooing sirens--sang and sank in +recurrent rhythms, Pobloff heard--this time he was sure--the regular +reverberation of distant footsteps. It was as if the monotonous beat of +the music were duplicated in some sounding mirror, some mirror that +magnified hideously, hideously mimicked the melody. Yet these footfalls +murmured as a sea-shell. Every phrase stood out before the pianist, +exquisitely clear; his brain had only once before harboured such an +exalted mood. There was the expectation of great things coming to pass; +dim rumours of an apocalyptic future, when the glory that never was on +sea or land should rend the veil of the visible and make clear all that +obscures and darkens. The transfiguration which informs the soul of one +taken down in epileptic seizure possessed him. Every cranny of his being +was flooded with overmastering light--and the faint sound of footsteps +marking sinister time to his music, drew closer, closer. + +Shaking off an insane desire to join his voice in the immortal choiring +of the Cherubim, Pobloff dashed into the passionate storm-scream of the +music, and like a pack of phantom bloodhounds the footsteps pressed him +in the race. He played as run men from starving wolves in Siberian +wastes. To stop would mean--God! what would it mean? These were no +mortal steps that crowded upon his sonorous trail. His fingers flew +over the keys as he finished the scurrying tempests of tone. Again the +first swaying refrain, and Pobloff heard the invisible multitude of feet +pause in the night, as if waiting the moment when the Ballade would +cease. He quivered; the surprises and terrors were telling upon his +well-seasoned nerves. + +Still he sped on, fearing the tremendous outburst at the close, where +Chopin throws overboard his soul, and with blood-red sails signals the +hellish _Willis_, the Lamias of the lake, to his side. Ah, if Pobloff +could but thus portion his soul as hostage to the infernal host that now +hemmed him in on all sides! Riding over the black and white rocks of his +keyboard, he felt as if in the clutches of an unknown force. He +discerned death in the distance--death and the unknown horror--and was +powerless to resist. Still the galloping of unseen feet, horrible, naked +flesh, that clattered and scraped the earth; the panting, hoarse and +subdued, of a mighty pack, whose thirst for destruction, for revenge, +was unslaked. And always the same trampling of human feet! Were they +human? Did not resilient bones tell the tale of brutes viler than men? +The glimmering lights seemed cowed, as they sobbed in vacuity and slowly +expired. + +Pobloff no longer asked himself what it meant; he was become a maniac, +pursued by deathless devils. He could have flown to the end of the +universe in this Ballade; but, at last, his heart cracking, head +bursting, face livid, overtaken by the Footsteps of the Missing, he +smashed both fists upon the keys and fell forward despairingly.... + + * * * * * + +... The gigantic, noseless negro, the grand vizier himself, sternly +regarded the prince, who stood, torch in hand, near the shattered +pianoforte. The dumb spoke:-- + +"Let us hope, Exalted Highness, that your masquerades and mystifications +are over forever. To-day's prankish sport may put us to trouble for a +satisfactory explanation." He waved his hand vaguely in the direction of +the prostrate composer. "And hasheesh sometimes maddens for a lifetime!" +He lightly touched the drugged Pobloff with his enormous foot. + +The youthful runaway ashamedly lowered his head--in reality he adored +music with all the fulness of his cruel, faunlike nature. + + + + +XV + +THE CURSORY LIGHT + + +To this day Pinton could never explain why he looked out of that pantry +window. He had reached his home in a hungry condition. He was tired and +dead broke, so he had resolved to forage. He had listened for two or +three, perhaps five, minutes in the hall of his boarding-house; then he +went, soft-footed, to Mrs. Hallam's pantry on the second floor. He was +sure that it was open, he was equally sure that it contained something +edible on its hospitable shelves. Ah! who has not his bread at midnight +stolen, ye heavenly powers, ye know him not! + +Pinton, however, knew one thing, and that was a ravenous desire to sink +his teeth into pie, custard, or even bread. He felt with large, eager +hands along the wall on the pantry side. With feverish joy he touched +the knob--a friendly knob, despite its cold, distant glaze--of the door +he sought. + +Pinton gave a tug, and then his heart stopped beating. The door was +locked. Something like a curse, something like a prayer, rose to his +lips, and his arms fell helplessly to his side. + +Mrs. Hallam, realizing that it was Saturday night--the predatory night +of the week--had secured her pastry, her confitures, her celebrated +desserts; and so poor Pinton, all his sweet teeth furiously aching, his +mouth watering, stood on the hither side of Paradise, a baffled peri in +pantaloons! + +After a pause, full of pain and troublous previsions of a restless, +discontented night, Pinton grew angry and pulled at the knob of the +door, thinking, perhaps, that it might abate a jot of its dignified +resistance. It remained immovable, grimly antagonistic, until his +fingers grew hot and cold as they touched a bit of cold metal. + +The key in the lock! In a second it was turned, and the hungry one was +within and restlessly searching and fumbling for food. He felt along the +lower shelves and met apples, oranges, and sealed bottles containing +ruined, otherwise miscalled preserved, fruit. He knelt on the dresser +and explored the upper shelf. Ah, here was richness indeed! Pies, pies, +cakes, pies, frosted cakes, cakes sweating golden, fruity promises, and +cakes as icy as the hand of charity. Pinton was happy, glutton that he +was, and he soon filled the pockets of his overcoat. What Mrs. Hallam +might say in the morning he cared not. Let the galled jade wince, his +breakfast appetite would be unwrung; and then he started violently, lost +his balance, and almost fell to the floor. + +Opposite him was the window of the pantry, which faced the wall of the +next house. Pinton had never been in the pantry by daylight, so he was +rudely shocked by the glance of a light--a cursory, moving light. It +showed him a window in the other house and a pair of stairs. It +flickered about an old baluster and a rusty carpet, it came from below, +it mounted upward and was lost to view. + +The burglar of pies, the ravisher of cakes, was almost shocked by this +unexpected light. He watched it dancing fantastically on the discoloured +wall of the house; he wondered--ill at ease--if it would flash in his +face. His surmise was realized, for a streak of illumination reached the +narrow chamber in which he cowered, and then he was certain some one was +looking at him. He never budged, for he was too frightened. Suddenly the +light vanished and a head was dimly silhouetted in the window opposite. +It nodded to Pinton. Pinton stared stupidly, and the head disappeared. +The hungry man, his appetite now gone, was numb and terrified. + +What did it mean, who was the man? A detective, or a friend of Mrs. +Hallam's in a coign from which the plunderers of her pantry could be +noted? Beady repentance stood out on Pinton's forehead. + +And the light came back. This time it was intelligible, for it was a +lantern in the hand of a young man of about thirty. His face was open +and smiling. He wore his hair rather long for an American, and it was +blond and curling. + +He surveyed Pinton for a moment, then he said, in a most agreeable +voice:-- + +"What luck, old pal?" + +Pinton dropped his pies, slammed the window, and got to his bedroom as +fast as his nervous legs could carry him. He undressed in a nightmare, +and did not sleep until the early summer sun shot hot shafts of heat +into his chamber. + +With a shamed Sabbath face he arose, dressed, and descended to his +morning meal. Mrs. Hallam was sitting in orotund silence, but seemed in +good humour. She asked him casually if he had enjoyed his Saturday +evening, and quite as casually damned the wandering cats that had played +havoc in her pantry. She remarked that leaving windows open was a poor +practice, even if hospitable in appearance, and nervous Mr. Pinton drank +his coffee in silent assent and then hurried off to the church where he +trod the organ pedals for a small salary's sake. + +The following Friday was rehearsal night, and the organist left his +choir in a bad humour. His contralto had not attended, and as she was +the only artiste and the only good-looking girl of the lot, Pinton took +it into his head to become jealous. She had not paid the slightest +attention to him, so he could not attribute her absence to a personal +slight; but he felt aggrieved and vaguely irritated. + +Pinton's musicianship was not profound. He had begun life as an organ +salesman. He manipulated the cabinet organ for impossible customers in +Wisconsin, and he came to New York because he was offered a better +chance. + +The inevitable church position occurred. Then came Zundel voluntaries +and hard pedal practice. At last Mendelssohn's organ sonatas were +reached and with them a call--organists, like pastors, have calls--to a +fashionable church. The salary was fair and Mr. Pinton grew +side-whiskers. + +He heard Paderewski play Chopin, and became a crazy lover of the piano. +He hired a small upright and studied finger exercises. He consulted a +thousand books on technic, and in the meantime could not play Czerny's +velocity studies. + +He grew thin, and sought the advice of many pianists. He soon found that +pressing your foot on the swell and pulling couplers for tone colour +were not the slightest use in piano playing. Subtle finger pressures, +the unloosening of the muscles, the delicate art of _nuance_, the art +unfelt by many organists, all were demanded of the pianist, and Pinton +almost despaired. + +He grew contemptuous of the king of instruments as he essayed the C +major invention of Bach. He sneered at stops and pedals, and believed, +in his foolish way, that all polyphony was bound within the boards of +the Well-Tempered Clavichord. Then the new alto came to the choir, and +Pinton--at being springtide, when the blood is in the joyful +mood--thought that he was in love. He was really athirst. + +This Friday evening he was genuinely disappointed and thirsty. He turned +with a sinking heart and parched throat into Pop Pusch's dearly beloved +resort. Earlier in his life he had often solaced himself with the free +lunch that John, the melancholy waiter, had dispensed. Pinton's mind was +a prey to many emotions as he entered the famous old place. He sat down +before a brown table and clamoured for amber beer. + +He was not alone at the table. As Pinton put the glass of Pilsner to his +lips he met the gaze of two sardonic eyes. He could not finish his +glass. He returned the look of the other man and then arose, with a +nervous jerk that almost upset the table. + +"Sit down, old pal; don't be crazy. I'll never say a word. Sit down, you +fool; don't you see people are looking at you?" + +The voice was low, kindly in intonation, but it went through Pinton like +a saw biting its way into wood. + +He sat down all in a heap. He knew the eyes; he knew the voice. It was +the owner of the dark lantern--the mysterious man in the other house of +that last Saturday night. Pinton felt as if he were about to become ill. + +"Lord, but you are a nervous one!" said the other, most reassuringly. +"Sit still and I'll order brandy. It will settle your stomach." + +That brought Pinton to his senses at once. + +"No, no, I'll be all right in a moment," he said rather huskily. "I +never drink spirits. Thank you, all the same." + +"Don't mention it," said the man, and he tossed off his Würzburger. Each +man stealthily regarded the other. Pinton saw the stranger of the +lantern and staircase. Close by he was handsome and engaging. His hair +was worn like a violin virtuoso's, and his hands were white, delicate, +and well cared for. He spoke first. + +"How did you make out on that job?--I don't fancy there was much in it. +Boarding-houses, you know!" + +Pinton, every particle of colour leaving his flabby face, asked:-- + +"What job?" + +The stranger looked at him keenly and went on rather ironically:-- + +"You are the most nervous duck I ever ran across. When I saw you last +your pocket was full of the silver plate of that pantry, and I can thank +you for a fright myself, for when I saw you, I was just getting ready to +crack a neat little crib. Say! why didn't you flash your glim at me or +make some friendly signal at least? You popped out of sight like a +prairie rabbit when a coyote heaves in view." + +Pinton felt the ground heave beneath him. What possible job could the +man mean? What was a "glim," and what did the fellow suggest by silver +plate? Then it struck him all of a sudden. Heavens! he was taken for a +burglar by a burglar. His presence in the pie pantry had been +misinterpreted by a cracksman; and he, the harmless organist of Dr. +Bulgerly's church, was claimed as the associate of a dangerous, perhaps +notorious, thief. Pinton's cup of woe overflowed. + +He arose, put on his hat, and started to go. The young man grasped his +arm, and said in a most conciliatory fashion:-- + +"Perhaps I have hurt your sensitive nature. It was far from my intention +to do so. I saluted you at first in the coarse, conventional manner +which is expected by members of our ancient and honourable craft, and if +I have offended you, I humbly beg your pardon." + +His accent was that of a cultivated gentleman. Pinton, somewhat assured, +dropped back in his seat, and, John passing by just then, more beer was +ordered. + +"Hear me before you condemn me," said the odd young man. "My name is +Blastion and I am a burglar by profession. When I saw you the other +night, at work on the premises next door to me, I was struck by your +refined face. I said to myself: 'At last the profession is being +recruited by gentlemen, men of culture, men of refinement. At last a +profitable, withal risky, pursuit is being dignified, nay, graced, by +the proper sort of person.' And I saluted you in a happy, haphazard +fashion, and then you flew the coop. Pardon my relapse into the +vernacular." + +Pinton felt that it was time to speak. + +"Pardon me, if I interrupt you, Mr. Blastion; but I fear we are not +meeting on equal ground. You take me for a--for a man of your +profession. Indeed, sir, you are mistaken. When you discovered me last +Saturday night I was in the pantry of Mrs. Hallam, my boarding-house +keeper, searching for pie. I am not a burglar--pardon my harsh +expression; I am, instead, an organist by profession." + +The pallor of the burglar's countenance testified to the gravity of his +feeling. He stared and blushed, looked apprehensively at the various +groups of domino players in the back room, then, pulling himself +together, he beckoned to melancholy John, and said:-- + +"Johann, two more beers, please. Yes?" + +Pinton became interested. There was something appealing in the signal +the man flashed from his eyes when he realized that he had unbosomed +himself to a perfect stranger, and not to a member of his beloved guild. +The organist put his hand on the man's arm and said--faint memories of +flatulent discourses from the Reverend Bulgerly coming to his aid: "Be +not alarmed, my friend. I will not betray you. I am a musician, but I +respect art ever, even when it reveals itself in manifold guises." + +Pinton felt that he was a man of address, a fellow of some wit; his +confidential and rather patronizing pose moved his companion, who slyly +grimaced. + +"So you are an organist and not a member of the noble Knights of the +Centrebit and Jimmy?" he asked rather sarcastically. + +"Yes," admitted Pinton, "I am an organist, and an organist who would +fain become a pianist." The other started. + +"I am a pianist myself, and yet I cannot say that I would like to play +the organ." + +"You are a pianist?" said Pinton, in a puzzled voice. + +"Well, why not? I studied in Paris, and I suppose my piano technic stood +me in good stead in my newer profession. Just look at my hands if you +doubt my word." + +Aghast, the organist examined the shapely hands before him. Without +peradventure of a doubt they were those of a pianist, an expert pianist, +and one who had studied assiduously. He was stupefied. A burglar and a +pianist! What next? + +Mr. Blastion continued his edifying remarks: "Yes, I studied very hard. +I was born in the Southwest, and went to Paris quite young. I had good +fingers and was deft at sleight-of-hand tricks. I could steal a +handkerchief from a rabbi--which is saying volumes--and I played all the +Chopin études before I was fifteen. At twenty-one I knew twenty-five +concertos from memory, and my great piece was the _Don Juan Fantasy_. +Oh, I was a wonder! When Liszt paid his last visit to Paris I played +before him at the warerooms of the Pleyels. + +"Monsieur Théodore Ritter was anxious for his old master to hear such a +pupil. I assure you there must be some congenital twist of evil in me, +for I couldn't for the life of me forbear picking the old fellow's +pockets and lifting his watch. Now don't look scandalized, Mr. ---- eh? +Oh! thank you very much, Mr. Pinton. If you are born that way, all the +punishments and preachments--excuse the alliteration--will not stand in +your way as a warning. I have done time--I mean I have served several +terms of imprisonment, but luckily not for a long period. I suffered +most by my incarceration in not having a piano. Not even a dumb keyboard +was allowed, and I practised the Jackson finger exercises in the air and +thus kept my fingers limber. On Saturdays the warden allowed me, as a +special favour, to practise on the cabinet organ--an odious +instrument--so as to enable me to play on Sundays in chapel. Of course +no practice was needed for the wretched music we poor devils howled once +a week, but I gained one afternoon in seven for study by my ruse. + +"Oh, the joy of feeling the ivory--or bone--under my expectant fingers! +I played all the Chopin, Henselt, and Liszt études on the miserable +keyboard of the organ. Yes, of course, without wind. It was, I assure +you, a truly spiritual consolation. You can readily imagine if a man has +been in the habit of practising all day, even if he does 'burgle' at +night, that to be suddenly deprived of all instrumental resources is a +bitter blow." + +Pinton stuttered out an affirmative response. Then both arose after +paying their checks, and the organist shook the burglar's hand at the +corner, after first exacting a promise that Blastion should play for him +some morning. + +"With pleasure, my boy. You're a gentleman and an artist, and I trust +you absolutely." And he walked away, whistling with rare skill the D +flat valse of Chopin. + +"You can trust me, I swear!" Pinton called after him, and then went +unsteadily homeward, full of generous resolves and pianistic ambitions. +As he intermittently undressed he discovered, to his rage and amazement, +that both his purse and watch had disappeared. The one was well filled; +the other, gold. Blastion's technic had proved unimpeachable. + + + + +XVI + +AN IRON FAN + + +Effinghame waited for Dr. Arn in the study, a small chamber crowded with +the contents of the universe--so it seemed to the visitor. There was a +table unusual in size, indeed, big enough to dissect a body thereon. It +was littered with books and medical publications and was not very +attractive. The walls were covered with original drawings of famous +Japanese masters, and over the fireplace hung a huge fan, dull gray in +colouring, with long sandalwood spokes. Not a noteworthy example of +Japanese art, thought Effinghame, as he glanced without marked curiosity +at its neutral tinting, though he could not help wondering why the +cunning artificers of the East had failed to adorn the wedge-shaped +surfaces of this fan with their accustomed bold and exquisite +arabesques. + +He impatiently paced the floor. His friend had told him to come at nine +o'clock in the evening. It was nearly ten. Then he began to finger +things. He fumbled the papers in the desk. He examined the two Japanese +swords--light as ivory, keen as razors. He stared at each of the prints, +at Hokusai, Toyokimi, Kuniyoshi, Kiyonaga, Kiosai, Hiroshighé, Utamaro, +Oukoyo-Yé,--the doctor's taste was Oriental. And again he fell to +scrutinizing the fan. It was large, ugly, clumsy. What possessed Arn to +place such a sprawling affair over his mantel? Tempted to touch it, he +discovered that it was as silky as a young bat's wing. At last, his +curiosity excited, he lifted it with some straining to the floor. What +puzzled him was its weight. He felt its thin ribs, its soft, paper-like +material, and his fingers chilled as they closed on the two outermost +spokes. They were of metal, whether steel or iron he could not +determine. A queer fan this, far too heavy to stir the air, and-- + +Effinghame held the fan up to the light. He had perceived a shadowy +figure in a corner. It resolved itself into a man's head--bearded, +scowling, crowned with thorns or sunbeams. It was probably a Krishna. +But how came such a face on a Japanese fan? The type was Oriental, +though not Mongolian, rather Semitic. It vaguely recalled to Effinghame +a head and face he had seen in a famous painting. But where and by whom? +It wore a vile expression, the eyes mean and revengeful; there was a +cruel mouth and a long, hooked, crafty nose. The forehead was lofty, +even intellectual, and bore its thorns--yes, he was sure they were +thorns--like a conqueror. Just then Dr. Arn entered and laughed when he +saw the other struggling with the fan. + +"My _Samurai_ fan!" he exclaimed, in his accustomed frank tones; "how +did you discover it so soon?" + +"You've kept me here an hour. I had to do something," answered the +other, sulkily. + +"There, there, I apologize. Sit down, old man. I had a very sick patient +to-night, and I feel worn out. I'll ring for champagne." They talked +about trifling personal matters, when suddenly Effinghame asked:-- + +"Why _Samurai_? I had supposed this once belonged to some prehistoric +giant who could waft it as do ladies their bamboo fans, when they brush +the dust from old hearts--as the Spanish poet sang." + +"That fan is interesting enough," was the doctor's reply. "When a +_Samurai_, one of the warrior caste Japanese, was invited to the house +of a doubtful friend, he carried this fan as a weapon of defence. +Compelled to leave his two swords behind a screen, he could close this +fighting machine and parry the attack of his hospitable enemy until he +reached his swords. Just try it and see what a formidable weapon it +would prove." He took up the fan, shut it, and swung it over his head. + +"Look out for the bottles!" cried Effinghame. + +"Never fear, old chap. And did you notice the head?" + +"That's what most puzzled me." + +"No wonder. I too was puzzled--until I found the solution. And it took +me some years--yes, all the time you were in Paris learning how to +paint and live." He paused, and his face became gloomy. + +"Well--well?" + +"There is no well. It's a damned bad fan, that iron one, and I don't +mind saying so to you." + +"Superstitious--you! Where is your Haeckel, your Wundt, your Weismann? +Do you still believe in the infallibility of the germ-plasm? Has the fan +brought you ill-luck? The fact is, Arn, ever since your return from +China you've been a strange bird!" It was Effinghame's turn to laugh. + +"Don't say another word." The doctor was vivacious in a moment and +poured out wine. They both lighted cigars. Slowly puffing, Arn took up +the fan and spread it open. + +"See here! That head, as you must have noticed, is not Japanese. It's +Jewish. Do you recall the head of Judas painted by Da Vinci in his Last +Supper? Now isn't this old scoundrel's the exact duplicate--well, if not +exact, there is a very strong resemblance." Effinghame looked and +nodded. + +"And what the devil is it doing on a fan of the _Samurai_? It's not +caprice. No Japanese artist ever painted in that style or ever expressed +that type. I thought the thing out and came to the conclusion--" + +"Yes--yes! What conclusion?" eagerly interrupted his listener. + +"To the conclusion that I could never unravel such a knotty question +alone." Effinghame was disappointed. + +"So I had recourse to an ally--to the fan itself," blandly added Arn, as +he poured out more wine. + +"The fan?" + +"Precisely--the fan. I studied it from tip to tip, as our bird-shooting +friends say, and I, at last, discovered more than a picture. You know I +am an Orientalist. When I was at Johns Hopkins University I attended the +classes of the erudite Blumenfeld, and what you can't learn from +him--need I say any more? One evening I held the fan in front of a vivid +electric light and at once noticed serried lines. These I deciphered +after a long time. Another surprise. They were Chinese characters of a +remotely early date--Heaven knows how many dynasties back! Now what, you +will ask, is Chinese doing on a _Samurai_ fighting fan! I don't know. I +never shall know. But I do know that this fan contains on one side of it +the most extraordinary revelation ever vouchsafed mankind, particularly +Christian mankind." Excited by his own words, Arn arose. + +"Effinghame, my dear fellow, I know you have read Renan. If Renan had +seen the communication on this iron fan, he would have never written his +life of the Messiah." His eyes blazed. + +"Why, what do you mean?" + +"I mean that it might have been a life of Judas Iscariot." + +"Good God, man, are you joking?" ejaculated Effinghame. + +"I mean," sternly pursued Arn, "that if De Quincey had studied this +identical fan, the opium-eater would have composed another gorgeous +rhetorical plea for the man preëlected to betray his Saviour, the +apostle who spilt the salt." He sat down and breathed heavily. + +"Go on! Go on!" + +"Shall I relate the history upon the fan?" And without waiting for an +answer he began at the left of the fan and slowly read to the right:-- + + I who write this am called Moâ the Bonze. What I write of I + witnessed in a walled city of Judea. I travelled there attracted by + the report of miraculous happenings brought about by the magic art + of a youthful barbarian called Ieshua. The day I arrived in the + city they had sentenced the wise man to death by crucifixion. I was + disappointed. I had come many moons and many leagues from the + Yellow Kingdom to see something rare. I was too late. The magician, + whom his disciples called a god, had been executed. I tarried a few + days in the city. After many questions put to beggars and outcasts, + I heard that a certain woman of rank had a portrait of Ieshua. I + called and without hesitation asked her to show me this picture. + She was an exalted soul. She wept bitter tears as she drew from a + secret cabinet a scarf upon which was imprinted a bloody image. She + continued to weep as I made a copy of the head. I confess I was not + impressed. The face was bearded and ugly. The new god was said to + have been as fair as the sun. And I told the woman this. She only + wept the more. + + "If he were a god," I asked, "where are outward evidences?" She + became frantic. + + "The real man!" she cried; "_this_ one died for the man he + betrayed," and again fell to lamenting. Seeing I could gain nothing + more from her, I left, wondering at the strange heretics I had + encountered. I went back to my country and after weaving this tale + and painting the head, there awaited the fifth Buddha, the + successor to Siddartha, whose coming has been predicted. + +Arn's voice ceased. There was silence in the chamber. Then Effinghame +started up and fiercely growled:-- + +"What do _you_ make of it, Arn?" + +"Isn't it clear enough? There's been a frightful error somewhere, one of +incalculable consequences. A tremendous act of heroism has been +committed by a man whose name has been universally execrated through the +ages. Perhaps he repented at the eleventh hour and by some means +impersonated his betrayed friend; perhaps--" + +"But that _other_ body found in the blasted field of Aceldama!" +demanded the agitated Effinghame. Dr. Arn did not answer. + +After a lugubrious pause, he whispered:-- + +"There's more to follow. You haven't heard the worst." + +"What--more! I thought your damnable old Bonze died in the odour of +sanctity over there in his Yellow Kingdom." + +"True. He died. But before he died he recorded a vision he had. It is +inscribed on the other side of the fan." + +Effinghame's features lengthened. + +"Still the same fan." + +"The same. Here is what it prophesies." Reversing the clumsy fan, Arn +again read:-- + + Before I pass over into Nirvana I must relate what I saw in the + country of the Christians. It was not a dream. It was too real. And + yet it is to be, for it has not yet happened. The Campagna was now + become a shallow lake from the sea almost to the Sabine Mountains. + What had been Rome was a black waste spot, full of stones and + weeds. And no two stones stood together. Ah! our war with the white + races had been successful. We had not used their fighting machines, + as did that nation of little brown men, the Japanese. The Chinese + were too sage. They allowed the Christians to exterminate the + Japanese; but when they attacked us and attempted to rob us of our + land, we merely resorted to our old-time weapon--the Odour-Death. + With it we smothered their armies, sunk their navies, swept through + their countries like the simoon. The awful secret of the + Odour-Death is one that has been ours from the beginning of time. + Known only to the College of Bonzes, it was never used except in + extreme peril. Its smell is more revolting in its consequences than + the Black Plague. It ravaged the earth. + + I sat in a flat-bottomed boat, enjoying the soft melancholy Italian + evening. Not a human did I see; nor had I encountered one on my + slow voyage from the Middle Seas. In meditation I pondered the + ultimate wisdom of Confucius and smiled at the folly of the white + barbarians who had tried to show us a new god, a new religion. At + last they, too, had succumbed like the nations before their era. + The temple of Jupiter on the Capitol had fallen, so had the holy + temple of Jerusalem. And now St. Peter's. Their central religion + had been destroyed, and yet prophecies of the second coming of + their divinity had not been accomplished. When the last Pope of + Rome dies, so it was said, then time would be accomplished. The + last Pope _had_ died. Their basilica with its mighty dome was a + desert where scorpions and snakes abounded. The fifth Buddha would + appear, not the second Christos. Suddenly I saw before me in a puny + boat a beautiful beardless youth. He was attired in some symbolical + garments and upon his head a triple tiara. I could not believe my + aged eyes. He sat upright. His attitude was hieratic. His eyes + were lifted heavenwards. He clasped his hands and prayed:-- + + "O Lord, remove thy servant. The time is at hand foretold by thy + slaughtered saints. I am the last Pope and the humblest of thy + servants. Though the heathen hath triumphed upon the earth, I go to + thy bosom, for all things are now accomplished." And he tumbled + forward, dead. The last Pope! I had seen him. Nothing could happen + after that. + + And as I turned my boat in the direction of the sea a moaning came + upon the waters. The sky became as brass. A roar, like the rending + asunder of the firmament, caused my soul to expand with horror and + joy. Yes, time _was_ accomplished. The last Pope had uttered the + truth. Eternity was nigh. But the Buddha would now prove to the + multitudes awakened from their long sleep that _He_, not other + gods, was the true, the only God. In a flare of light sounded the + trumpets of destiny; eternity unrolled before me, and on the vast + plain I saw the bones of the buried dead uniting, as men and women + from time's beginnings arose in an army, the number whereof is + unthinkable. And oh! abomination of desolation, the White Horse, + not _Kalki_ the tenth incarnation of Vishnu, but the animal + foretold in _their_ Apocalypse, came through the lightnings, and in + the whirlwinds of flame and thunder I saw the shining face of Him, + the Son of Man! Where our Buddha? Alas! the last Pope spake truth. + I, Moâ the Bonze, tell you this ere it be too late to repent your + sins and forswear your false gods. The Galilean is our master.... + +"_Farceur!_ Do you know what I would do with that accursed fan? I'd +destroy it, sell it, get rid of it somehow. Or else--" Effinghame +scrutinized the doctor, whose eyes were closed--"or else I would return +to the pious practices of my old religion." No smile crossed the face of +his friend as he firmly held the fighting fan, the iron and mystical fan +of the _Samurai_. + + + + +XVII + +THE WOMAN WHO LOVED CHOPIN + + +I + +When Marco Davos left Ischl on the midday train, that picturesque, +huddled Austrian watering-place was stuffy. He was surprised then most +pleasantly by the coolness of Aussee, further down the line in the +direction of Vienna. Ischl is not a bad place, but it lies, as the +natives say, smothered in a kettle. He rode over from the station to the +stadt park, where the band was playing. There he dismounted, for he was +going further--Aussee is not very interesting, but it principally serves +as a good starting-point for trips to many of the charming lakes with +which Styria is dotted. After asking his way, Davos passed the swimming +baths, and keeping on the left bank of a tiny stream, he presently found +himself walking through an earthly paradise. Since his advent in Ischl, +where he drank the waters and endeavoured to quiet his overtaxed nerves, +he had made up his mind to visit Alt-Aussee; several Viennese friends +had assured him that this hamlet, beneath a terrific precipice and on +the borders of a fairy-like lake, would be well worth the while. + +It was a relief to breathe the thinner mountain air, and the young +artist inhaled it with satisfaction, his big hat in hand, his long curly +black hair flowing in the gentle breeze. He found himself in tunnels of +verdure, the sunlight shut off by the heavy leafage; then the path +debouched into the open and, skirting closely the rocky wall, it widened +into an island of green where a shady pagoda invited. He sat down for a +few minutes and congratulated himself that he had escaped the intimate +discomforts of the omnibus he discerned on the opposite bank, packed +with stout people. This was the third week of his vacation, one enforced +by a nerve specialist in the Austrian capital, and for the first time +Davos felt almost cheerful. Perhaps the absolute hush of the country and +the purity of the atmosphere, with its suggestion of recent rain,--the +skies weep at least once a day in the Salzkammergut region,--proved a +welcome foil to fashionable Ischl, with its crowds, its stiffness, its +court ceremonial--for the emperor enjoys his _villegiatura_ there. And +Davos was sick and irritable after a prolonged musical season. He had +studied the pianoforte with Rosenthal, and his success, from his début, +had been so unequivocal that he played too much in public. There was a +fiery particle in his interpretations of Chopin, Schumann, and Liszt +that proclaimed the temperament, if not the actual possession, of +genius. Still in his early manhood--he was only twenty--the maturity of +his musical intelligence and the poetry of his style created havoc in +impressionable hearts. With his mixed blood, Hungarian and Italian, +Marco Davos' performance of romantic composers was irresistible; in it +there was something of Pachmann's wayward grace and Paderewski's +plangency, but with an added infusion of gypsy wildness which evoked for +old concert-goers memories of Liszt the brilliant rhapsodist. + +But he soon overpaid the score presented by the goddess Fortune--his +nerves were sadly jangled. A horror of the human face obsessed his +waking and sleeping hours; he dreamed of colossal countenances with +threatening eyes, a vast composite of the audiences he nightly faced. As +his popularity increased the waning of his self-respect told him that he +must go into retreat, anywhere out of the musical world--else would his +art suffer. It did suffer. The nervous diffidence, called stage-fright, +which had never assailed his supreme self-balance, intruded its +unwelcome presence. Marco, several months after he had discovered all +these mischievous symptoms, the maladies of artistic adolescence, was +not assured when the critics hinted of them--the public would surely +follow suit in a few weeks. Then came the visit to the learned Viennese +doctor and the trip to Ischl. A few more months of this appalling +absorption in his own personality, this morbid marriage of man to his +own image, and he suspected that his brain would be irretrievably +injured. + +He was a curious student of matters psychologic as well as musical. A +friendly laboratory had inducted him into many biologic mysteries. +Particularly fascinating to him was the tactile sense, that sense of +touch wherewith man acquaints himself with this earth-clot swimming in +space. Davos contemplated the tips of his fingers as he sat in the +grateful cool, his ten voices as he named them. With them he sang, +thundered, and thought upon the keyboard of his grand piano-forte. A +miracle, indeed, these slender cushions of fat, ramified by a network of +nerves, sinews, and bones as exquisite in their mechanism as the motion +of the planets. If hearing is a miracle, so is touch; the ear is not a +resonator, as has been so long maintained, but an apparatus which +records variations of pressure. This makes it subservient to the laws of +sensation; touch and hearing are akin. It aroused the pride of Davos +after he had read the revolutionary theories of Pierre Bounier regarding +the touch. So subtle could the art of touch be cultivated, the pianist +believed, that the blind could _feel_ colour on the canvas of the +painter. He spent weeks experimenting with a sensitive manometer, +gauging all the scale of dynamics. No doubt these fumblings on the edge +of a new science temporarily hurt his play. With a dangerous joy he +pressed the keys of his instrument, endeavouring to achieve more +delicate shadings. He quarrelled with the piano manufacturers for their +obstinate adherence to the old-fashioned clumsy action; everything had +been improved but the keyboard--that alone was as coldly unresponsive +and inelastic as a half-century ago. He had fugitive dreams of wires +that would vibrate like a violin. The sounding-board of a pianoforte is +too far from the pianist, while the violinist presses his strings as one +kisses the beloved. Little wonder it is the musical monarch. A new +pianoforte, with passionately coloured overtones, that could sob like a +violoncello, sing like a violin, and resound with the brazen clangours +of the orchestra--Liszt had conceived this synthesis, had by the sheer +force of his audacious genius compelled from his instrument ravishing +tones that were never heard before or--alas!--since. + +Even the antique harpsichord had its compensations; not so powerful in +its tonal capacity, it nevertheless gave forth a pleading, human quality +like the still small angelic voice. Davos pondered these problems, +pondered Chopin's celestial touch and the weaving magic of his many-hued +poems; Chopin--Keats, Shelley, and Heine battling within the walls of a +frail tender soul. + +The sound of footsteps and voices aroused him. He shivered with disgust. +More people! Two men, well advanced in life, followed by two women, +barely attracted his notice, until he saw that the little creature who +waddled at the rear of the party was a Japanese in European clothes. +Notwithstanding her western garb, she resembled a print of Utamaro. +Beside her walked a tall, grave girl, with dark hair and gray eyes, +attired in the quaint garb of some early nineteenth-century epoch--1840 +or thereabouts. As old-fashioned as she looked, a delicate girlish +beauty was hers, and when she indifferently gazed at Davos, straightway +he heard humming in his head the "glance motive" from Tristan and +Isolde. They passed on, but not leaving him as he was before; a voice +whispered in the secret recesses of his being: "You love! Follow! Seek +her!" And under the sudden impulsion of this passion he arose and made a +few steps toward the curve of the path around which the girl and her +companions had disappeared. The absurdity of this hasty translation into +action of his desire halted him. Yes, his nerves must be in a bad way if +a casual encounter with a pretty woman--but was she pretty? He did not +return to his seat. He continued his stroll leisurely. Pretty! Not +exactly pretty--distinguished! Noble! Lovely! Beautiful! He smiled. Here +he was playing the praises of the unknown in double octaves. He did not +overtake her. She had vanished on the other side of the bridge, and in a +few minutes he found himself entering Alt-Aussee. It wore a bright +appearance, with its various-coloured villas on the lake shores, and its +church and inn for a core. The garden of this hotel he found to be +larger than he had imagined; it stretched along the bank and only +stopped as if stone and mortar had been too lazy to go farther. + +Again he hesitated. The garden, the _restauration_--full of people: +women knitting, children bawling, men reading; and all sipping coffee to +a background of gossip. He remembered that it was the sacred hour of +_Kaffeeklatsch_, and he would have escaped by a flight of steps that led +down to the beach, but he was hailed. A company of a half-dozen sat at a +large table under the trees, and the host was an orchestral conductor +well known to Davos. There was no alternative. He took a chair. He was +introduced as the celebrated pianoforte-virtuoso to men and women he had +never seen before, and hoped--so rancorous was his mood--never to see +again. A red-headed girl from Brooklyn, who confessed that she thought +Maeterlinck the name of some new Parisian wickedness, further bothered +him with questions about piano teachers. No, he didn't give lessons! He +never would! She dropped out of the conversation. Finally by an effort +he swore that his head was splitting, that he must return to Ischl. He +broke away. When he discovered that the crowd was also bound for the +same place, he abruptly disappeared. It took him just two hours to +traverse the irregular curves of the lake on the Franz Carl Promenade, +and he ate his dinner in peace at the inn upon a balcony that projected +over the icy waters. + +Davos decided, as he smoked a mild cigarette, that he would remain at +Alt-Aussee for the night. The peace of the landscape purified his soul +of its irritability, though he wished that the Dachstein would not +dominate so persistently the sky-line--it was difficult to avoid the +view of this solitary and egotistic peak, the highest in Styria. He was +assigned a comfortable chamber, but the night was too fine for bed. He +did not feel sleepy, and he went along the road he had come by; the +church was an opaque mass, the spire alone showing in the violet +twilight, like some supernatural spar on a ship far out at sea. He +attempted to conjure to his tired brain the features, the expression, of +the girl. They would not reappear; his memory was traitorous. + +The murmur of faint music, piano music, made his ears wince--how he +hated music! But afar as were these tonal silhouettes, traced against +the evening air, his practised hearing told him that they were made by +an artist. He languidly followed the clue, and soon he was at the gate +of a villa, almost buried in the bosk, and listening with all his +critical attention to a thrilling performance--yes, thrilling was the +word--of Chopin's music. What! The last movement of the B flat minor +sonata, the funeral march sonata, but no more like the interpretation he +had heard from others--from himself--than--than.... + +But, good heavens! _Who_ was playing! The unison passages that mount and +recede were iridescent columns of mist painted by the moonlight and +swaying rhythmically in the breeze. Here was something rare. No longer +conscious of the technical side of the playing, so spiritualized was it, +so crystalline the touch, Davos forgot his manners and slipped through +the gateway, through the dark garden, toward an open window in which +burned a solitary candle. The mystery of this window and the quicksilver +dartings of the music--gods, what a touch, what gossamer delicacy!--set +his heart throbbing. He forgot his sick nerves. When the trumpet blows, +the war-horse lusts for action--and this was not a trumpet, but a horn +of elf-land. He moved as closely as he dared to the window, and the +music ceased--naturally enough, the movement had concluded. His ears +burned with the silence. _She_ came to the window. Arrested by the +vision--the casement framed her in a delicious manner--he did not stir. +She could not help seeing this intruder, the light struck him full in +the face. She spoke:-- + +"Dear Mr. Davos, won't you come into the house? My father and my uncle +will be most happy to receive you." + + * * * * * + +She knew him! Stunned by his overstrung emotions, he could only bow his +head. + + +II + +He received the welcome of a king. The two men he had seen earlier in +the day advanced ceremoniously and informed him that the honour of his +presence was something they had never hoped for; that--as news flies +swiftly in villages--they had heard he was at Alt-Aussee; they had +recognized the _great_ Marco Davos on the road. These statements were +delivered with exaggerated courtesy, though possibly sincere. The elder +of the pair was white-whiskered, very tall and spare, his expression a +sadly vague one. It was her father. The other an antique person, a +roly-poly fellow who chuckled and quavered, was her uncle. Davos sat in +a drawing-room containing a grand pianoforte, a few chairs, and couches. +The floor was stained, and when a cluster of lights was brought by the +uncle, he noticed that only Chopin portraits hung on the walls. He +apologized for his intrusion--the music had lured him from the highroad. + +"We are very musical," said the father. + +"I should say so," reiterated his brother-in-law. + +"Musical!" echoed Davos. "Do you call it by such an everyday phrase? I +heard the playing of a marvellous poet a moment ago." The two men looked +shyly at each other. She entered. He was formally presented. + +"Monsieur Davos, this is Constantia Grabowska, my daughter. My name is +Joseph Grabowski; my late wife's brother, Monsieur Pelletier." Davos +was puzzled by the name, Constantia Grabowska! She sat before him, +dressed in black silk with crinoline; two dainty curls hung over her +ears; her profile, her colouring, were slightly Oriental, and in her +nebulous gray eyes with their greenish light there was eternal youth. +Constantia! Polish. And how she played Chopin--ah! it came to him before +he had finished his apologies. + +"You are named after Chopin's first love," he ejaculated. "Pardon the +liberty." She answered him in her grave, measured contralto. + +"Constantia Gladowska was my grandmother." The playing, the portraits, +were now explained. A lover of the Polish composer, Davos knew every +incident of his biography. + +"I am the son of that Joseph Grabowski, the Warsaw merchant who married +the soprano singer, Constantia Gladowska, in 1832," said the father, +smilingly. "My father became blind." + +"Chopin's _Ideal_!" exclaimed Marco. He was under the spell of the +girl's beauty and music. He almost stared at her, for the knowledge that +she was a great artiste, perhaps greater than himself, rather dampened +his passion. She was adorable as she returned without coquetry his +ardent gaze; but she was--he had to admit it--a rival. This composite +feeling he inwardly wrestled with as the conversation placidly +proceeded. They only spoke of Poland, of Chopin. Once the name of +Emilia Plater, the Polish Joan of Arc, was mentioned--she, too, was a +distant connection. The young pianist hinted that more music would be +agreeable, but there was no response. He was quite alone with +Constantia, and they talked of Poland's tone-poet. She knew much more of +Chopin than he did, and she recited Mickïewicz's patriotic poems with +incomparable verve. + +"Do you believe in heredity?" he cried, as the father entered with the +tea. "Do you believe that your love of Chopin is inherited? Chopin +composed that wonderful slow movement of the F minor concerto because of +his love for your grandmother. How I wish I could have seen her, heard +her." + +The girl, without answering him, detached from her neck a large brooch +and chain. Davos took it and amazedly compared the portrait with the +living woman. + +"You _are_ Constantia Gladowska." She smiled. + +"Her love of Chopin--she must have loved her youthful adorer--has been +transmitted to you. Oh, please play me that movement again, the one +Rubinstein called 'the night wind sweeping over the churchyard graves.'" +Constantia blushed so deeply that he knew he had offended her. She had +for him something of the pathos of old dance music--its stately +sweetness, its measured rhythms. After drinking a cup of tea he drifted +to the instrument--flies do not hanker after honey as strongly as do +pianists in the presence of an open keyboard. A tactful silence ensued. +He began playing, and, as if exasperated at the challenge implied by her +refusal, he played in his old form. Then he took the theme of Chopin's E +flat minor Scherzo, and he juggled with it, spun it into fine fibres of +tone, dashed it down yawning and serried harmonic abysses. He was +magnificent as he put forth all the varied resources of his art. +Constantia, her cheeks ablaze, her lips parted, interposed a fan between +her eyes and the light. There was something dangerous and passionate in +her regard. In all the fury of his play he knew that he had touched her. +Once, during a pause, he heard her sigh. As he finished in a thunderous +crash he saw in the doorway the figure of the Japanese maid--an ugly, +gnarled idol with slitted eyes. She withdrew when he arose to receive +the unaffected homage of his hosts. He was curious. Monsieur Pelletier, +who looked like a Brazilian parrot in beak and hue, cackled:-- + +"That's Cilli, our Japanese. She was born in Germany, and is my niece's +governess. Quite musical, too, I should say so. Just look at my two +Maltese cats! I call them Tristan and Isolde because they make noises in +the night. Don't you _loathe_ Wagner?" + +It was time to go. Enamoured, Davos took his leave, promising to call +the next forenoon before he went back to Ischl. He held her fingers for +a brief moment and longed to examine their tips,--the artist still +struggled to subdue the man,--but the pressure he received was so +unmistakable that he hurried away, fearing to betray his emotion. He +hovered in the vicinity of the house, longing for more music. He was +disappointed. For a full hour he wandered through the dusty lanes in the +faded light of an old moon. When he reached his chamber, it was long +past one o'clock; undaunted, his romantic fervour forced him to the +window, and he watched the shining lake. He fell asleep thinking of +Constantia. But he dreamed of Cilli, the Japanese maid with the hideous +eyes. + + +III + +Not only that morning, but every morning for two weeks, did Marco Davos +visit Alt-Aussee. He came down from Ischl on the earliest train, and +some nights he stopped at the hotel near his new friends. After a few +visits he saw little of the father and uncle, and he was not sorry--they +were old bores with their archaic anecdotes of dead pianists. Two +maniacs on the subject of music, Davos wished them to the devil after he +had known them twenty-four hours. His passion had reached the acute key. +He could not eat or drink in normal fashion, and no sooner had he left +the girl than the sky became sombre, his pulse weakened, and he longed +to return to her side to tell her something he had forgotten. He did +this several times, and hesitated in his speech, reddened, and left her, +stumbling over the grass like a lame man. Never such a crazy wooer, +never a calmer maiden. She looked unutterable sentiment, but spoke it +not. + +When he teased her about her music, she became a statue. She was too +timid to play before artists; her only master had been her father. Once +more he had heard the piano as he returned unexpectedly, and almost +caught her; he saw her at the instrument, but some instinct must have +warned her that she was being spied upon. She stopped in the middle of a +phrase from a Mendelssohn song, and even to his prejudiced ears her +touch had seemed commonplace. Yet he loved her all the more despite her +flat refusal to play. The temptation to his excited artistic temperament +was removed. He played, often, gloriously. His nerves were steel. This +was a cure his doctor had not foreseen. What did it matter, anyhow?--he +was near Constantia daily, and the sunshine was royal. Only--why did her +relatives absent themselves so obstinately! She told him, with her +secret smile, that she had scolded them for talking so much; but when he +played they were never far away, she assured him. Nor was the Japanese +woman, Cilli--what a name! A nickname given by Constantia in her +babyhood. Cilli was a good soul. He hoped so--her goodness was not +apparent. She had a sneering expression as he played. He never looked up +from the keyboard that he did not encounter her ironical gaze. She was +undoubtedly interested. Her intensity of pose proved it; but there was +no sympathy in her eyes. And she had a habit of suddenly appearing in +door or window, and always behind her mistress. She ended by seriously +annoying him, though he did not complain. It was too trivial. + +One afternoon he unfolded his novel views on touch. If the action of the +modern pianoforte could be made as sensitive in its response as the +fingerboard of a fiddle.... Constantia listened with her habitual +gravity, but he knew that she was bored. Then he shifted to the subject +of fingers. He begged to be allowed the privilege of examining hers. At +first she held back, burying her hand in the old Mechlin lace flounce of +her sleeves. He coaxed. He did not attempt to conceal his chagrin when +he finally saw her fingers. They were pudgy, good-humoured, fit to lift +a knife and fork, or to mend linen. They did not match her cameo-like +face, and above all they did not reveal the musical soul he knew her to +possess. For the first time since he met her she gave evidence of ill +humour. She sharply withdrew her hand from his, and as she did so a +barbaric croon was heard, a sort of triumphant wailing, and Constantia, +without making an excuse, hurriedly left the room. The singing stopped. + +"It's that devil of a Japanese woman," he muttered testily. He waited +for nearly an hour, and in a vile temper took up his hat and stick and +went away. Decidedly this was his unlucky day, he grumbled, as he +reached the water. He saw Grabowski and Pelletier, arm in arm, trudging +toward the villa, but contrived to evade them. In ten minutes he found +himself spying on the house he had quitted. He skirted a little private +way back of the villa, and to his amazement father, uncle, and +Constantia came out and hailed the omnibus which travelled hourly to +Aussee. Davos was furious. He did not risk following them, for he +realized he had been treated shabbily. His wrath softened as he +reflected; perhaps Constantia, agitated by his rudeness,--had he been +rude?--persuaded her family to follow him to Ischl. The sky cleared. +That was the solution--Marco Davos straightened himself--his pride was +no longer up in arms. Poor child--she was so easily wounded! How he +loved her! + +His body trembled. He could not believe he was awake. Incredible music +was issuing from behind the closed blinds of the villa. Music! And the +music he had overheard that first night. But Constantia had just gone +away; he had seen her. There must be some mistake, some joke. No, no, by +another path she had managed to get back to the house. Ay! but what +playing. Again came that purling rush of notes, those unison passages, +as if one gigantic hand grasped them--so perfect was the tonal accord. +He did not hesitate. At a bound he was in the corridor and pushed open +the door of the drawing-room.... + +At first the twilighted room blinded him. Then to his disgust and terror +he saw the apelike features of the squat Japanese governess. She sat at +the piano, her bilious skin flushed by the exertion of playing. + +"You--you!" he barely managed to stammer. She did not reply, but +preserved the immobility of a carved idol. + +"You are a wonderful artiste," he blurted, going to her. She stolidly +answered:-- + +"The Japanese have the finest sense of touch in the world. I was once a +pupil of Karl Tausig." Involuntarily he bowed his head to the revered +name of the one man he had longed to hear. Then his feelings almost +strangled him; his master passion asserted itself. + +"Your fingers, your fingers--let me see them," he hoarsely demanded. +With a malicious grin she extended her hands--he groaned enviously. Yes, +they were miracles of sculpture, miracles of colour and delicacy, the +slender tips well-nigh prehensile in their cunning power. And the +fingers of Constantia, of his love, of the woman who loved Chopin--that +Chopin whose first passion was for her grandmother, the opera singer +Constantia Gladowska! + +The knowledge of her cruel deception crept into his consciousness. He +was chilled for several seconds. Grief at his lost love, implacable +anger at her trickery, crowded into his unhappy brain. But he only bowed +to Cilli, and summoning all his will he politely said:-- + +"It is quite true that when the Japanese choose to play the piano, we +Europeans must shut up shop." He hurried out to the road and walked +desperately.... + +The next morning, as he nervously paced the platform of the Ischl +railway station, he encountered his old friend Alfred Brünfeld, the +jovial Viennese pianist. + +"Hullo!" + +"Hullo!" + +"Not going back to Vienna?" + +"Yes--I'm tired of the country." + +"But, man, you are pale and tired. Have you been studying up here after +your doctor bade you rest?" The concern in Brünfeld's voice touched +Davos. He shook his head, then bethought himself of something. + +"Alfred, you are acquainted with everybody in Europe. How is it you +never told me about that strange Grabowski crowd--you know, the +granddaughter of Chopin's first love?" Brünfeld looked at him with +instant curiosity. + +"You also?" he said. The young man blushed. After _that_ he could never +forgive! The other continued:-- + +"Granddaughter, fiddlesticks! They are not Poles, those Grabowskis, but +impostors. Their real name is--is--" Davos started. + +"What, you have met them?" + +"Yes, the stupid father, the odious uncle, the fair Constantia--what a +meek saint!--and that diabolical Japanese, who plays the piano like a +house on fire." Tears came to the eyes of Marco Davos. + +"Did they--I mean, did _she_ take you in, too?" + +"Here, at Ischl, last summer," was the grim reply. + + + + +XVIII + +THE TUNE OF TIME + + +Ferval returned to Rouen after a fatiguing trip down the Seine as far as +Croisset, the old home of Gustave Flaubert. Here he viewed, not without +a dismal sense of fame and its futility, the little garden-house in +which the masterpieces of the great Frenchman had been conceived in joy +and executed in sorrow. He met the faithful Colange, one-time attendant +of Flaubert, and from him learned exacerbating details of the novelist's +lonesome years; so he was in a mood of irritation as he went ashore near +the Boïeldieu Bridge and slowly paced toward his hotel. He loved this +Norman Rouen, loved the battered splendour of Nôtre-Dame Cathedral, +loved the church of Saint-Ouen--that miracle of the Gothic, with its +upspringing turrets, its portal as perfect as a Bach fugue. And in the +Solferino Garden he paid his tribute of flowers at the monuments of +Maupassant and Flaubert. Ferval was modern in his tastes; he believed +nothing in art was worth the while which did not date from the +nineteenth century. + +Deplorably bored, he passed his hotel on the Quai and turned into the +Rue Jeanne d'Arc, which led by the façade of the Palais de Justice. He +had studied it carefully, and it did not, this dull afternoon in +September, hold his interest long; he sauntered on, not feeling strong +enough to light a cigarette. Decidedly, Rouen was become tiresome. He +would go back to Paris by the evening train--or to Dieppe, thence to +London, on the morning boat. Presently he found himself nearing the +Porte de la Grosse Horloge. Through its opening poured vivacious working +girls and men in blouse and cap, smoking, chattering, gesticulating. It +was all very animated, and the wanderer tried to enjoy the picture. Then +over against the crenellated wall, under the tablet bearing the quaint +inscription picked out in choice Latin, Ferval saw a tall girl. Her bare +head would not have marked her in a crowd where motley prevailed; it was +her pose that attracted him,--above all, her mediæval face, with its +long, drooping nose which recalled some graven image of Jean Goujon. Her +skin was tanned; her hair, flame-coloured, was confined by a classic +fillet; her eyes, Oriental in fulness, were light blue--Ferval had +crossed to the apparition and noted these things. She did not return his +stare, but continued to gaze at the archway as if expecting some one. +Young, robust, her very attitude suggested absolute health; yet her +expression was so despairing, her eyes so charged with misery, that +involuntarily he felt in his pocket for money. And then he saw that in +her hand she held a tambourine. She wore a faded uniform of the +Salvation Army. + +Suddenly an extraordinary noise was heard; music, but of such a peculiar +and excruciating quality that the young man forgot his neighbour and +wondered what new pain was in store for his already taut nerves. The +shops emptied, children stopped their games, and the Quarter suspended +its affairs to welcome the music. Ferval heard rapturous and mocking +remarks. "Baki, Baki, the human orchestra!" cried one gossip to another. +And the reverberating music swelled, multifarious and amazing as if a +military band from piccolo to drum were about to descend the highway. A +clatter and bang, a sweet droning and shrill scraping, and then an old +man proudly limped through the gateway of the Great Clock. This was the +conjurer, this white-haired fellow, who, with fife, cymbals, bells, +concertinas,--he wore two strapped under either arm,--at times fiddler, +made epileptic music as he quivered and danced, wriggled, and shook his +venerable skull. The big drum was fastened to his back, upon its top +were placed cymbals. On his head he wore a pavilion hung with bells that +pealed when he twisted or nodded his long, yellow neck. He carried a +weather-worn fiddle with a string or two missing, while a pipe that +might have been a clarinet years before, now emitted but cackling tones +from his thin lips, through which shone a few fanglike teeth. By some +incomprehensible coördination of muscular movements he contrived to make +sound simultaneously his curious armoury of instruments, and the +whistling, screeching, scratching, drumming, wheezing, and tinkling of +metal were appalling. But it was rhythmic, and at intervals the edge of +a tune could be discerned, cutting sharply through the dense cloud of +vibrations, like the prow of a boat cleaving the fog. Baki, his face red +and swollen by his exertions, moved to the spot where waited the girl. + +"_Ai_, Debora!" cried a boy, "here's the old man. Pass the plate, pass +the plate!" To his amazement, though he could give no reason for the +feeling, Ferval saw the girl go from group to group, her tambourine +outstretched, begging for coppers. Once she struck an insulting youth +across the face, but when she reached Ferval and met his inquiring look, +she dropped her eyes and did not ask for alms. A red-headed Sibyl, he +thought discontentedly, a street beggar, the daughter of an old ruffian. +And as he walked away rapidly he remembered her glance, in which there +lurked some touch of antique pride and wrath. + + +II + +Rouen lay below him, a violet haze obscuring all but the pinnacles of +its churches. The sinking sun had no longer power to pierce this misty +gulf, at the bottom of which hummed the busy city; but Ferval saw +through rents in the twirling, heat-laden atmosphere the dim shapes of +bridges mirrored by the water beneath him; and once the two islands +apparently swept toward him, a blur of green; while at the end of the +valley, framed by hills, he seemed to discern the odd-looking +Transbordeur spanning the Seine. + +For twenty-four hours he had not ceased thinking of the girl with the +tambourine, of her savage, sullen grace, her magnificent poise and +strange glance. He had learned at his hotel that she was called "_Debora +la folle_," and that she was the daughter of the still crazier Baki. Was +she some sort of a gypsy, or a Continental version of Salvation Army +lass? No one knew. Each year, at the beginning of autumn, the pair +wandered into Rouen, remained a few weeks, and disappeared. Where? +Paris, perhaps, or Italy or--_là bas!_ The shoulder-shrugging proved +that Baki and his daughter were not highly regarded by reputable +citizens of Rouen, though the street people followed their music and +singing as long as it lasted. Singing? queried Ferval; does the woman +sing? + +He became more interested. His visits to the country where Pissarro +painted and Flaubert wrote revealed other possibilities besides those +purely artistic ones in which this amateur of fine shades and sensations +delighted. He did not deny, on the esplanade where behind him stood +Bonsecours and the monument of Jeanne d'Arc, that souvenirs of the girl +had kept his eyelids from closing during the major portion of the night. +To cool his brain after the midday breakfast he had climbed the white, +dusty, and winding road leading to the Monumental Cemetery wherein, true +Flaubertian, he had remained some moments uncovered at the tomb of the +master. Now he rested, and the shade of the trees mellowed the slow dusk +of a Rouen evening. + +A deep contralto voice boomed in his ears. As he had seen but a scant +half-dozen persons during the afternoon on the heights, Ferval was +startled from his dreams. He turned. Sitting on a bank of green was the +girl. Her hands were clasped and she spoke carelessly to her father, +who, unharnessed from his orchestra, appeared another man. Rapidly +Ferval observed his striking front, his massive head with the long, +white curls, the head of an Elijah disillusioned of his mission. He, +too, was sitting, but upright, and his arm was raised with a threatening +gesture as if in his desolating anger he were about to pronounce a +malediction upon the vanishing twilighted town. Ferval moved +immediately, as he did not care to be caught spying upon his queer +neighbours. He was halted by their speech. It was English. His surprise +was so unaffected that he turned back and went up to the two and bade +them good-day. At once he saw that the girl recognized him; the father +dropped his air of grandeur and put on the beggar's mask. What an actor! +thought Ferval, at the transformation. "Would the good gentleman +please--?" + +The girl plucked at her father's arm imploringly. With her grave, cold +expression she answered the other's salutation and fixed him with her +wonderful eyes so inquiringly that Ferval began a hasty explanation. +"English was rarely spoken here ... and then the pleasure of the music!" +The old man burst into scornful laughter. + +"The music!" he exclaimed. "The music!" echoed his daughter. Ferval +wished himself down in Rouen. But he held his position. + +"Yes," he continued, "your music. It interested me. And now I find you +speaking my own tongue. I must confess that I am curious, that my +curiosity has warrant." Thus was he talking to beggars as if they were +his social equals. Unconsciously the tone he adopted had been forced +upon him by the bearing of his companions, above all by their accent, +that of cultivated folk. Who and what were they? The musician no longer +smiled. + +"You are a music-lover, monsieur?" he asked in a marked French _patois_. + +"I love music, and I am extremely engaged by your remarkable combination +of instruments," answered Ferval. Baki regarded his wretched orchestra +on the grass, then spoke to his daughter. + +"Debora," he said in English, and his listener wondered if it were +Celtic or Scotch in its unusual intonations, "Debora, you must sing +something for the gentleman. He loves our art,"--there was indescribable +pathos in this phrase,--"so sing something from Purcell, Brahms, or +Richard Strauss." + +These words were like the sting of hail; they seemed to drop from the +sky, so out of key were they with the speaker's ragged clothes and the +outlandish garb of his daughter. Purcell! Brahms! Strauss! What could +these three composers mean to such outcasts? Believing that he was the +victim of a mystification, Ferval waited, his pulses beating as if he +had been running too hard. The girl slowly moved her glorious eyes in +his direction; light as they were in hue, their heavy, dark lashes gave +them a fantastic expression--bright flame seen through the shadow of +smoke. He felt his own dilating as she opened her throat and poured out +a broad, sonorous stream of sound that resolved into Von ewiger Liebe by +Brahms. He had always loved deep-voiced women. Had he not read in the +Talmud that Lilith, Adam's first wife, was low of voice? And this +beggar-maid? Maybe a masquerading singer with a crazy father! What else +could mean such art wasted on the roads, thrown in the faces of a +rabble! Ferval kindled with emotion. Here was romance. Brahms and his +dark song under the bowl of the troubled blue sky strongly affected him. +He took the lean, brown hand of the singer and kissed it fervently. She +drew back nervously, but her father struck her on the shoulder +chidingly. + +"A trifle too dreary," he rumbled in his heavy bass. "Now, Purcell for +the gentleman, and may he open his heart and his purse for the poor." + +"Father," she cried warningly, "we are not beggars, _now_!" She turned +supplicatingly to the young man and made a gesture of dismissal. He +gently shook his head and pretended that he was about to leave, though +he felt that his feet were rooted in the earth, his power of willing +gone. + +"Ay, ay, my girl!" continued the musician, "you can sing as well as the +best of them, only you love your sinful old father so much that you have +laid aside your ambitions, to follow him in his pilgrimage of expiation +about this wicked globe. Ah, sir, if you but knew--I _will_ speak, +Debora, for he is a gentleman and a lover of music! If you but knew our +history, you would not be surprised at us. Have ye ever been in Wales?" + +Ferval stumbled in his answer. It was overlooked; the old man continued: +"If ye have, ye must have heard of the sin-eaters. I am one of them, I +am an eater of sin--" + +Again the girl exclaimed, this time piteously, "Oh, father, remember +your vow!" + +"Poor lass! Yes, I was a doer of evil, and I became an eater of sin. +Some day my sins will be forgiven--this is my penance." He pointed to +his instruments. Ferval kept silence. He feared a word would blow away +the cobweb foundations of the narrative. The girl had turned and was +watching a young tilted moon which with a single star made silvery dents +low in the western horizon. + +"I am an eater of sin. We still have a few such in Wales. They put a +piece of bread and cheese on the breast of a dead man and when the +sin-eater eats it, the sins of the dead are passed into the bread and +cheese and the soul of the dead is shrived of them. Ay, ay, but it's a +grave duty, my friend, to take upon your own soul the crime of another. +If you are free from sin yourself, you may walk through life a brave +creature; but ... I took his sins, sins, the sins of the wickedest +composer of our century, God rest his soul. And for the wicked things he +put into his symphonies I must march through life playing on this +terrible collection of instruments the Tune of Time--" His daughter +faced him. + +"Father, we must go; you are only keeping the gentleman." Again she +signalled Ferval, but he disregarded her warning. He would not stir. The +story and the man who told it, a prophet shorn of his heaven-storming +powers, fascinated him. + +"I took his sins to myself and they were awful. Once every night I play +the Tune of Time in which the wickedness of the dead man is spread out +like dry rot in a green field. This man kept his genius so long stagnant +that it decayed on his hands, and then into his pestilential music he +poured his poison, and would have made the world sick. Oh, for delivery +from the crushing transgressions of another! His name? Ah, but that is +my secret! I ate his sin, and truth, my son, is stranger than theology! +Listen!" + +Before his daughter could check him he had hastily donned his armament +of instruments and, tramping slowly the broad, smooth path, began +playing. Ferval, much disappointed, was about to disappear, for he +remembered the racking noises of the previous day. But this music, this +Tune of Time!... + + +III + +It was like the flare of lightning which illuminates strange regions +beyond the borders of the soul. Ferval no longer heard, he felt; he felt +no more, he saw. The white veil was torn asunder, and it showed him a +melodious thunder-pool wherein tapering tiny bodies swam, whose eyes +were the eyes of Debora. They split and coalesced into other creatures, +and to the drummings of spheric harmonies resolved themselves scaly and +monstrous. Never did they cease changing. As the music buzzed he saw the +great ladder of life, the lowermost rungs resting in lakes of melted +amber, the top threatening the remotest rims of the universe. And still +the Tune of Time whirred on, as facet after facet of the Infinite +wheeled toward creation. Numberless legions of crumpled nightmare shapes +modulated into new, familiar forms. Ferval saw plasmic dew become +anthropoidal apes, fiercely roaming primeval forests in search of prey. +The music mounted ever upward, for the Tune of Time is the Tune of +Love--love and its inseparable shadow, hate, fashion the firmament. The +solid, circular earth shivered like a mighty harp under this lyric +burden of love. The very stars sported in their orbits; and from the +fulgurating ovens of the Milky Way there shot forth streams of audible +light that touched the heart-strings of the hairy, erect primates and +set them chanting; thus were the souls born which crowned them men. This +space-bridging music ranged from sun to sun, and its supernatural +symphony had no beginning and never shall end. + +But the magician or devil who revealed this phantasmagoria of the +Cosmos--how had he wrested from the Inane the Tune of Time that in a +sequence of chromatic chords pictured the processes of the eternal +energy? Was this his sin, the true sin against the Holy Ghost? How had +he blundered upon the secret of the rhythmic engine which spun souls +through the ages? No man could live after this terrific peep at the +Ancient of Days. Debora's eyes peered into Ferval's, filled with the +music that enmeshes. And now sounded the apocalyptic trumpets even unto +the glittering edges of eternity.... + +Amid this vertiginous tempest of tones Debora danced the Dance of Space. +She revolved in lenten movement to the lilt of the music, her eyes +staring and full of broken lights. As her gaze collided with her +companion's he saw a disk of many-coloured fire; and then her languorous +gestures were transformed into shivering intensities. She danced like +the wine-steeped Noah; she danced as danced David before the Ark of the +Covenant. And she was Herodias pirouetting for the price of John's head, +and her brow was wreathed with serpents. Followed the convulsive +curvings of the Nautch and the opaque splendours of stately Moorish +slaves. Debora threw her watcher into a frenzy of fear. He crouched +under a sky that roofed him in with its menacing blackness; the orbs of +the girl were shot with crescent lightnings. Alien in his desolation, he +wondered if her solemn leaps, as the music dashed with frantic speed +upon his ear-drums, signified the incarnation of Devi, dread slayer of +men! The primal charmers affrighted his vision: Lilith, Ourania, +Astarté, Ashtaroth, Belkis, Ishtar, Mylitta, Cotytto, and many +immemorial figures from before the Flood streamed by and melted into the +woven paces of Debora--this new Jephtha's daughter dancing to her doom +as her father fingered the Tune of Time. In the whirling patterns of her +dance, Ferval discerned, though dimly, the Veil of Maya, the veil of +illusion called Space, on the thither side of which are embroidered the +fugacious symbols of Time.... + +... As the delirious music faltered and fainted, he watched the tragic +eyes of Debora yellowing cat-like. His senses and imagination had been +hypnotized by all this fracas and by the beauty of the girl. With such a +mate and such formidable music, he could conquer the earth! His brain +was afire with the sweetness of the odour that enveloped them, an odour +as penetrating as the music of the nocturnal Chopin. + +"Debora," he whispered, "you must never go away from me." She hung her +head. The old man was not to be seen; the darkness had swallowed him. +Ferval quietly passed his arm about the waist of the silent woman and +slowly they walked in the tender night. She was the first to speak:-- + +"You did not hear a madman's story," she asserted in her clear, candid +voice, which had for him the hue of a cleft pomegranate. "It is the +history of my father's soul. It is his own sin he expiates." + +"But you, you!" Ferval cried unsteadily. "Why must your life be +sacrificed to gratify the bizarre egotism of such a--" He cut short the +phrase, fearful of wounding her. He felt her body tremble and her arm +contract. They reached the marble staircase of the Jeanne d'Arc +memorial. She stopped him and burst forth:-- + +"Would you be willing to share his burden? Would you take upon your +shoulders his sin? He may have committed the one unpardonable sin, for +he discovered the true philosopher's stone, that can transmute metals, +make mountains nod, the stars to stop, and command the throne of +Jehovah--oh, what blasphemy has been his in his daring music! If he +could persuade one other soul besides mine to help him, he might be +released from his woe. Will you be that other?" + +She put this question as if she were proposing a commonplace human +undertaking. Ferval in his confusion fancied that she was provoking him +to a declaration. To grasp his receding reason he fatuously exclaimed:-- + +"Is this a Salvation Army fantasy?" + +With that she called out, in harsh resentment: + +"Not salvation for you!" + +She then thrust him from her so violently that he tumbled backward down +the steps to the very bottom, where, unnerved by the ferocity of the +attack and his head bruised by the fall, he felt his consciousness +escape like gas from a punctured balloon. When found the next morning, +he was barely covered by the old sin-eater's rags, while near by was +scattered the entire orchestra of that eloquent wizard. Shudderingly he +realized that it had been no dream; shudderingly he wondered if upon his +soul had been shifted the unknown crime of the fanatic! The witching, +enigmatic Debora haunted his memory; and with dismay he recalled the +blistering vision evoked by the music, through which she had glided like +some tremulous Lamia. Decidedly his imagination had carried him far. He +cursed his easy credulity, he reviled his love of the exotic.... + +Ferval made inquiry of the authorities, but received little comfort. +Salvation Army people they were not, this father and daughter; the +tambourine, assumed garb, and prophet's beard had deceived him. +Impostors! But of what incredible caliber, of what illusion-creating +power! For years he could not see a Salvation Army girl without a sense +of cerebral exaltation. If he could have met Debora again, he would have +forgiven her sibylline deceptions, her father's chicanery. And how did +they spin their web? Ferval, student of the occult, greedy of +metaphysical problems, at first set it down to Indian Yogi magic. But +the machinery--the hideously discordant human orchestra, the corybantic +dancing! No, he rejected the theory. Music is sometimes hypnotic, but +not such music; dancing is the most alluring of the spatial arts, and +Debora's miming was a delight to the eye; but could it have so obscured +his judgments as to paint upon the canvas of his fancy those prodigious +frescoes of time and space? + +In the iron solitude of his soul he tortured himself with these +questions. His stupor lasted for days--was it the abrupt fall or was it +the result of his absinthe-like dreams? He was haunted by an odour that +assailed his brain like one tune persistently played. The odour! Whence +did it come with its sickly sweetness? Perhaps therein lay the secret of +his hallucinating visions. Perhaps a drug had perverted his brain. But +within the week the dangerous perfume had become dissipated, and with it +vanished all hope of solving the riddle. Oh, to sense once more the +enchantments of its fragrance, once more revel in the sublimated +intoxication of mighty forces weaving at the loom of life! By the +cadences of what infernal art had he been vouchsafed a glimpse of the +profiles of the gods? Henceforth Ferval became a lover of shadows. + + + + +XIX + +NADA + + +The tenderness of the growing night disquieted the dying woman. + +"Aline!" she called. But it was only the name that reverberated within +the walls of her brain, harrowed by fever. A soft air rustled the drawn +curtains of lawn; and on the dressing table the two little lamps +fluttered in syncopated sympathy. One picture the room held. It was +after a painting by Goya, and depicted a sneering skeleton scrawling on +his dusty tomb, with a bony fore-finger, the sinister word, +_Nada_--nothing! The perturbation of the woman increased, though +physical power seemed denied her. "Aline, my child!" This time a +clucking sound issued from her throat. + +The girl went to the bedside and gently fanned. Her aunt wagged her head +negatively. "No, no!" she stuttered. Aline stopped, and kneeling, took +the sick hands in her own. Their eyes met and Aline, guided by the +glance, looked over at the picture with its sardonic motto. + +"Shall I take it away, Aunt Mary?" The elder woman closed her eyes as if +to shut out the ghoulish mockery. Then Aline saw the tabouret that stood +between the windows--it was burdened with magnolias in a deep white +bowl. + +"Do you wish them nearer?" + +"No, no," murmured her aunt. Her eyes brightened. She pushed her chin +forward, and the young girl removed the flowers, knowing that their +odour had become oppressive. She was not absent more than a few seconds. +As she returned the maid touched her arm. + +"The gentlemen are waiting below, miss. They won't leave until they see +you." + +"How can I go now? Send them away, send them away!" + +"Yes, miss; but I told them what you said this afternoon about the +danger of Holiest Mother--" + +"Hush! she is calling." Aline slipped into the room on hurried feet, her +eyes dilated, her hair in anxious disorder. But the invalid made no +signal. She lay with closed eyelids, the contraction of her nostrils a +faint proclamation of life. Again the niece took her place at the +headboard, and with folded fingers watched the whispering indications of +speedy flight. The maid soon beckoned her from a narrowed door. Aline +joined her. + +"They say that if you don't go down, they will come up." + +"Who says?" was the stern query. + +"The Second Reader and the Secretary. I think you had better see them; +they both look worried. Really I do, Miss Allie." + +"Very well, Ellen; but you must stay here, and if Holiest Mother makes +the slightest move, touch the bell. I'll not be gone five minutes." + +Without arranging her hair or dress, Aline opened the folding doors of +the drawing-room. Only the centre lamp was lighted, but she recognized +the two men. They were sitting together, and arose as she entered. The +burly Second Reader wore a dismayed countenance. His cheeks were flabby, +his eyes red. The other was a timid little man who never had anything to +say. + +"How is Holiest Mother?" asked the Reader. + +"Dying." + +"Oh, Sister Aline! Why such a blunt way of putting it? _She_ may be +exchanging her earthly garb for a celestial one--but die! We do not +acknowledge death in the Church of the New Faith." He paused and blandly +stroked his huge left hand, covered with red down. + +"Holiest Mother, my aunt, has not an hour to live," was the cool +response of the girl. "If you have no further question, I must ask you +to excuse me; I am needed above." She stepped to the door. + +"Wait a moment, sister! Not so fast. The situation is serious. Hundreds +of thousands of the faithful depend on our report of this--of this sad +event. We may tell them that the female pope of our great religion"--he +bent his big neck reverently--"was wafted to her heavenly abode by the +angels. But there are the officers of the law, the undertaker, the +cemetery people, to be considered. Shall we acknowledge that our founder +has died like any other human--in bed, of a fever? And who is to be her +successor? Has she left a will?" + +"Poor Aunt Mary!" muttered the girl. + +"It must be a woman, will or no will," continued the Second Reader, in +the tone of a conqueror making terms with a stricken foe. "Now Aline, +sister, you are the nearest of kin. You are a fervent healer. _You_ are +the Woman." + +"How can you stand there heartlessly plotting such things and a dying +woman in the house?" Aline's voice was metallic with passion. "You care +only for the money and power in our church. I refuse to join with you in +any such scheme. Aunt Mary will die. She will name her successor. Then +it will be time to act. Have you forgotten her last words to the +faithful?" She pointed to a marble tablet above the fireplace, which +bore this astounding phrase: "My first and forever message is one and +eternal." Nothing more,--but the men cowered before the sublime wisdom +uttered by a frail woman, wisdom that had started the emotional +machinery of two continents. + +"But, great God! Miss Aline, you mustn't go off and leave us in this +fix." Drops of water stood on the forehead of the Second Reader. His +hands dropped to his side with a gesture of despair. His companion kept +to the corner, a scared being. + +"You know as well as I do that _somebody_ has to take the throne seat +after--after your Aunt Mary dies--I mean, after Holiest Mother is +translated to eternity. Ask her, beg her, for some advice. We can't let +the great undertaking go to pieces--" + +"You have little faith, brother," replied Aline. "If that message means +anything, then the New Faith will take care of itself--" + +"Yes, yes, I know," was the testy interruption; "but the world is not so +easily led in matters of religion. The message, as you say, is divine; +but it may sound like meaningless twaddle to the world at large. If we +are to heal mankind and dispel the heresy of disease and death, why +can't Holiest Mother save herself? Mind you, I am looking at this thing +with the eyes of the sceptics--" + +"You are an unbeliever, a materialist, yourself," was the bold retort. +"Do as you please, but you can't drag me into your money calculations." +The swift slam of the door left them to their fears. + +Her aunt, sitting as upright as a candle, was conducting an invisible +orchestra when Aline returned. The frightened maid tried to hold the +lean, spasmodic arms as they traced in the air the pompous rhythm of a +march that moved on silent funereal pinions through the chamber. The +woman stared threateningly at the picture on the wall, the picture of +the skeleton which had come from nothingness to reveal nothingness to +the living. The now distraught girl, her nerves crisped by her doubts, +threw herself upon the bed, her fears sorely knocking at her heart. + +"Aunt, Aunt Mary--Holiest Mother, in Christ's name, in the name of the +New Faith, tell me before you go--tell me what is to become of our holy +church after you die--after you pass over to the great white light. Is +it all real? Or is it only a dream, _your_ beautiful dream?--What is the +secret truth? Or--or--is there no secret--no--" her voice was cracked by +sobs. The stately, soundless music was waved on by her aunt. Then +Holiest Mother fell back on her pillow, and with a last long glance at +the picture, she pointed, with smiling irony at the picture. + +_Nada, Nada ..._ + +The night died away in tender complicity with the two little lamps on +the dressing table, and the sweet, thick perfume of magnolias modulated +into acrid decay as day dawned. Below, the two men anxiously awaited the +message from the dead. And they saw again upon the marble tablet above +the fireplace her cryptic wisdom:-- + +"My first and forever message is one and eternal." + + + + +XX + +PAN + + For the Great God Pan is alive again. + + --DEAN MANSEL. + + +I + +The handsome Hungarian kept his brilliant glance fixed upon Lora Crowne; +she sat with her Aunt Lucas and Mr. Steyle at a table facing the +orchestra. His eyes were not so large as black; the intensity of their +gaze further bewildered the young woman, whose appearance that evening +at the famous café on the East Side was her initial one. The heat, the +bristling lights, the terrific appealing clamour of the gypsy band, set +murmuring the nerves of this impressionable girl. And the agility of the +_cymbalom_ player, his great height, clear skin, and piercing eyes, +quite enthralled her. + +"It is the gypsy dulcimer, Lora; I read all about it in Liszt's book on +gypsy music," said Aunt Lucas, in an airy soprano. + +Mr. Steyle was impressed. Lora paid no attention, but continued to gaze +curiously at the antics of the player, who hammered from his instrument +of wire shivering, percussive music. With flexible wrists he swung the +felt-covered mallets that brought up such resounding tones; at times +his long, apelike arms would reach far asunder and, rolling his eyes, he +touched the extremes of his _cymbalom_; then he described furious +arpeggios, punctuated with a shrill tattoo. And the crazy music defiled +by in a struggling squad of chords; but Aŕpad Vihary never lifted his +eyes from Lora Crowne.... + +The vibration ceased. Its withdrawal left the ear-drums buzzing with a +minute, painful sensation, like that of moisture rapidly evaporating +upon the naked skin. A battalion of tongues began to chatter as the +red-faced waiters rushed between the tables, taking orders. It was after +eleven o'clock, and through the swinging doors passed a throng of motley +people, fanning, gossiping, bickering--all eager and thirsty. Clarence +Steyle pointed out the celebrities with conscious delight. Over +yonder--that man with the mixed gray hair--was a composer who came every +night for inspiration,--musical and otherwise, Clarence added, with a +laugh. And there was the young and well-known decadent playwright who +wore strangling high collars and transposed all his plays from French +sources; he lisped and was proud of his ability to dramatize the latest +mental disease. And a burglar who had written a famous book on the +management of children during hot weather sat meekly resting before a +solitary table. + +The leader of the Hungarian band was a gypsy who called himself Alfassy +Janos, though he lived on First Avenue, in a flat the door of which +bore this legend: _Jacob Aron_. The rest of the band seemed gypsy. Who +is the _cymbalom_ player? That is not difficult to answer; the programme +gives it. + +"There you are, Miss Lora." + +She looked. "Oh, what a romantic name! He must be a count at least." + +"Lora, dear, gypsies never bear titles," remarked Aunt Lucas, +patronizingly. + +"How about the Abbé Liszt?" triumphantly asked her charge. + +Aunt Lucas laughed coldly. "Liszt was Hungarian, not Romany. But your +artist with the drumsticks certainly is distinguished-looking. If he +only would not wear that odious scarlet uniform. I wonder why he does +not sit down, like the rest of his colleagues." + +Aŕpad Vihary leaned against the panelled wall, his brow puckered in +boredom, his long black mustaches drooping from sheer discouragement. +His was a figure for sculpture--a frame powerfully modelled, a bisque +complexion. Thin as a cedar sapling, he preserved such an immovable +attitude that in the haze of the creamy atmosphere he seemed a carved, +marmoreal image rather than a young man with devouring eyes. + +The three visitors ate sandwiches and pretended to relish Munich beer +served in tall stone mugs. Aunt Lucas, who was shaped like a 'cello, +made more than a pretence of sipping; she drank one entirely, +regretting the exigencies of chaperonage: to ask for more might shock +the proper young man. + +"It's horrid here, after all," she remarked discontentedly. "So many +people--_such_ people--and very few nice ones. The Batsons are over +there, Lora; but then you don't care for them. O dear, I wish the band +would strike up again." + +It did. A vicious swirl of colour and dizzy, dislocated rhythms prefaced +the incantations of the Czardas. Instantly the eating, gabbling crowd +became silent. Alfassy Janos magnetized his hearers with cradling, +caressing movements of his fiddle. He waved like tall grass in the wind; +he twisted snakewise his lithe body as he lashed his bow upon the +screaming strings; the resilient tones darted fulgurantly from +instrument to instrument. After chasing in circles of quicksilver, they +all met with a crash; and the whole tonal battery, reënforced by the +throbbing of Aŕpad Vihary's dulcimer, swept through the suite of rooms +from ceiling to sanded floor. It was no longer enchanting music, but +sheer madness of the blood; sensual and warlike, it gripped the +imagination as these tunes of old Egypt, filtered through savage +centuries, reached the ears. Lora trembled in the gale that blew across +the Puzta. She imagined a determined Hungarian prairie, over which +dashed disordered centaurs brandishing clubs, driving before them a band +of satyrs and leaping fauns. The hoofed men struggled. At their front +was a monster with a black goat-face and huge horns; he fought fiercely +the half-human horses. The sun, a thin scarf of light, was eclipsed by +earnest clouds; the curving thunder closed over the battle; the air was +flame-sprinkled and enlaced by music; and most melancholy were the eyes +of the defeated Pan--the melancholy eyes of Aŕpad Vihary.... + +Aunt Lucas was scandalized. "Do you know, Lora, that the impudent +dulcimer virtuoso"--she prided herself on her musical terms--"actually +stared you out of countenance during the entire Czardas?" And she could +have added that her niece had returned the glance unflinchingly. + +Mr. Steyle noticed Lora's vacant regard when he addressed her and +insisted on getting her away from the dangerous undertow of this "table +d'hôte music," as he contemptuously called it. He summoned the waiter. + +Lora shed her disappointment. "Oh, let's wait for the _cymbalom_ solo," +she frankly begged. + +Her aunt was unmoved. "Yes, Mr. Steyle, we had better go; the air is +positively depressing. These slumming parties are delightful if you +don't overdo them--but the people!" Up went her lorgnon. + +They soon departed. Lora did not dare to look back until she reached the +door that opened on the avenue; as she did so her vibrant gaze collided +with the Hungarian's. She determined to see him again. + + +II + +Nice Brooklyn girls always attend church and symphony concerts. This +dual custom is considered respectable and cultured. Lora's parents +during their lifetime never missed the Theodore Thomas concerts and the +sermons of a certain famous local preacher; but there were times when +the young woman longed for Carmen and the delights of fashionable +Bohemia. Carefully reared by her Aunt Lucas, she had nevertheless a +taste for gypsy bands and "Gyp's" novels. She read the latter +translated, much to the disedification of her guardian, who was a +linguist and a patron of the fine arts. This latter clause included +subscriptions to the Institute Course and several scientific journals. +If Lora were less romantic, all would be well. Once the careful chaperon +had feared music and its disturbing influences; but after she had read +an article about its healing effect upon the insane she felt that it +could work no evil in Lora; indeed, it was an elevating art. She was +fond of music herself, and, as dancing was strictly tabooed, there +seemed little likelihood of the noble art of "sweet concordance"--Aunt +Lucas had picked this quotation up somewhere--doing mischief to her +impressionable niece. + +Nearly all dwelling-houses look alike in Brooklyn, even at midday. The +street in which the Crownes lived was composed of conventional +brown-stone buildings and English basements. Nielje, the Dutch maid, +stood at the half-opened door, regarding with suspicion the big, dark +man who had pulled the bell so violently. Aunt Lucas was in New York at +the meeting of a society devoted to Ethical Enjoyment. Though Nielje had +been warned secretly of an expected visitor, this wild-looking young man +with long black hair, wearing a flaring coat of many colours and baggy +Turkish trousers, gave her a shock. Why did he come to the basement as +if he were one of the cook's callers? She paused. Then the door was +shoved in by a muscular arm, and she was pushed against the wall. + +"Don't try that again, man," she protested. + +He answered her in gibberish. "Mees, Mees Lora," he repeated. + +"Ach!" she exclaimed. + +Aŕpad Vihary gloomily followed her into the dining-room, where Lora +stood trembling. This was the third time she had met the Hungarian, and +fearing Prospect Park,--after two timid walks there, under the +fiery-fingered leaves of early autumn,--she had been prevailed upon to +invite Aŕpad to her home. She regretted her imprudence the moment he +entered. All his footlight picturesqueness vanished in the cold, hard +light of an unromantic Brooklyn breakfast-room. He seemed like a clumsy +circus hero as he scraped his feet over the parquetry and attempted to +kiss her hand. She drew away instantly and pointed to a chair. He +refused to sit down; his pride seemed hurt. + +Then he gave the girl an intense look, and she drew nearer. + +"Oh, Aŕpad Vihary," she began. + +He interrupted. "You do not love me now. Why? You told me you loved me, +in the park, yesterday. I am a poor artist, that is the reason." + +This speech he uttered glibly, and, despite the extraordinary +pronunciation, she understood it. She took his long hand, the fingers +amazed her. He bent them back until they touched his wrist, and was +proud of their flexibility. He walked to the dining-table and tossed its +cover-cloth on a chair. Upon his two thumbs he went around it like an +acrobat. "Shall I hold you out with one arm?" he softly asked. Lora was +vastly amused; this was indeed a courtship out of the ordinary--it +pleased her exotic taste. + +"Hungarian gypsies are very strong, are they not?" she innocently asked. + +"I am not gypsy nor am I Hungarian; I am an East Indian. My family is +royal. We are of the Rajpoot tribes called Ranas. My father once ruled +Roorbunder." + +Lora was amazed. A king's son, a Rana of Roorbunder! She became very +sympathetic. Again she urged him to sit down. + +"My nation never sits before a woman," he proudly answered. + +"But I will sit beside you," she coaxed, pushing him to a corner. He +resisted her and went to the window. Lora again joined him. The man +piqued her. He was mysterious and very unlike Mr. Steyle--poor, +sentimental Clarence, who melted with sighs if she but glanced at him; +and then, Clarence was too stout. She adored slender men, believing that +when fat came in at the door love fled out of the window. + +"They put me in a circus at Buda-Pesth," remarked Aŕpad Vihary, as if he +were making a commonplace statement about the weather. + +She gave a little scream; he regarded her with Oriental composure. "In a +circus! You! Did you ride?" + +"I cannot ride," he said. "I played in a cage all day." + +"Because you were wild?" She then went into a fit of laughter. He was +such a funny fellow, though his ardent gaze made her blush. So blond and +pink was Lora that her friends called her Strawberry--a delicate +compliment in which she delighted. It was this golden head and radiant +face, with implacably blue eyes, that set the blood pumping into Aŕpad's +brain. When he looked at her, he saw sunlight. + +"Do you know, you absurd prince, that when you played the Czardas the +other night I seemed to see a vision of a Hungarian prairie, covered +with fighting centaurs and satyrs! I longed to be a _vivandière_ among +all those fauns. You were there--in the music, I mean--and you were big +Pan--oh, so ugly and terrible!" + +"Pan! That is a Polish title," he answered quite simply. + +"Stupid! The great god Pan--don't you know your mythology? Haven't you +read Mrs. Browning? He was the god of nature, of the woods. Even now, I +believe you have ears with furry tips and hoofs like a faun." + +He turned a sickly yellow. + +"Anyhow, why did they put you in a cage? Were you a wild boy?" + +"They thought so in Hungary." + +"But why?" + +He stared at her sorrowfully, and was about to empty his soul; but she +turned away with a shudder. + +"I know, I know," she whispered; "your hands--they are like the hands +of--" + +Aŕpad threw out his chest, and Lora heard with a curiosity that became +nervous a rhythmic wagging sound, like velvet bruised by some dull +implement. It frightened her. + +"Do not be afraid of me," he begged. "You cannot say anything I do not +know already." He walked to the door, and the girl followed him. + +"Don't go, Aŕpad," she said with pretty remorse. + +The fire blazed in his eyes and with a single swift grasp he seized her, +holding her aloft like a torch. Lora almost lost consciousness. She had +not counted upon such barbarous wooing, and, frightened, cried out, +"Nielje, Nielje!" + +Nielje burst into the room as if she had been very near the keyhole. +She was a powerful woman from Holland, who did not fear an army. + +"Put her down!" she insisted, in her deepest gutturals. "Put her down, +you brute, or I'll hurt you." + +Lora jumped to the floor as Nielje struck with her broomstick at Aŕpad's +retreating back. To the surprise of the women he gave a shriek of agony +and ran to the door, Nielje following close behind. Lora, her eyes +strained with excitement, did not stir; she heard a struggle in the +little hall as the man fumbled at the basement entrance. Again he +yelled, and then Lora rushed to the window. Nielje, on her knees, was +being dragged across the grassy space in front of the house. She held +on, seemingly, to the coat-tail of the frantic musician; only by a +vigorous shove did he evade her persistent grasp and disappear. + +A policeman with official aptness went leisurely by. Nielje flew into +the house, locking and bolting the door. Her face was red as she rolled +on the floor, her hands at her sides. Lora, alarmed, thought she was +seriously hurt or hysterical from fright; but the laughter was too +hearty and appealing. + +"Oh, Meeslora! Oh, Meeslora!" she gasped. "He must be monkey-man--he has +monkey tail!" + +Lora could have fainted from chagrin and horror. + +Had the great god Pan passed her way? + + + + +BOOKS BY JAMES HUNEKER + + +What Maeterlinck wrote: + +Maurice Maeterlinck wrote thus of James Huneker: "Do you know that +'Iconoclasts' is the only book of high and universal critical worth that +we have had for years--to be precise, since Georg Brandes. It is at once +strong and fine, supple and firm, indulgent and sure." + +The _Evening Post_ of June 10, 1915, wrote of Mr. Huneker's "The New +Cosmopolis": + +"The region of Bohemia, Mr. James Huneker found long ago, is within us. +At twenty, he says, he discovered that there is no such enchanted spot +as the Latin Quarter, but that every generation sets back the mythical +land into the golden age of the Commune, or of 1848, or the days of +'Hernani.' It is the same with New York's East Side, 'the fabulous East +Side,' as Mr. Huneker calls it in his collection of international urban +studies, 'The New Cosmopolis.' If one judged externals by grime, by +poverty, by sanded back-rooms, with long-haired visionaries assailing +the social order, then the East Side of the early eighties has gone down +before the mad rush of settlement workers, impertinent reformers, +sociological cranks, self-advertising politicians, billionaire +socialists, and the reporters. To-day the sentimental traveller 'feels a +heart-pang to see the order, the cleanliness, the wide streets, the +playgrounds, the big boulevards, the absence of indigence that have +spoiled the most interesting part of New York City.' But apparently this +is only a first impression; for Mr. Huneker had no trouble in +discovering in one café a patriarchal figure quite of the type beloved +of the local-color hunters of twenty years ago, a prophet, though +speaking a modern language and concerned with things of the day. So that +we owe to Mr. Huneker the discovery of a notable truth, namely, that +Bohemia is not only a creation of the sentimental memory, but, being +psychological, may be located in clean and prosperous quarters. The +tendency has always been to place it in a golden age, but a tattered and +unswept age. Bohemia is now shown to exist amidst model tenements and +sanitary drinking-cups." + + +IVORY APES AND PEACOCKS + +_WITH FRONTISPIECE PORTRAIT OF DOSTOÏEVSKY_ + +12mo. $1.50 net + + * * * * * + +NEW COSMOPOLIS + +12mo. $1.50 net + + * * * * * + +THE PATHOS _of_ DISTANCE + +A Book of a Thousand and One Moments + +12mo. $2.00 net + + * * * * * + +PROMENADES _of an_ IMPRESSIONIST + +12mo. $1.50 net + +"We like best such sober essays as those which analyze for us the +technical contributions of Cézanne and Rodin. Here Mr. Huneker is a real +interpreter, and here his long experience of men and ways in art counts +for much. Charming, in the lighter vein, are such appreciations as the +Monticelli, and Chardin."--FRANK JEWETT MATHER, JR., in _New +York Nation_ and _Evening Post_. + + * * * * * + +EGOISTS + +A Book of Supermen + +STENDHAL, BAUDELAIRE, FLAUBERT, ANATOLE FRANCE, HUYSMANS, BARRÈS, HELLO, +BLAKE, NIETZSCHE, IBSEN, AND MAX STIRNER + +_With Portrait and Facsimile Reproductions_ + +12mo. $1.50 net + + * * * * * + +ICONOCLASTS: + +A Book of Dramatists + +12mo. $1.50 net + +CONTENTS: Henrik Ibsen--August Strindberg--Henry +Becque--Gerhart Hauptmann--Paul Hervieu--The Quintessence of Shaw--Maxim +Gorky's Nachtasyl--Hermann Sudermann--Princess Mathilde's Play--Duse and +D'Annunzio--Villiers de l'Isle Adam--Maurice Maeterlinck. + +"His style is a little jerky, but it is one of those rare styles in +which we are led to expect some significance, if not wit, in every +sentence."--G.K. CHESTERTON, in _London Daily News_. + + * * * * * + +OVERTONES: + +A Book of Temperaments + +_WITH FRONTISPIECE PORTRAIT OF RICHARD STRAUSS_ + +12mo. $1.50 net + +"In some respects Mr. Huneker must be reckoned the most brilliant of all +living writers on matters musical."--_Academy, London_. + + * * * * * + +MEZZOTINTS IN MODERN MUSIC + +BRAHMS, TSCHAÏKOWSKY, CHOPIN, RICHARD STRAUSS, LISZT, AND WAGNER + +12mo. $1.50 net + +"Mr. Huneker is, in the best sense, a critic; he listens to the music +and gives you his impressions as rapidly and in as few words as +possible; or he sketches the composers in fine, broad, sweeping strokes +with a magnificent disregard for unimportant details.... A distinctly +original and very valuable contribution to the world's tiny musical +literature."--J.F. RUNCIMAN, in _London Saturday Review_. + + * * * * * + +FRANZ LISZT + +_WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS_ + +12mo. $2.00 net + + * * * * * + +CHOPIN: + +The Man and His Music + +_WITH ETCHED PORTRAIT_ + +12mo. $2.00 net + + * * * * * + +VISIONARIES + +12mo. $1.50 net + +CONTENTS: A Master of Cobwebs--The Eighth Deadly Sin--The Purse +of Aholibah--Rebels of the Moon--The Spiral Road--A Mock +Sun--Antichrist--The Eternal Duel--The Enchanted Yodler--The Third +Kingdom--The Haunted Harpsichord--The Tragic Wall--A Sentimental +Rebellion--Hall of the Missing Footsteps--The Cursory Light--An Iron +Fan--The Woman Who Loved Chopin--The Tune of Time--Nada--Pan. + +"In 'The Spiral Road' and in some of the other stories both fantasy and +narrative may be compared with Hawthorne in his most unearthly moods. +The younger man has read his Nietzsche and has cast off his heritage of +simple morals. Hawthorne's Puritanism finds no echo in these modern +souls, all sceptical, wavering and unblessed. But Hawthorne's splendor +of vision and his power of sympathy with a tormented mind do live again +in the best of Mr. Huneker's stories."--_London Academy_ (Feb. 3, 1906). + + * * * * * + +MELOMANIACS + +12mo. $1.50 net + +"It would be difficult to sum up 'Melomaniacs' in a phrase. Never did a +book, in my opinion at any rate, exhibit greater contrasts, not, +perhaps, of strength and weakness, but of clearness and +obscurity."--HAROLD E. GORST, in _London Saturday Review_. + + * * * * * + +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS, NEW YORK + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Visionaries, by James Huneker + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VISIONARIES *** + +***** This file should be named 17922-0.txt or 17922-0.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/7/9/2/17922/ + +Produced by Ted Garvin, Taavi Kalju, and the Online +Distributed Proofreaders Europe at http://dp.rastko.net + + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +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 + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + +*** END: FULL LICENSE *** + diff --git a/17922-0.zip b/17922-0.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..5d1aa38 --- /dev/null +++ b/17922-0.zip diff --git a/17922-8.txt b/17922-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..470cbbf --- /dev/null +++ b/17922-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9047 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Visionaries, by James Huneker + +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: Visionaries + +Author: James Huneker + +Release Date: March 4, 2006 [EBook #17922] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VISIONARIES *** + + + + +Produced by Ted Garvin, Taavi Kalju, and the Online +Distributed Proofreaders Europe at http://dp.rastko.net + + + + + + + +VISIONARIES + +BY + +JAMES HUNEKER + + + J'aime les nuages ... l bas...! + + BAUDELAIRE + + +NEW YORK +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS +1916 + + +COPYRIGHT, 1905, +BY CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS + +Published October, 1905. + + + + +A +MON CHER MATRE + +REMY DE GOURMONT +PARIS + + + + +CONTENTS + + PAGE + + I. A MASTER OF COBWEBS 1 + + II. THE EIGHTH DEADLY SIN 23 + + III. THE PURSE OF AHOLIBAH 44 + + IV. REBELS OF THE MOON 64 + + V. THE SPIRAL ROAD 80 + + VI. A MOCK SUN 110 + + VII. ANTICHRIST 135 + + VIII. THE ETERNAL DUEL 145 + + IX. THE ENCHANTED YODLER 149 + + X. THE THIRD KINGDOM 168 + + XI. THE HAUNTED HARPSICHORD 188 + + XII. THE TRAGIC WALL 203 + + XIII. A SENTIMENTAL REBELLION 227 + + XIV. HALL OF THE MISSING FOOTSTEPS 249 + + XV. THE CURSORY LIGHT 266 + + XVI. AN IRON FAN 278 + + XVII. THE WOMAN WHO LOVED CHOPIN 289 + +XVIII. THE TUNE OF TIME 309 + + XIX. NADA 326 + + XX. PAN 332 + + + + +VISIONARIES + + + + +I + +A MASTER OF COBWEBS + + +I + +Alixe Van Kuyp sat in the first-tier box presented to her husband with +the accustomed heavy courtesy of the Socit Harmonique. She went early +to the hall that she might hear the entire music-making of the +evening--Van Kuyp's tone-poem, Sordello, was on the programme between a +Weber overture and a Beethoven symphony, an unusual honour for a young +American composer. If she had gone late, it would have seemed an +affectation, she reasoned. Her husband kept within doors; she could tell +him all. And then, was there not Elvard Rentgen? + +She regretted that she had invited the Parisian critic to her box. It +happened at a _soire_, where he showed his savage profile among +admiring musical lambs. But he was never punctual at musical affairs. +This consoled Alixe. + +Perhaps he would forget her impulsive, foolish speech,--"without him the +music would fall upon unheeding ears,--he, who interpreted art for the +multitude, the holder of the critical key that unlocked masterpieces." +She had felt the banality of her compliment as she uttered it, and she +knew the man who listened, his glance incredulous, his mouth smiling, +could not be deceived. Rentgen had been too many years in the candy shop +to care for sweets. She recalled her mean little blush as he twisted his +pointed, piebald beard with long, fat fingers and leisurely +traversed--his were the measuring eyes of an architect--her face, her +hair, her neck, and finally, stared at her ears until they burned like a +child's cheek in frost time. + +Alixe Van Kuyp was a large woman, with a conscientious head and gray +eyes. As she waited, she realized that it was one of her timid nights, +when colour came easily and temper ran at its lowest ebb. She had begged +Van Kuyp to cancel the habit of not listening to his own music except at +rehearsal, and, annoyed by his stubbornness, neglected to tell him of +the other invitation. The house was quite full when the music began. +Uneasiness overtook her as the Oberon slowly stole upon her +consciousness. She forgot Rentgen; a more disquieting problem presented +itself. Richard's music--how would it sound in the company of the old +masters, those masters who were newer than Wagner, newer than Strauss +and the "moderns"! She envisaged her husband--small, slim, with his +bushy red hair, big student's head--familiarly locking arms with Weber +and Beethoven in the hall of fame. No, the picture did not convince her. +She was his severest censor. Not one of the professional critics could +put their fingers on Van Kuyp's weak spots--"his sore music," as he +jestingly called it--so surely as his wife. She had studied; she had +even played the violin in public; but she gave up her virtuosa ambitions +for the man she had married during their student years in Germany. Now +the old doubts came to life as the chivalric tones of Weber rose to her +sharpened senses. Why couldn't Richard-- + +The door in the anteroom opened, her guest entered. Alixe was not +dismayed. She left her seat and, closing the curtains, greeted him. + +The overture was ending as Rentgen sat down beside her in the intimate +little chamber, lighted by a solitary electric bulb. + +"You are always thoughtful," she murmured. + +"My dear lady, mine is the honour. And if you do not care, can't we hear +the music of your young man--" he smiled, she thought, acidly--"here? If +I sit outside, the world will say--we have to be careful of our +unsmirched reputations--we poor critics and slave-drivers of the deaf." + +She drew her hand gently away. He had held it, playfully tapping it as +he slowly delivered himself in short sentences. He was a Dane, but his +French and English were without trace of accent; certain intonations +alone betrayed his Scandinavian origin. + +Alixe could not refuse, for the moment he finished speaking she heard a +too familiar motive, the ponderous phrase in the brass choir which Van +Kuyp intended as the thematic label for his hero, "Sordello." + +"Ah, there's your Browning in tone for you," whispered the critic. She +wished him miles away. The draperies were now slightly parted and into +the room filtered the grave, languorous accents of the new tone-poem. +Her eyes were fixed by Rentgen's. His expression changed; with nostrils +dilated like a hunter scenting prey, his rather inert, cold features +became transfigured; he was the man who listened, the cruel judge who +sentenced. And she hoped, also the kind friend who would consider the +youth and inexperience of the culprit. To the morbidly acute hearing of +the woman, the music had a ring of hollow sonority after the denser +packed phrases of Weber. + +She had read Sordello with her husband until she thought its meaning was +as clear as high noon. By the critic's advice the subject had been +selected for musical treatment. Sordello's overweening spiritual +pride--"gate-vein of this heart's blood of Lombardy"--appealed to Van +Kuyp. The stress of souls, the welter of cross-purposes which begirt the +youthful dreamer, his love for Palma, and his swift death when all the +world thrust upon him its joys--here were motives, indeed, for any +musician of lofty aim and sympathetic imagination. + +Alixe recalled the interminable arguments, the snatches of poetry, the +hasty rushes to the keyboard; a composer was in travail. At the end of a +year, Rentgen professed his satisfaction; Van Kuyp stood on the highroad +to fame. Of that there could be no doubt; Elvard Rentgen would say so in +print. Alixe had been reassured-- + +Yet sitting now within the loop of her husband's music it suddenly +became insipid, futile, and lacking in those enchantments for which she +yearned. Her eyes dropped to the shapely hands meekly folded in her lap, +dropped because the bold, interrogative expression on Rentgen's face +disturbed her. She knew, as any woman would have known, that he admired +her--but was he not Richard's friend? His glance enveloped her with +piteous mockery. + +The din was tremendous. After passages of dark music, in which the +formless ugly reigned, occurred the poetic duel between Sordello and +Eglamor at Palma's Court of Love. But why all this stress and fury? On +the pianoforte the delicate episode sounded gratefully; with the thick +riotous orchestration came a disillusioning transformation. There was +noise without power, there was sensuality that strove to imitate the +tenderness of passion; and she had fancied it a cloudy garden of love. +Alixe raised an involuntary hand to her ear. + +"Yes," whispered the critic, "I warned him not to use his colours with a +trowel. His theme is not big enough to stand it." He lifted thin +eyebrows and to her overheated brain was an unexpected Mephisto. Then +the music whirled her away to Italy; the love scene of Palma and +Sordello. It should have been the apex of the work. + +"Sounds too much like Tschakowsky's Francesca da Rimini," interrupted +Rentgen. She was annoyed. + +"Why didn't you tell Van Kuyp before he scored the work?" she demanded, +her long gray eyes beginning to blacken. + +"I did, my dear lady, I did. But you know what musicians are--" He +shrugged a conclusion with his narrow shoulders. Alixe coldly regarded +him. There was something new and dangerous in his attitude to her +husband's music this evening. + +Her heart began to beat heavily. What if her suspicions were but the +advance guard of a painful truth! What if this keen analyst of other +men's ideas--she dared not finish the thought. With a sluggish movement +the music uncoiled itself like a huge boa about to engulf a tiny rabbit. +The simile forced itself against her volition; all this monstrous +preparation for a--rabbit! In a concert-hall the poetic idea of the +tone-poem was petty. And the churning of the orchestra, foaming hysteria +of the strings, bellowing of the brass--would they never cease! Such an +insane chase after a rabbit! Yes, she said the word to herself and found +her lips carved into a hard smile, which she saw reflected as in a trick +mirror upon the face of Elvard Rentgen. _He_ understood. + +Of little avail Sordello's frantic impotencies. She saw through the +rhetorical trickeries of the music, weighed its cheap splendours, +realized the mediocrity of this second-rate poet turned symphonist. +Image after image pressed upon her brain, each more pessimistic, more +depressing than its predecessor. Alixe could have wept. Her companion +placed his hand on her arm. His fingers burned; she moved, but she felt +his will controlling her mood. With high relief she heard the music end. +There was conventional applause. Alixe restlessly peered into the +auditorium. Again she saw opera-glasses turned toward the box. "Our good +friends," she rather bitterly thought. Rentgen recognized her mental +turmoil. + +"Don't worry," he said soothingly. "It will be all right to-morrow +morning. What I write will make the fortune of the composition." He did +not utter this vaingloriously, but as a man who stated simple truth. She +gazed at him, her timidity and nervousness returning in full tide. + +"I know I am overwrought. I should be thankful. But--but, isn't it +deception--I mean, will it be fair to conceal from Richard the real +condition of affairs?" He took her hand. + +"Spoken like a true wife," he gayly exclaimed. "My dear friend, there +will be no deception. Only encouragement, a little encouragement. As for +deceiving a composer, telling him that he may not be so wonderful as he +thinks--that's impossible. I know these star-shouldering souls, these +farmers of phantasms who exist in a world by themselves. It would be a +pity to let in the cold air of reality--anyhow Van Kuyp has some +talent." + +Like lifting mists revealing the treacherous borders of a masked pool, +she felt this speech with its ironic innuendo. She flushed, her vanity +irritated. Rentgen saw her eyes contract. + +"Let us go when the symphony begins," she begged, "I can't talk to any +one in my present bad humour; and to hear Beethoven would drive me +mad--now." + +"I don't wonder," remarked her companion, consolingly. Alixe winced. + +The silver-cold fire of an undecided moon was abroad in the sky and +rumours of spring filled the air. They parted at a fiacre. He told her +he would call the next afternoon, and she nodded an unforgiving head. It +was her turn to be disagreeable. + +In his music room, Van Kuyp read a volume of verse. He did not hear his +wife enter. It pained her when she saw his serious face with its +undistinguished features and dogged expression. No genius this, was her +hasty verdict, as she quickly went to him and put a hand on his head. +It was her hand now that was hot. He raised eyes, dolent with dreams. + +"Well?" he queried. + +"You are a curious man!" she said wonderingly. "Aren't you interested in +the news about your symphonic poem?" He smiled the smile of the fatuous +elect. "I imagine it went all right," he languidly replied. "I heard it +at rehearsal yesterday--I suppose Thelme took the _tempi_ too slow!" + +She sighed and asked:-- + +"What are you reading a night like this?" His expression became +animated. + +"A volume of Celtic poetry--I've found a stunning idea for music. What a +tone-poem it will make! Here it is. What colour, what rhythms. It is +called The Shadowy Horses. 'I hear the shadowy horses, their long manes +a-shake'--" + +"Who gave you the poem?" + +"Oh, Rentgen, of course. Did you see him to-night?" + +"You dear boy! You must be tired to death. Better rest. The critics will +get you up early enough." + +Through interminable hours the mind of Alixe revolved about a phrase she +had picked up from Elvard Rentgen: "Music is a trap for weak souls; for +the strong as the spinning of cobwebs...." + + +II + +It was pompous July and the Van Kuyps were still in Paris. They lived +near Passy--from her windows high in the air Alixe caught the green at +dawn as the sun lifted level rays. Richard was writing his new +tone-poem, which the Socit Harmonique accepted provisionally for the +season following. Sordello had set the town agog because of the +exhaustive articles by Rentgen it brought in its wake. He was a critic +who wrote brilliantly of music in the terms of painting, of plastic arts +in the technical phraseology of music, and by him the drama was +discussed purely as literature. This deliberate and delicate confusion +of sthetics clouded the public mind. He described Sordello as a vast +mural fresco, a Puvis de Chavannes in tone, a symphonic drama wherein +agonized the shadowy schylean protagonist. Even sculpture was rifled +for analogies, and Van Kuyp to his bewilderment found himself called +"The Rodin of Music"; at other times, "Richard Strauss II," or a "Tonal +Browning"; finally, he was adjured to swerve not from the path he had so +wonderfully hewn for himself in the virgin jungle of modern art, and +begged to resist the temptations of the music-drama. + +Rentgen loathed the music of Wagner. Wagner had abused Meyerbeer for +doing what he did himself--writing operas stuffed with spectacular +effects. This man of the foot-lights destroyed all musical imagination +with his puppet shows, magic lanterns, Turkish bazaars, where, to the +booming of mystic bells, the listener was drugged into opium-fed +visions. + +Under a tent, as at a fair, he assembled the mangled masterpieces of +Bach, Gluck, Beethoven, Weber, Schubert, Schumann, Chopin, and to a +gullible public sold the songs of these music-lords--songs that should +swim on high like great swan-clouds cleaving skies blue and +inaccessible. And his music was operatic, after all, grand opera +saccharine with commonplace melodies gorgeously attired--nothing more. +Wagner, declared the indignant critic, was not original. He popularized +the noble ideas of the masters, vulgarized and debased their dreams. He +never conceived a single new melody, but substituted instead, sadly +mauled and pinched thematic fragments of Liszt, Berlioz, and Beethoven, +combined with exaggerated fairy-tales, clothed in showy tinsel and +theatrical gauds, the illusion being aided by panoramic scenery; scenery +that acted in company with toads, dragons, horses, snakes, crazy +valkyrs, mermaids, half-mad humans, gods, demons, dwarfs, and giants. +What else is all this but old-fashioned Italian opera with a new name? +What else but an inartistic mixture of Scribe libretto and Northern +mythology? Music-drama--fudge! Making music that one can _see_ is a +death-blow to a lofty idealization of the art. + +Puzzled by the richness of Rentgen's vocabulary, by his want of logic, +Alixe asked herself many times whether she was wrong and her husband +right. She wished to be loyal. His devotion to his work, his inspiration +springing as it did from poetic sources, counted for something. Why not? +All composers should read the poets. It is a starting-point. Modern +music leans heavily on drama and fiction. Richard Strauss embroiders +philosophical ideas, so why should not Richard Van Kuyp go to Ireland, +to the one land where there is hope of a spiritual, a poetic renascence? +Ireland! The very name evoked dreams! + +When Rentgen called at the Van Kuyps' it was near the close of a warm +afternoon. The composer would not stir, despite the invitation of the +critic or the pleading of his wife. He knew that the angel wings of +inspiration had been brushing his brow all the morning, and such visits +were too rare to be flouted. He sat at his piano and in a composer's +raucous varied voice, imitated the imaginary _timbres_ of orchestral +instruments. Sent forth, Mrs. Van Kuyp and Rentgen slowly walked into +the little Parc of Auteuil, once the joy of the Goncourts. + +"Musicians are as selfish as the sea," he asserted, as they sat upon a +bench of tepid iron. She did not demur. The weather had exhausted her +patience; she was young and fond of the open air--the woods made an +irresistible picture this day. The critic watched her changing, +dissatisfied face. + +"Shall we ride?" he suddenly asked. Before she could shake a negative +head, he quickly uttered the words that had been hovering in her mind +for hours. + +"Or, shall we go to the Bois?" She started. "What an idea! Go to the +Bois without Richard, without my husband?" + +"Why not?" he inquired, "it's not far away. Send him a wire asking him +to join us; it will do him good after his labours. Come, Madame Van +Kuyp, come Alixe, my child." He paused. Her eyes expanded. "I'll go," +she quietly announced--"that is, if you grant me a favour." + +"A hundred!" he triumphantly cried. + + +III + +To soothe her conscience, which began to ring faint alarm-bells at +sundown, Alixe sent several despatches to her husband, and then tried a +telephone; but she was not successful. Her mood shifted chilly, and they +bored each other immeasurably on the long promenade vibrating with gypsy +music and frivolous folk. + +It was after seven o'clock as the sun slowly swam down the sky-line. +Decidedly their little flight from the prison of stone was not offering +rich recompense to Alixe Van Kuyp and her elderly companion. + +"And now for the favour!" he demanded, his eyes contentedly resting upon +the graceful expanse of his guest's figure. + +She moved restlessly: "My dear Rentgen, I am about to ask you a +question, only a plain question. _That_ is the favour." He bowed +incredulously. + +"I must know the truth about Richard. It is a serious matter, this +composing of his. He neglects his pupils--most of them Americans who +come to Paris to study with him. Yet with the reputation he has +attained, due to you entirely"--she waved away an interruption--"he +refuses to write songs or piano music that will sell. He is an +incorrigible idealist and I confess I am discouraged. What can be our +future?" She drew the deep breath of one in peril; this plain talk +devoid of all sham mortified her exceedingly. + +She was thankful that he did not attempt to play the rle of fatherly +adviser. His eyes were quite sincere when he answered her:-- + +"What you say, Alixe--" the familiarity brought with it no condescending +reverberations--"has bothered me more than once. I shall be just as +frank on my side. No, your husband has but little talent; original +talent, none. He is mediocre--wait!" She started, her cheeks red with +the blood that fled her heart when she heard this doleful news. "Wait! +There are qualifications. In the first place, what do you expect from an +American?" + +"But you always write so glowingly of our composers," she interjected. + +"And," he went on as if she had not spoken, "Van Kuyp is your typical +countryman. He has studied in Germany. He has muddled his brain with +the music of a dozen different nations; if he had had any individuality +it would have been submerged. His memory has killed his imagination. He +borrows his inspiration from the poets, from Liszt, Wagner, Berlioz, +Richard Strauss. Anyhow, like all musicians of his country, he is too +painfully self-conscious of his nationality." + +"You, alone, are responsible for his present ambitions," retorted the +unhappy woman. + +"Quite true, my dear friend. I acknowledge it." + +"And you say this to my face?" + +"Do you wish me to lie?" She did not reply. After a grim pause she burst +forth:-- + +"Oh, why doesn't he compose an opera, and make a popular name?" + +"Richard Wagner Number II!" There were implications of sarcasm in this +which greatly displeased Mrs. Van Kuyp. They strolled on slowly. It was +a melodious summer night; mauve haze screened all but the exquisite +large stars. Soothed despite rebellion, Alixe told herself sharply that +in every duel with this man she was worsted. He said things that +scratched her nerves; yet she forgave. He had not the slightest +attraction for her; nevertheless, when he spoke, she listened, when he +wrote, she read. He ruled the husband through his music; he ruled her +through her husband. And what did he expect? + +They retraced their way. A fantastic bridge spanning the brief +marshland, frozen by the moonlight, appealed to them. They crossed. A +coachman driving an open carriage hailed confidentially. Alixe entered +and with a dexterous play of draperies usurped the back seat. Rentgen +made no sign. He had her in full view, the moon streaking her disturbed +features with its unflattering pencil. + +They started bravely, the horses running for home; but the rapid gait +soon subsided into a rhythmic trot. Rentgen spoke. She hardly recognized +his voice, so gently monotonous were his phrases. + +"Dear Alixe. It is a night for confessions. You care for your husband, +you are wrapped up in his art work, you are solicitous of his future, of +his fame. It is admirable. You are a model wife for an artist. But tell +me frankly, doesn't it bore you to death? Doesn't all this talk of +music, themes, orchestration, of the public, critics, musicians, +conductors, get on your nerves? Is it any consolation for you to know +that Van Kuyp will be famous? What is his fame or his failure to you? +Where do you, Alixe Van Kuyp, come in? Why must your charming woman's +soul be sacrificed, warped to this stunted tree of another's talent? You +are silent. You say he is trying to make me deny Richard! You were never +more mistaken. I am interested in you both; interested in you as a noble +woman--stop! I mean it. And interested in Richard--well--because he is +my own creation...." + +She watched him now with her heart in her eyes; he frightened her more +with these low, purring words, than if he declared open love. + +"He is my own handiwork. I have created him. I have fashioned his +outlines, have wound up the mechanism that moves him to compose. Did you +ever read that terrifying thought of Yeats, the Irish poet? I've +forgotten the story, but remember the idea: 'The beautiful arts were +sent into the world to overthrow nations, and, finally, life itself, +sowing everywhere unlimited desires, like torches thrown into a burning +city.' There--'like torches thrown into a burning city!' Richard Van +Kuyp is one of my burning torches. In the spectacle of his impuissance I +find relief from my own suffering." + +The booming of the Tzigane band was no longer heard--only the horses' +muffled footfalls and the intermittent chromatic drone of hidden distant +tram-cars. She shivered and shaded her face with her fan. There was +something remote from humanity in his speech. He continued with +increasing vivacity:-- + +"Music is a burning torch. And music, like ideas, can slay the brain. +Wagner borrowed his harmonic fire from the torch of Chopin--" She broke +in:-- + +"Don't talk of Chopin! Tell me more of Van Kuyp. Why do you call him +_yours_?" Her curiosity was become pain. It mastered her prudence. + +"In far-away Celtic legends there may be found a lovely belief that our +thoughts are independent realities, that they go about in the void +seeking creatures to control. They are as bodiless souls. When they +descend into a human being they possess his moods, in very existence--" + +"And Richard!" she muttered. His words swayed her like strange music; +the country through which they were passing was a blank; she could see +but two luminous points--the nocturnal eyes of Elvard Rentgen, as he +spun his cobwebs in the moonshine. She did not fear him; nothing could +frighten her now. One desire held her. If it were unslaked, she felt she +would collapse. It was to know the truth, to be told everything! He put +restraining fingers on her ungloved hand; they seemed like cold, fat +spiders. Yet she was only curious, with a curiosity that murdered the +spirit within her. + +"To transfuse these shadows, my dear Alixe, has been one of my delights, +for I can project my futile desires into another's soul. I am denied the +gift of music-making, so this is my revenge on nature for bungling its +job. If Richard had genius, my intervention would be superfluous. He has +none. He is dull. You must realize it. But since he has known me, has +felt my influence, has been subject to my volition, my sorcery, you may +call it,--" his laugh was disagreeably conscious,--"he has developed the +shadow of a great man. He will seem a great composer. I shall make him +think he is one. I shall make the world believe it, also. It is my +fashion of squaring a life I hate. But if I chose to withdraw--" + +The road they entered was black and full of the buzzing shadows of hot +night, but she was oblivious to everything but his hallucinating +voice:-- + +"And if you withdraw?" Her mouth echoed phrases without the complicity +of her brain. + +"If I do--ah, these cobweb spinners! Good-by to Richard Van Kuyp and +dreams of glory." This note of harsh triumph snapped his weaving words. + +"I don't believe you or your boasts," remarked Alixe, in her most +conventionally amused manner. "You are trying to scare me, and with this +hypnotic joke about Richard you have only hypnotized yourself. I mean to +tell Mr. Van Kuyp every bit of our conversation. I'm not frightened by +your vampire tales. You critics are only shadows of composers." + +"Yes, but we make ordinary composers believe they are great," he replied +acridly. + +"I'll tell this to Richard." + +"He won't believe you." + +"He shall--he won't believe _you_! Oh, Rentgen, how can you invent such +cruel things? Are you always so malicious? What do you mean? Come--what +do you expect?" She closed her eyes, anticipating an avowal. Why should +a man seek to destroy her faith in her husband, in love itself, if not +for some selfish purpose of his own? But she was wrong, and became +vaguely alarmed--at least if he had offered his service and sympathy in +exchange for her friendship, she might have understood his fantastic +talk. Rentgen sourly reflected--despite epigrams, women never vary. For +him her sentiment was suburban. It strangled poetry. But he said +nothing, though she imagined he looked depressed; nor did he open his +mouth as the carriage traversed avenues of processional poplars before +arriving at her door. She turned to him imploringly:-- + +"You must come with me. I shall never be able to go in alone, without an +excuse. Don't--don't repeat to Richard what you said to me, in joke, I +am sure, about his music. Heavens! What will my husband think?" There +was despair in her voice, but hopefulness in her gait and gesture, when +they reached the ill-lighted hall. + +A night-lamp stood on the composer's study table. The piano was open. He +sat at the keyboard, though not playing, as they hurriedly entered the +room. + +"You poor fellow! You look worn out. Did you think we had run away from +you? Did you get the wires, the telephone messages? Oh, why did you keep +us expecting you, Richard! We have had a wonderful time and missed you +so much! Such a talk with Rentgen! And all about _you_. _Nicht wahr_, +Rentgen? He says you are the only man in the world with a musical +future. Isn't that so, Rentgen? Didn't you say that Richard was the only +man in whom you took any interest? Say what you said to me! I _dare_ +you!" + +The musician, aroused by this wordy assault, looked from one to the +other with his heavy eyes, the eyes of an owl rudely disturbed. Alixe +almost danced her excitement. She hummed shrilly and grasped Van Kuyp's +arm in the gayest rebounding humour. + +"Why don't you speak, Maestro?" + +"I didn't join you because I was too busy at my score. Listen, children! +I have sketched the beginning of The Shadowy Horses. You remember the +Yeats poem, Rentgen? Listen!" + +Furiously he attacked the instrument, from which escaped accents of +veritable torture; a delirium of tone followed, meagre melodies fighting +for existence in the boiling madness of it all; it was the parody of a +parody, the music of yesterday masquerading as the music of to-morrow. +Alixe nervously watched the critic. He stood at the end of the piano and +morosely fumbled his beard. Again a wave of anxious hatred, followed by +forebodings, crowded her alert brain. She desperately clutched her +husband's shoulder; he finished in a burst of sheer pounding and brutal +roaring. Then she threw her arms about him in an ecstasy of pride--her +confidence was her only anchorage. + +"There, Elvard Rentgen! What did you tell me? I dare you to say that +this music is not marvellous, not original!" Her victorious gaze, in +which floated indomitable faith, challenged him, as she drew the head of +her husband to her protecting bosom. The warring of exasperated eyes +endured a moment; to Alixe it seemed eternity. Rentgen bowed and went +away from this castle of cobwebs, deeply stirred by the wife's tender +untruths.... She was the last dawn illuminating his empty, sordid +life,--now a burnt city of defaced dreams and blackened torches. + + + + +II + +THE EIGHTH DEADLY SIN + + Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which + the Lord God had made.--_Genesis._ + + +I + +THE SERMON + +"And the Seven Deadly Sins, beloved brethren, are: Pride, Covetousness, +Lust, Anger, Gluttony, Envy, Sloth. To these our wise Mother, the +Church, opposes the contrary virtues: Humility, Chastity, Meekness, +Temperance, Brotherly Love, Diligence." The voice of the preacher was +clear and well modulated. It penetrated to the remotest corner of the +church. Baldur, sitting near the pulpit, with its elaborate traceries of +marble, idly wondered why the sins were, with few exceptions, words of +one syllable, while those of the virtues were all longer. Perhaps +because it was easier to sin than to repent! The voice of the speaker +deepened as he continued:-- + +"Now the Seven Deadly Arts are: Music, Literature, Painting, Sculpture, +Architecture, Dancing, Acting. The mercy of God has luckily purified +these once pagan inventions, and transformed them into saving +instruments of grace. Yet it behooves us to examine with the utmost +diligence the possible sources of evil latent in each and every one of +those arts. Then we shall consider some of the special forms of sin that +may develop from them. St. Chrysostom warned the faithful against the +danger of the Eighth Deadly Art--Perfume...." + +His phrases, which began to fall into the rhythmic drone of a Sunday +sermon, lulled Baldur to dreaming. Perfume--that delicious vocable! And +the contrast with what his own nostrils reported to his consciousness +made him slightly shiver. It was on a Friday night in Lent that, weary +in flesh and spirit, his conscience out of tune, he had entered the +church and taken the first vacant seat. Without, the air was sluggish; +after leaving his club the idea of theatres or calls had set his teeth +on edge. He longed to be alone, to weigh in the silence of his heart the +utter futility of life. Religion had never been a part of his training +as the only son of a millionnaire, and if he preferred the Roman +Catholic ritual above all others, it was because the appeal was to his +sthetic sense; a Turkish mosque, he assured his friends, produced the +same soothing impression--gauze veils gently waving and slowly obscuring +the dulling realities of everyday existence. This _morbidezza_ of the +spirit the Mahometans call _Kef_; the Christians, pious ecstasy. + +But now he could not plunge himself, despite the faint odour of incense +lingering in the atmosphere, into the deepest pit of his personality. At +first he ascribed his restlessness to the sultry weather, then to his +abuse of tea and cigarettes,--perhaps it was the sharp odour of the +average congregation, that collective odour of humanity encountered in +church, theatre, or court-rooms. The smell of poverty was mingled with +the heavy scents of fashionable women, who, in the minority, made their +presence felt by their showy gowns, rustling movements, and attitudes of +superior boredom. In a vast building like this extremes touch with +eagerness on the part of the poor, to whom these furtive views of the +rich and indolent brought with them a bitter consolation. + +Baldur remarked these things as he leaned back in his hard seat and +barely listened to the sermon, which poured forth as though the tap +would never be turned off again. And then a delicate note of iris, most +episcopal of perfumes, emerged from the mass of odours--musk, garlic, +damp shoes, alcohol, shabby clothing, rubber, pomade, cologne, +rice-powder, tobacco, patchouli, sachet, and a hundred other tintings of +the earthly symphony. The finely specialized olfactory sense of the +young man told him that it was either a bishop or a beautiful woman who +imparted to the air the subtle, penetrating aroma of iris. But it was +neither ecclesiastic nor maid. At his side was a short, rather thick-set +woman of vague age; she might have been twenty-five or forty. Her hair +was cut in masculine fashion, her attire unattractive. As clearly as he +could distinguish her features he saw that she was not good-looking. A +stern mask it was, though not hardened. He would not have looked at such +an ordinary physiognomy twice if the iris had not signalled his peculiar +sense. There was no doubt that to her it was due. Susceptible as he was +to odours, Baldur was not a ladies' man. He went into society because it +was his world; and he attended in a perfunctory manner to the enormous +estate left him by his father, bound up in a single trust company. But +his thoughts were always three thousand miles away, in that delectable +city of cities, Paris. For Paris he suffered a painful nostalgia. There +he met his true brethren, while in New York he felt an alien. He was +one. The city, with its high, narrow streets--granite tunnels; its rude +reverberations; its colourless, toiling barbarians, with their +undistinguished physiognomies, their uncouth indifference to art,--he +did not deny that he loathed this nation, vibrating only in the presence +of money, sports, grimy ward politics, while exhibiting a depressing +snobbery to things British. There was no _nuance_ in its life or its +literature, he asserted. France was his _patrie psychique_; he would +return there some day and forever.... + +The iris crept under his nostrils, and again he regarded the woman. This +time she faced him, and he no longer wondered, for he saw her eyes. +With such eyes only a great soul could be imprisoned in her brain. They +were smoke-gray, with long, dark lashes, and they did not seem to focus +perfectly--at least there was enough deflection to make their expression +odd, withal interesting, like the slow droop of Eleonora Duse's magic +eye. Though her features were rigid, the woman's glance spoke to Baldur, +spoke eloquently. Her eyes were--or was it the iris?--symbols of a +soul-state, of a rare emotion, not of sex, nor yet sexless. The pupils +seemed powdered with a strange iridescence. He became more troubled than +before. What did the curious creature want of him! She was neither +coquette nor cocotte, flirtation was not hinted by her intense +expression. He resumed his former position, but her eyes made his +shoulders burn, as if they had sufficient power to bore through them. He +no longer paid any attention to his surroundings. The sermon was like +the sound of far-away falling waters, the worshippers were so many black +marks. Of two things was he aware--the odour of iris and her eyes. + +He knew that he was in an overwrought mood. For some weeks this mood had +been descending upon his spirit, like a pall. He had avoided music, +pictures, the opera--which he never regarded as an art; even his +favourite poets he could not read. Nor did he degustate, as was his +daily wont, the supreme prose of the French masters. The pleasures of +robust stomachs, gourmandizing and drinking, were denied him by nature. +He could not sip a glass of wine, and for meat he entertained distaste. +His physique proved him to be of the neurotic temperament--he was very +tall, very slim, of an exceeding elegance, in dress a finical dandy; +while his trim pointed blue-black beard and dark, foreign eyes were the +cause of his being mistaken often for a Frenchman or a Spaniard--which +illusion was not dissipated when he chose to speak their several +tongues. + +Involuntarily, and to the ire of his neighbours, he arose and indolently +made his way down the side aisle. When he reached the baize swinging +doors, he saw the woman approaching him. As if she had been an +acquaintance of years, she saluted him carelessly, and, accompanied by +the scandalized looks of many in the congregation, the pair left the +church, though not before the preacher had sonorously quoted from the +Psalm, _Domine ne in Furore_, "For my loins are filled with illusions; +and there is no health in my flesh." + + +II + +THE SANCE + + Je cherche des parfums nouveaux, des fleurs plus larges, des + plaisirs inprouvs.--FLAUBERT. + +"It may be all a magnificent illusion, but--" he began. + +"Everything is an illusion in this life, though seldom magnificent," she +answered. They slowly walked up the avenue. The night was tepid; motor +cars, looking like magnified beetles, with bulging eyes of fire, went +swiftly by. The pavements were almost deserted when they reached the +park. He felt as if hypnotized, and once, rather meanly, was glad that +no one saw him in company of his dowdy companion. + +"I wonder if you realize that we do not know each other's name," he +said. + +"Oh, yes. You are Mr. Baldur. My name is Mrs. Lilith Whistler." + +"Mrs. Whistler. Not the medium?" + +"The medium--as you call it. In reality I am only a woman, happy, or +unhappy, in the possession of super-normal powers." + +"Not supernatural, then?" he interposed. He was a sceptic who called +himself agnostic. The mystery of earth and heaven might be interpreted, +but always in terms of science; yet he did not fancy the superior manner +in which this charlatan flouted the supernatural. He had heard of her +miracles--and doubted them. She gave a little laugh at his correction. + +"What phrase-jugglers you men are! You want all the splendours of the +Infinite thrown in with the price of admission! I said super-normal, +because we know of nothing greater than nature. Things that are off the +beaten track of the normal, across the frontiers, some call +supernatural; but it is their ignorance of the vast, unexplored +territory of the spirit--which is only the material masquerading in a +different guise." + +"But you go to church, to a Lenten service--?" It was as if he had known +her for years, and their unconventional behaviour never crossed his +mind. He did not even ask himself where they were moving. + +"I go to church to rest my nerves--as do many other people," she +replied; "I was interested in the parallel of the Seven Deadly Sins and +the Seven Deadly Arts." + +"You believe the arts are sinful?" He was curious. + +"I don't believe in sin at all. A bad conscience is the result of poor +digestion. Sins are created so that we pay the poll-tax to eternity--pay +it on this side of the ferry. Yet the arts may become dangerous engines +of destruction if wrongfully employed. The Fathers of the early Church, +Ambrose and the rest, were right in viewing them suspiciously."--He +spoke:-- + +"The arts diabolic! Then what of the particular form of wizardry +practised so successfully by the celebrated Mrs. Whistler, one of whose +names is, according to the Talmud, that of Adam's first wife?" + +"What do you know, my dear young man, of diabolic arts?" + +"Only that I am walking with you near the park on a dark night of April +and I never saw you before a half-hour ago. Isn't that magic--white, not +black?" + +"Pray do not mock magic, either white or black. Remember the fate of the +serpents manufactured by Pharaoh's magicians. They were, need I tell +you, speedily devoured by the serpents of Moses and Aaron. Both parties +did not play fair in the game. If it was black magic to transform a rod +into a snake on the part of Pharaoh's conjurers, was it any less +reprehensible for the Hebrew magicians to play the same trick? It was +prestidigitation for all concerned--only the side of the children of +Israel was espoused in the recital. Therefore, do not talk of black or +white magic. There is only one true magic. And it is not slate-writing, +toe-joint snapping, fortune-telling, or the vending of charms. Magic, +too, is an art--like other arts. This is forgotten by the majority of +its practitioners. Hence the sordid vulgarity of the average mind-reader +and humbugging spiritualist of the dark-chamber sance. Besides, the +study of the super-normal mind tells us of the mind in health--nature is +shy in revealing her secrets." + +They passed the lake and were turning toward the east driveway. Suddenly +she stopped and under the faint starlight regarded her companion +earnestly. He had not been without adventures in his career--Paris +always provided them in plenty; but this encounter with a homely woman +piqued him. Her eye he felt was upon him and her voice soothing. + +"Mr. Baldur--listen! Since Milton wrote his great poem the +English-speaking people are all devil-worshippers, for Satan is the hero +of Paradise Lost. But I am no table-tipping medium eager for your +applause or your money. I don't care for money. I think you know enough +of me through the newspapers to vouchsafe that. You are rich, and it is +your chief misery. Listen! Whether you believe it or not, you are very +unhappy. Let me read your horoscope. Your club life bores you; you are +tired of our silly theatres; no longer do you care for Wagner's music. +You are deracinated; you are unpatriotic. For that there is no excuse. +The arts are for you deadly. I am sure you are a lover of literature. +Yet what a curse it has been for you! When you see one of your friends +drinking wine, you call him a fool because he is poisoning himself. But +you--you--poison your spirit with the honey of France, of Scandinavia, +of Russia. As for the society of women--" + +"The Eternal Womanly!" he sneered. + +"The Eternal Simpleton, you mean. In _that_ swamp of pettiness, idiocy, +and materialism, a man of your nature could not long abide. Religion--it +has not yet responded to your need. And without faith your sins lose +their savour. The arts--you don't know them all, the Seven Deadly Arts +and the One Beautiful Art!" She paused. Her voice had been as the sound +of delicate flutes. He was aflame. + +"Is there, then, an eighth art?" he quickly asked. + +"Would you know it if you saw it?" + +"Of course. Where is it, what is it?" + +She laughed and took his arm. + +"Why did you look at me in church?" + +"Because--it was mere chance--no, it may have been the odour of iris. I +am mad over perfume. I think it a neglected art, degraded to the +function of anointment. I have often dreamed of an art by which a +dazzling and novel synthesis of fragrant perfumes would be invented by +some genius, some latter-day Rimmel or Lubin whom we could hail as a +peer of Chopin or Richard Strauss--two composers who have expressed +perfume in tone. Roinard in his Cantiques des Cantiques attempted a +concordance of tone, light, and odours. Yes--it was the iris that +attracted me." + +"But I have no iris about me. I have none now," she simply replied. He +faced her. + +"No iris? What--?" + +"I _thought_ iris," she added triumphantly, as she guided him into one +of the side streets off Madison Avenue. He was astounded. She must be a +hypnotist, he said to himself. No suggestion of iris clung to her now. +And he remembered that the odour disappeared after they left the church. +He held his peace until they arrived before a brown-stone house of the +ordinary kind with an English basement. She took a key from her pocket +and, going down several steps, beckoned to him. Baldur followed. His +interest in this modern Cassandra and her bizarre words was too great +for him to hesitate or to realize that he would get himself into some +dangerous scrape. And was this truly the Mrs. Whistler whose tricks of +telepathy and other extraordinary antics had puzzled and angered the +wise men of two continents? He did not have much time for reflection. A +grilled door opened, and presently he was in a room furnished very much +like a physician's office. Electric bulbs, an open grate, and two +bookcases gave the apartment a familiar, cheerful appearance. Baldur sat +down on a low chair, and Mrs. Whistler removed her commonplace headgear. +In the bright light she was younger than he had imagined, and her head a +beautifully modelled one--broad brows, very full at the back, and the +mask that of an emotional actress. Her smoke-coloured eyes were most +remarkable and her helmet of hair blue black. + +"And now that you are my guest at last, Mr. Baldur, let me apologize for +the exercise of my art upon your responsive nerves;" she made this +witch-burning admission as if she were accounting for the absence of +tea. To his relief she offered him nothing. He had a cigarette between +his fingers, but he did not care to smoke. She continued:-- + +"For some time I have known you--never mind how! For some time I have +wished to meet you. I am not an impostor, nor do I desire to pose as the +goddess of a new creed. But you, Irving Baldur, are a man among men who +will appreciate what I may show you. You love, you understand, perfumes. +You have even wished for a new art--don't forget that there are others +in the world to whom the seven arts have become a thrice-told tale, to +whom the arts have become too useful. All great art should be useless. +Yet architecture houses us; sculpture flatters us; painting imitates us; +dancing is pure vanity; literature and the drama, mere vehicles for +bread-earning; while music--music, the most useless art as it should +have been--is in the hands of the speculators. Moreover music is too +sexual--it reports in a more intense style the stories of our loves. +Music is the memory of love. What Prophet will enter the temple of the +modern arts and drive away with his divine scourge the vile +money-changers who fatten therein?" Her voice was shrill as she paced +the room. A very sibyl this, her crest of hair agitated, her eyes +sparkling with wrath. He missed the Cuman tripod. + +"There is an art, Baldur, an art that was one of the lost arts of +Babylon until now, one based, as are all the arts, on the senses. +Perfume--the poor, neglected nose must have its revenge. It has outlived +the other senses in the sthetic field." + +"What of the palate--you have forgotten that. Cookery, too, is a fine +art," he ventured. His smile irritated her. + +"Yes, Frenchmen have invented symphonic sauces, they say. But again, +eating is a useful art; primarily it serves to nourish the body. When +man was wholly wild--he is a mere barbarian to-day--his sense of smell +guarded him from his foes, from the beasts, from a thousand dangers. +Civilization, with its charming odours of decay,--have you ever ventured +to savour New York?--cast into abeyance the keenest of all the senses. +Little wonder, then, that there was no art of perfume like the arts of +vision and sound. I firmly believe the Hindoos, Egyptians, and the +Chinese knew of such an art. How account for the power of theocracies? +How else credit the tales of the saints who scattered perfumes--St. +Francis de Paul, St. Joseph of Cupertino, Venturini of Bergamo?" + +"But," he interrupted, "all this is interesting, fascinating. What I +wish to know is what form your art may take. How marshal odours as +melodies in a symphony, as colours on a canvas?" She made an impatient +gesture. + +"And how like an amateur you talk. Melody! When harmony is infinitely +greater in music! Form! When colour is infinitely greater than line! The +most profound music gives only the timbre--melodies are for infantile +people without imagination, who believe in patterns. Tone is the quality +_I_ wish on a canvas, not anxious drawing. So it is with perfumes. I can +blend them into groups of lovely harmony; I can give you single notes of +delicious timbre--in a word, I can evoke an odour symphony which will +transport you. Memory is a supreme factor in this art. Do not forget how +the vaguest scent will carry you back to your youthful dreamland. It is +also the secret of spiritual correspondences--it plays the great rle of +bridging space between human beings." + +"I sniff the air promise-crammed," he gayly misquoted. "But when will +you rewrite this Apocalypse? and how am I to know whether I shall really +enjoy this feast of perfume, if you can simulate the odour of iris as +you did an hour ago?" + +"I propose to show you an artificial paradise," she firmly asserted. In +the middle of the room there was a round table, the top inlaid with +agate. On it a large blue bowl stood, and it was empty. Mrs. Whistler +went to a swinging cabinet and took from it a dozen small phials. "Now +for the incantation," he jokingly said. In her matter-of-fact manner she +placed the bottles on the table, and uncorking them, she poured them +slowly into the bowl. He broke the silence:-- + +"Isn't there any special form of hair-raising invocation that goes with +this dangerous operation?" + +"Listen to this." Her eyes swimming with fire, she intoned:-- + + As I came through the desert thus it was, + As I came through the desert: Lo you there, + That hillock burning with a brazen glare; + Those myriad dusky flames with points aglow + Which writhed and hissed and darted to and fro; + A Sabbath of the serpents, heaped pell-mell + For Devil's roll-call and some fte in Hell: + Yet I strode on austere; + No hope could have no fear. + +He did not seem to hear. From out the bowl there was stealing a perfume +which overmastered his will and led him captive to the lugubrious glade +of the Druids.... + + +III + +THE CIRCUS OF CANDLES + + Comme d'autres esprits voguent sur la musique, + Le men, mon amour! nage sur ton parfum. + + --BAUDELAIRE. + +He was not dreaming, for he saw the woman at the bowl, saw her +apartment. But the interior of his brain was as melancholy as a lighted +cathedral. A mortal sadness encompassed him, and his nerves were like +taut violin strings. It was within the walls of his skull, that he +saw--his mundane surroundings did not disturb his visions. And the waves +of dolour swept over his consciousness. A mingling of tuberoses, +narcissus, attar of roses, and ambergris he detected in the air--as +_triste_ as a morbid nocturne of Chopin. This was followed by a blending +of heliotrope, moss-rose, and hyacinth, together with dainty touches of +geranium. He dreamed of Beethoven's manly music when whiffs of +apple-blossom, white rose, cedar, and balsam reached him. Mozart passed +roguishly by in strains of scarlet pimpernel, mignonette, syringa, and +violets. Then the sky was darkened with Schumann's perverse harmonies as +jasmine, lavender, and lime were sprayed over him. Music, surely, was +the art nearest akin to odour. A superb and subtle chord floated about +him; it was composed of vervain, opoponax, and frangipane. He could not +conceive of a more unearthly triad. It was music from Parsifal. Through +the mists that were gathering he savoured a fulminating bouquet of +patchouli, musk, bergamot, and he recalled the music of Mascagni. Brahms +strode stolidly on in company with new-mown hay, cologne, and sweet +peas. Liszt was interpreted as ylang-ylang, myrrh, and marchale; +Richard Strauss, by wistaria, oil of cloves, chypre, poppy, and +crab-apple. + +Suddenly there developed a terrific orchestration of chromatic odours: +ambrosia, cassia, orange, peach-blossoms, and musk of Tonkin, magnolia, +eglantine, hortensia, lilac, saffron, begonia, peau d'Espagne, acacia, +carnation, liban, fleur de Takeoka, cypress, oil of almonds, benzoin, +jacinth, rue, shrub, olea, clematis, the hediosma of Jamaica, olive, +vanilla, cinnamon, petunia, lotus, frankincense, sorrel, neroli from +Japan, jonquil, verbena, spikenard, thyme, hyssop, and decaying orchids. +This quintessential medley was as the sonorous blasts of Berlioz, +repugnant and exquisite; it swayed the soul of Baldur as the wind sways +the flame. There were odours like wingd dreams; odours as the plucked +sounds of celestial harps; odours mystic and evil, corrupt and opulent; +odours recalling the sweet, dense smell of chloroform; odours evil, +angelic, and anonymous. They painted--painted by Satan!--upon his +cerebellum more than music--music that merged into picture; and he was +again in the glade of the Druids. The huge scent-symphony dissolved in a +shower of black roses which covered the ground ankle-deep. An antique +temple of exotic architecture had thrown open its bronze doors, and out +there surged and rustled a throng of Bacchanalian beings who sported and +shouted around a terminal god, which, with smiling, ironic lips, +accepted their delirious homage. White nymphs and brown displayed in +choric rhythms the dance of the Seven Deadly Sins, and their goat-hoofed +mates gave vertiginous pursuit. At first the pagan gayety of the scene +fired the fancy of the solitary spectator; but soon his nerves, +disordered by the rout and fatigued by the spoor of so many odours, +warned him that something disquieting was at hand. He felt a nameless +horror as the sinister bitter odour of honeysuckle, sandalwood, and +aloes echoed from the sacred grove. A score of seductive young witches +pranced in upon their broomsticks, and without dismounting surrounded +the garden god. A battalion of centaurs charged upon them. The +vespertine hour was nigh, and over this iron landscape there floated the +moon, an opal button in the sky. Then to his shame and fear he saw that +the Satyr had vanished and in its place there reared the Black Venus, +the vile shape of ancient Africa, and her face was the face of Lilith. +The screaming lovely witches capered in fantastic spirals, each sporting +a lighted candle. It was the diabolic Circus of the Candles, the +infernal circus of the Witches' Sabbath. Rooted to the ground, Baldur +realized with fresh amazement and vivid pain the fair beauty of Adam's +prehistoric wife, her luxurious blond hair, her shapely shoulders, her +stature of a goddess--he trembled, for she had turned her mordant gaze +in his direction. And he strove in vain to bring back the comforting +vision of the chamber. She smiled, and the odours of sandal, coreopsis, +and aloes encircled his soul like the plaited strands of her glorious +hair. She was that other Lilith, the only offspring of the old Serpent. +On what storied fresco, limned by what worshipper of Satan, had these +accursed lineaments, this lithe, seductive figure, been shown! Names of +Satanic painters, from Hell-fire Breughel to Arnold Bcklin, from +Felicien Rops to Franz Stuck, passed through the halls of Irving +Baldur's memory. + +The clangour of the feast was become maddening. He heard the Venus +ballet music from Tannhuser entwined with the acridities of aloes, +sandal, and honeysuckle. Then the aroma of pitch, sulphur, and +assafoetida cruelly strangled the other melodic emanations. Lilith, +disdaining the shelter of her nymphs and their clowneries, stood forth +in all the hideous majesty of nothea, the undulating priestess of the +Abominable Shape. His nerves macerated by this sinful apparition, Baldur +struggled to resist her mute command. What was it? He saw her wish +streaming from her eyes. Despair! Despair! Despair! There is no hope for +thee, wretched earthworm! No abode but the abysmal House of Satan! +Despair, and you will be welcomed! By a violent act of volition, set in +motion by his fingers fumbling a small gold cross he wore as a +watch-guard, the heady fumes of the orgy dissipated.... + +He was sitting facing the bowl, and over it with her calm, confidential +gaze was the figure of Lilith Whistler. + +"Have I proved to you that perfume is the art of arts?" she demanded. He +rushed from the room and was shaking the grilled gate in the hallway +like a caged maniac, when with a pitying smile she released him. He +reached the street at a bound.... + + * * * * * + +... "the evil of perfume, I repeat, was one against which the venerable +Fathers of the Church warned the faithful." The preacher's voice had +sagged to a monotone. Baldur lifted his eyes in dismay. Near him sat the +same woman, and she still stared at him as if to rebuke him for his +abstraction. About her hovered the odour of iris. Had it been only a +disturbing dream? Intoxicated by his escape from damnation, from the +last of the Deadly Arts, he bowed his head in grateful prayer. What +ecstasy to be once more in the arms of Mother Church! There, dipped in +her lustral waters, and there alone would he find solace for his barren +heart, pardon for his insane pride of intellect, and protection from the +demons that waylaid his sluggish soul. The sermon ended as it began:-- + +"And the Seven Deadly Sins, beloved brethren, are: Pride, Covetousness, +Lust, Anger, Gluttony, Envy, Sloth. _Oremus!_" + +"Amen," fervently responded Baldur the Immoralist. + + + + +III + +THE PURSE OF AHOLIBAH + + Lo, this is that Aholibah + Whose name was blown among strange seas.... + + --SWINBURNE. + + +I + +THE AVIARY + +When the last breakfast guests had gone the waiters of the caf began +their most disagreeable daily task. All the silver was assembled on one +of the long tables in an inner room, where, as at a solemn conclave, the +servants took their seats, and, presided over by the major-domo of the +establishment, they polished the knives and forks, spoons, and +sugar-tongs, filled the salt-cellars, replenished the pepper-boxes and +other paraphernalia of the dining art. The gabble in this close +apartment was terrific. Joseph, the matre d'htel, rapped in vain a +dozen times for silence. The chef poked his head of a truculent Gascon +through the door and indulged in a war of wit with a long fellow from +Marseilles,--called the "mast" because he was very tall and thin, and +had cooked in the galley of a Mediterranean trading brig. From time to +time one of the piccolos, a fat little boy from the South, carried in +pitchers of flat beer, brewed in the suburbs. As it was a hot day, he +was kept busy. The waiters had gone through a trying morning; there were +many strangers in Paris. Outside, the Boulevard des Italiens, despite +its shade trees, broiled under a torrid July sun that swam in a +mercilessly blue sky. + +The majority of the men were listening to gossip about their colleagues +in the Caf Cardinal across the way. Ambroise alone sat apart and patted +and smoothed the salt in its receptacles. He was a young man from some +little town in Alsace, a furious patriot, and the butt of his +companions--for he was the latest comer in the Caf Riche. Though he +told his family name, Nettier, and declared that his father and mother +were of French blood, he was called "the German." He was good-looking, +very blond, with big, innocent blue eyes; and while he was never +molested personally,--a short, sharp tussle with a cook had proved him +to be a man of muscle,--behind his back his walk was mimicked, his +precise attitudes were openly bantered. But Ambroise stood this torture +gantlet equably. He had lived long enough among Germans to copy their +impassive manner and, coupled with a natural contempt for his +fellow-monkeys in the cage, he knew that perhaps in a day a new man +would receive all these unwelcome attentions. Moreover, his work, +clear-cut, unobtrusive, and capable, pleased M. Joseph. And when the +patron himself dined at the caf, Ambroise was the garon selected to +wait upon him. Hence the jealousy of his colleagues. Couple to this the +fact that he was reported miserly, and had saved a large sum--which were +all sufficient reasons for his unpopularity. + +As the afternoon wore on little airs began to play in the tree-tops; the +street watering carts had been assiduous, and before the terrace water +had been sprinkled by the piccolos so effectively that at five o'clock, +when the jaded stock-brokers, journalists, and business men began to +flock in, each for his apritif, the caf was comparatively cool. + +A few women's frocks relieved the picture with discreet or joyous shades +of white and pink. Ambroise was diligent and served his regular +customers, the men who grumbled if any one occupied their favourite +corners. Absinthe nicely iced, dominoes, the evening papers--these he +brought as he welcomed familiar faces. But his thoughts were not his +own, and his pose when not in service was listless, even bored. Would +_she_ return that evening with the same crowd--was the idea that had +taken possession of his brain. He was very timid in the presence of +women, and it diverted the waiters to see him blush when he waited upon +the gorgeous birds that thronged the aviary at night, making its walls +echo with their chattering, quarrels, laughter. This provincial, modest, +sensitive, the only child of old-fashioned parents, was stupefied and +shocked in the presence of the over-decorated and under-dressed +creatures, daubed like idols, who began to flock in the caf, with or +without escorts, after eleven o'clock every night in the year. He knew +them all by name. He knew their histories. He could detect at a glance +whether they were unhappy or merely depressed by the rain, whether they +drank champagne from happiness or desperation. Notwithstanding his +dreamy disposition his temperament was ardent; his was an unspoiled +soul; he felt himself a sort of moral barometer for the magnificent and +feline women who treated him as if he were a wooden post when they were +gossiping, harried him like an animal when they were thirsty. He noted +that they were always thirsty. They smoked more than they ate, and +whispered more, if no men were present, than they smoked. But then, men +were seldom absent. + +The night previous, Ambroise recalled the fact, she had not come in with +a different set. This was not her custom, and he worried over it. +Protected by princes and financiers, she nevertheless loved her liberty +so much that one seldom caught her in the same company twice in +succession. For this singular caprice Aholibah, oftener called the Woman +from Morocco,--because she had lived in Algiers,--was the despair of her +circle. Why, argued the other birds, why fly in the face of luck? To be +sure, she was still young, still beautiful, with that sort of metallic +beauty which reminded Ambroise of some priceless bronze blackened in the +sun. She was meagre, diabolically graceful, dark, with huge saucer-like +eyes that greedily drank in her surroundings. But her lashes were long, +and she could veil her glance so that her brilliant face looked as if +the shutters had been closed on her soul. Across her brows a bar of +blue-black marked the passage of her eyebrows--which sable line was +matched by her abundant hair, worn in overshadowing clusters. She +dressed winter and summer in scarlet, and her stage name was +Aholibah--bestowed upon her by some fantastic poet who had not read +Ezekiel, but Swinburne. It was rumoured by her intimates that her real +name was Clotilde Durval, that her mother had been a seamstress.... + +With a sinking at the heart Ambroise saw her enter in the company of the +same gentleman she had brought the previous evening. The garon did not +analyze this strange, jealous feeling, for he was too busily employed in +seating his guests and relieving the man of his hat and walking-stick. +An insolent chap it was, with his air of an assured conqueror and the +easy bearing of wealth. There was little discussion as to the order--a +certain brand of wine, iced beyond recognition for any normal palate, +was always served to Aholibah. She loved "needles on her tongue," she +asseverated if any one offered her weaker stuff. That July night she +looked like a piratical craft that had captured a sleek merchantman for +prize. She was all smoothness; Ambroise alone detected the retracted +claws of the leopardess. She blazed in the electric illumination, and +her large hat, with its swelling plumes, threw her dusky features into +shadow--her eyes seemed far away under its brim and glowed with unholy +phosphorescence. + +While he arranged the details of the silver wine-pail in the other room, +the chef asked him if the Princess Comet had arrived. Ambroise almost +snarled--much to the astonishment of the Gascon. And when the sommelier +attempted to help him with the wine, he was elbowed vigorously. Ambroise +must have been drinking too much, said the boys. Joseph rather curiously +inspected his waiter as he made his accustomed round in the caf. But, +pale as usual, Ambroise stood near his table, his whole bearing an +intent and thoroughly professional one. Joseph was satisfied and drove +the chef back to the kitchen. + +The young Alsatian had never seen Aholibah look so radiant. She was in +high spirits, and her pungent talk aroused her companion from incipient +moroseness. After midnight the party grew--some actresses from a near-by +theatre came in with their male friends, and another waiter was detailed +to the aid of Ambroise. But he stuck to the first-comers and served so +much wine to them that he had the satisfaction of seeing Aholibah's +disagreeable protector collapse. She hardly noticed it, for she was +talking vivaciously to Madeleine about the premire of Donnay's comedy. +Thrice Ambroise sought to fill her glass; but she repulsed him. He was +sad. Something told him that Aholibah was farther away from him than +ever; was she on the eve of forming one of those alliances that would +rob him finally of her presence? He eyed the sleeping man--surely a +monster, a millionnaire, with the tastes of a brute. It was all very +trying to a man with fine nerves. Several times he caught Aholibah's eye +upon him, and he vaguely wondered if he had omitted anything--or, had he +betrayed his feelings? In Paris the waiter who shows that he has ears, +or eyes, or a heart, except in the exercise of his functions, is lost. +He is bound to be caught and his telltale humanity scourged by instant +dismissal. So when those fathomless eyes glittered in his direction, his +knees trembled, and a ball of copper invaded his throat. He could barely +drag himself to her side and ask if he could help her. A burst of +impertinent laughter greeted him, and Madeleine cried:-- + +"Your blond garon seems smitten, Aholibah!" When Ambroise heard this +awful phrase, his courage quite forsook him, and he withdrew into the +obscurity of the hall. So white was he that the kindly Joseph asked +solicitously if he were ill. Ambroise shook his head. The heat, he +feebly explained, had made his head giddy. Better drink some iced +mineral water, was suggested--the other man could look after the party! +But Ambroise would not hear of this, and feeling once more the beckoning +gaze of Aholibah he marched bravely to her and was rewarded by a tap on +the wrist. + +"There, loiterer! Go call a carriage. The Prince is sleepy--dear sheep!" +This last was a tender apostrophe to her snoring friend. Ambroise helped +them into a fiacre. When it drove away it was past two o'clock; the +house had to be closed. He walked slowly home to his little chamber on +the Rue Puteaux, just off the Batignolles. But he could not sleep until +the street-cleaners began the work of another day.... The Woman from +Morocco was the scarlet colour of his troubled dreams.... + + * * * * * + +August had almost spent itself, and Aholibah remained in the arid and +flavourless town. Her intimate friends had weeks earlier gone to +Trouville, to Dinard, to Ostende, to Hombourg, even as far as Brighton; +but she lingered, seemingly from perversity. She came regularly to the +caf about eleven, always in company with her Prince, and was untiringly +served by Ambroise. He was rewarded for his fidelity with many valuable +tips and latterly with gifts--for on being questioned he was forced to +admit that gratuities had to be shared with the other waiters. He was so +amiable, his smile so winning, his admiration so virginal, that +Aholibah kept him near her. Her Prince drank, sulked, or grumbled as +much as ever. He was bored by the general heat and the dulness, yet made +no effort to escape either. One night they entered after twelve o'clock. +Aholibah was in vicious humour and snapped at her garon. Dog-like he +waited upon her, an humble, devoted helot. He overheard her say to her +companion that she must have lost the purse at the Folies-Bergres. + +"Well, go to the Rue de la Paix to-morrow and buy another," was the +reply. + +"I can't replace that purse. Besides, it was a prized gift--" + +"From your sainted mother in heaven!" he sneered. + +Ambroise saw the windows of her eyes close with a snap, and he moved +away, fearing to be present in the surely impending quarrel. He +remembered the purse. It was a long gold affair, its tiny links crusted +with precious pearls--emeralds, rubies, diamonds. And the top he saw +before him with ease, for its pattern was odd--a snake's head with jaws +distended by a large amethyst. Yes, it was unique, that purse. And its +value must have been bewildering for any but the idle rich. Ah! how he +hated all this money, coming from nowhere, pouring in golden streams +nowhere. He was not a revolutionist,--not even a socialist,--but there +were times when he could have taken the neck of the Prince between his +strong fingers and choked out his worthless life. These attacks of envy +were short-lived--he could not ascribe them to the reading of the little +hornet-like anarchist sheet, _Pre Peinard_, which the other waiters +lent him; rather was it an excess of bile provoked by the coveted beauty +of Aholibah. + +She usurped his day dreams, his night reveries. He never took a step +without keeping her memory in the foreground. When he closed his eyes, +he saw scarlet. When he opened them, he felt her magnetic glance upon +him, though she was far from the caf. His one idea was to speak with +her. His maddest wish assumed the shape of a couple walking slowly arm +in arm through the Bois--_she_ was the woman! But this particular vision +bordered on delirium, and he rarely indulged in it.... He stooped to +look under the chairs, under the table, for the missing treasure. It was +not to be seen. Indolently the Prince watched him as he peered all over +the caf, out on the terrace. Aholibah was deeply preoccupied. She +sipped her wine without pleasure. Her brows were thunderous. The +cart-wheel hat was tipped low over them. Several times Ambroise sought +her glance. He could have sworn that she was regarding him steadily. So +painful became the intensity of her eyes that he withdrew in confusion. +His mind was made up at last. + +The next day was for him a free one. He wandered up and down the Rue de +la Paix staring moodily into the jewellers' windows. That night, though +he could have stayed away from the caf, he returned at ten o'clock, and +luckily enough was needed. Joseph greeted him effusively. The "mast," +the thin fellow from Marseilles, had gone home with a splitting +headache. Would Ambroise stay and serve his usual table? To his immense +astonishment and joy he saw her enter alone. He took her wraps and +seated her on her favourite divan near an electric fan. Then he stared +expectantly at the door. But her carriage had driven away. Was a part of +his dream coming true? He closed his eyes, and straightway saw scarlet. +Then he went for wine, without taking her order. + +Aholibah was preoccupied. She played with the bracelet on her tawny left +wrist. Occasionally she lifted her glass, or else tossed her hair from +her eyes. If any stranger ventured near her, she began to hum +insolently, or spoke earnestly with Ambroise. He was in the eleventh +heaven of the Persians. Two Ambroises appeared to be in him: one served +his lady, spoke with her; the other from afar contemplated with the +ecstasy of a hasheesh eater his counterfeit brother. It was an exquisite +sensation. + +"The purse--has Mademoiselle--" He stammered. + +"No," she crisply answered. + +"Can it never be duplicated? Perhaps--" + +"Never. It is impossible. It was made in Africa." + +"But--but--" he persisted. His bearing was so peculiar that she bent +upon him her dynamic gaze. + +"What's the matter with you this evening, Ambroise? Have you come into a +successful lottery ticket? Or--" She was suspiciously looking at him. +"Or--you haven't found _it_?" + +He nodded his head, his face beatific with joy. He resembled the +youthful Saint George after slaying the dragon. She was startled. Her +eyes positively lightened; he listened for the attendant peal of +thunder. + +"Speak out, you booby. Cornichon! Where did you find it? Let me see +it--at once." All fire and imperiousness, she held out grasping fingers. +He shook. And then carefully he drew from the inside pocket of his coat, +the purse. She snatched it. Yes--it was her purse. And yet there was +something strange about it. Had the stones been tampered with? She +examined it searchingly. She boasted a jeweller's knowledge of diamonds +and rubies. One of the stones had been transposed, that she could have +sworn. And how different the expression of the serpent's eyes--small +carbuncles. No--it was not her purse! She looked at Ambroise. He was +paling and reddening in rapid succession. + +"It is _not_ my purse! How did this come into your possession? It is +very valuable, quite as valuable as mine. But the eyes of my serpent +were not so large--I mean the carbuncles. Ambroise--look at me! I +command you! Where did you find this treasure--cher ami!" Her seductive +voice lingered on the last words as if they were a morsel of delicious +fruit. He leaned heavily on the table and closed his eyes to shut out +her face--but he only saw scarlet. He heard scarlet. + +"I--I--bought the thing because--you missed the other--" He could get no +further. She smiled, showing her celebrated teeth. + +"You bought the thing--_hein_? You must be a prince in +disguise--Ambroise! And I have just lost _my_ Prince! Perhaps--you +thought--you audacious boy--" + +He kept his eyes closed. She was in a corner of the room--quite +empty--the other waiters were on the terrace. She weighed his appearance +and smiled mysteriously; her smile, her glance, and her scarlet gowns +were her dramatic assets. Then she spoke in a low voice--a contralto +like the darker tones of an English horn:-- + +"I fancy I'll keep your thoughtful _gift_--Ambroise. And now, like a +good boy, get a fiacre for me!" She went away, leaving him standing in +the middle of the room, a pillar of burning ice. When Joseph spoke to +him he did not answer. Then they took him by the arm, and he fell over +in a seizure which, asserted the practical head waiter, was caused by +indigestion. + + +II + +ACROSS THE STYX + +It was raining on the Left Bank. The chill of a November afternoon cut +its way through the doors of the Caf La Source in the Boul' Mich' and +made shiver the groups of young medical students who were reading or +playing dominos. Ambroise Nettier, older, thinner, paler, waited +carefully on his patrons. He had been in the hospital with brain fever, +and after he was cured, one of the students secured him a position at +this caf in the Quartier. He had been afraid to go back to the Caf +Riche; Joseph had harshly discharged him on that terrible night; alone, +without a home, without a penny, his savings gone, his life insurance +hypothecated,--it had been intended for the benefit of his parents,--his +clothes, his very trunk gone, and plunged in debt to his fellow-waiters, +his brain had succumbed to the shock. But Ambroise was young and strong; +when he left the hospital he was relieved to find that he no longer saw +scarlet. He was a healed man. He had intended to seek for a place at the +Caf Cardinal, but it was too near the Caf Riche--he might meet old +acquaintances, might be asked embarrassing questions. So he gladly +accepted his present opportunity. + +The dulness of the day waxed with its waning. It was nearly six o'clock +when the door slowly opened and Aholibah entered. She was alone. Her +scarlet plumage was wet, and she was painted like a Peruvian war-god. +She did not appear so brilliant a bird of paradise--or elsewhere--as at +the aviary across the water. Yet her gaze was as forthright as ever. She +sat on a divan between two domino parties, and was hardly noticed by the +fanatics of that bony diversion. Recognizing Ambroise, she made a sign +to him. It was some minutes before he could reach her table; he had +other orders. When he did, she said she wanted some absinthe. He stared +at her. Yes, absinthe--she had discarded iced wines. The doctor told her +that cold wine was dangerous. He still stared. Then she held up the +purse. It was a mere shell; all the stones save the amethyst in the +mouth of the serpent were gone. She laughed shrilly. He went for the +drink. She lighted a cigarette.... + +Every night for six months she haunted the caf. She was always +unattended, always in excellent humour. She made few friends among the +students. Her scarlet dress grew shabbier. Her gloves and boots were +pitiful to Ambroise, who recalled her former splendours, her outrageous +extravagances. Why had fortune flouted her! Why had she let it, like +water, escape through her jewelled, indifferent fingers! He made no +inquiries. She vouchsafed none. They were now on a different footing. +Tantalizingly she dangled the purse under his nose as he brought her +absinthe--always this opalescent absinthe. She drank it in the morning, +in the afternoon, at night. She seldom spoke save to Ambroise. And +he--he no longer saw scarlet, for the glorious tone of her hat and gown +had vanished. They were rusty red, a carroty tint. Her face was like the +mask of La Buveuse d'Absinthe, by Felicien Rops; her eyes, black wells +of regard; her hair without lustre, and coarse as the mane of a horse. +Aholibah no longer manifested interest in the life of Paris. She did not +read or gossip. But she still had money to spend. + +The night he quarrelled with his new patron, Ambroise was not well. All +the day his head had pained him. When he reached La Source, the dame at +the cashier's desk told him that he was in for a scolding. He shrugged +his thin shoulders. He didn't care very much. Later the prophesied event +occurred. He had been much too attentive to the solitary woman who drank +absinthe day and night. The patron did not propose to see his +establishment, patronized as it was by the shining lights of medicine--! + +Ambroise changed his clothes and went away without a word. He was weary +of his existence, and a friend who shared his wretched room in the Rue +Mouffetard had apprised him of a vacant job at a livelier resort, the +Caf Vachette, commonly known as the Caf Rasta. There he would earn +more tips, though the work would be more fatiguing. And--the Morocco +Woman might not follow him. He hurried away. + + +III + +AVERNUS + +She sat on a divan in the corner when he entered the Vachette for the +first time. He said nothing, nor did he experience either a thrill of +pleasure or disgust. The other waiters assured him that she was an old +customer, sometimes better dressed, yet never without money. And she was +liberal. He took her usual order, but did not speak to her, though she +played with the purse as if to tempt him--it had become for him a symbol +of their lives. A quick glance assured him that the amethyst had +disappeared. She was literally drinking _his_ gift away in absinthe. The +spring passed, and Ambroise did not regain his former health. His limbs +were leaden, his head always heavy. The alert waiter was transformed. He +took his orders soberly, executed them soberly,--he was still a good +routinier; but his early enthusiasm was absent. Something had gone from +him that night; as she went to her carriage with her scornful, snapping, +petulant _a_!--he felt that his life was over. Aholibah watched like a +cat every night; he was not on for day duty. She never came to the Rasta +before dark. The story of her infatuation for the well-bred, melancholy +garon was noised about; but it did not endanger his position, as at La +Source. He paid little attention to the jesting, and was scrupulously +exact in his work. But the sense of his double personality began to +worry him again. He did not see scarlet as of old; he noticed when his +eyes were closed that the apparition of a second Ambroise swam into the +field of his vision. And he was positively certain that this spectre of +himself saw scarlet--the attitude of his double assured him of the fact. +Simple-minded, ignorant of cerebral disorders, loyal, and laborious, +Ambroise could not speak of these disquieting things--indeed, he only +worked the more.... + +At last, one night in late summer, she did not appear. It was after a +day when she had sung more insolently than ever, drunk more than her +accustomed allowance, and had shown Ambroise the purse--the sockets of +the serpent's eyes untenanted by the beautiful carbuncles. Apathetic as +he had become, he was surprised at her absence. It was either caprice or +serious illness. She had dwindled to a skeleton, with a maleficent +smile. Her teeth were yellow, her hands become claws, the scarlet of her +clothes a drab hue, the plumes on her hat gone. Ambroise wondered. About +midnight a mean-looking fellow entered and asked for him. A lady, a very +ill lady, was in a coup at the door. He hurried out. It was Aholibah. +Her eyes were glazed and her lips black and cracked. She tried to croon, +in a hoarse voice:-- + +"I am the Woman of Morocco!" But her head fell on the window-sill of the +carriage. Ambroise lifted the weary head on his shoulder. His eyes were +so dry that they seemed thirsty. The old glamour gripped him. The cabman +held the reins and waited; it was an every-night occurrence for him. The +starlight could not penetrate to the Boulevard through the harsh +electric glare; and the whirring of wheels and laughter of the caf's +guests entered the soul of Ambroise like steel nails. She opened her +eyes. + +"I am that Aholibah ... a witness through waste Asia ... that the strong +men and the Captains knew ..." This line of Swinburne's was pronounced +in the purest English. Ambroise did not understand. Then followed some +rapidly uttered jargon that might have been Moorish. He soothed her, and +softly passed his hand over her rough and dishevelled hair. His heart +was bursting. She was after all his Aholibah, his first love. A crowd +gathered. He asked for a doctor. A dozen students ran in a dozen +different directions. The tired horse stamped its feet impatiently, and +once it whinnied. The coachman lighted his pipe and watched his dying +fare. Some wag sang a drunken lyric, and Ambroise repeated at +intervals:-- + +"Please not so close, Messieurs. She needs air." Then she moved her head +and murmured: + +"Where's--my Prince? My--Prince Ambroise--I have something--" Her head +fell back on his shoulder with a rigid jerk. In her clenched fingers he +recognized his purse--smudged, torn, the serpent mouth gaping, the eyes +empty.... And for the last time Ambroise saw scarlet--saw scarlet +double. His two personalities had separated, never to merge again. + + + + +IV + +REBELS OF THE MOON + + "On my honour, friend," Zarathustra answered, "what thou speakest + of doth not exist: there is no devil nor hell. Thy soul will be + dead even sooner than thy body: henceforth fear naught." + + +The moon, a spiritual gray wafer, fainted in the red wind of a summer +morning as the two men leaped a ditch soft with mud. The wall was not +high, the escape an easy one. Crouching, their clothes the colour of +clay, they trod cautiously the trench, until opposite a wood whose trees +blackened the slow dawn. Then, without a word, they ran across the road, +and, in a few minutes, were lost in the thick underbrush of the little +forest. It was past four o'clock and the dawn began to trill over the +rim of night; the east burst into stinging sun rays, while the moving +air awoke the birds and sent scurrying around the smooth green park a +cloud of golden powdery dust.... + +Arved and Quell stood in a secret glade and looked at each other +solemnly--but only for a moment. Laughter, unrestrained laughter, +frightened the squirrels and warned them that they were still in +danger. + +"Well, we've escaped this time," said the poet. + +"Yes; but how long?" was the sardonic rejoinder of the painter. + +"See here, Quell, you're a pessimist. You are never satisfied; which, I +take it, is a neat definition of pessimism." + +"I don't propose to chop logic so early in the morning," was the surly +reply. "I'm cold and nervous. Say, did you lift anything before we got +away?" Arved smiled the significant smile of a drinking man. + +"Yes, I did. I waited until Doc McKracken left his office, and then I +sneaked _this_." The severe lines in Quell's face began to swim +together. He reached out his hand, took the flask, and then threw back +his head. Arved watched him with patient resignation. + +"Hold on there! Leave a dozen drops for a poor maker of rhymes," he +chuckled, and soon was himself gurgling the liquor. + +They arose, and after despairing glances at their bespattered garments, +trudged on. In an hour, the pair had reached the edge of the forest, +and, as the sun sat high and warm, a rest was agreed upon. But this time +they did not easily find a hiding-place. Fearing to venture nearer the +turnpike, hearing human sounds, they finally retired from the clearing, +and behind a moss-etched rock discovered a cool resting-place on the +leafy floor. + +At full length, hands under heads, brains mellowed by brandy, the men +summed up the situation. Arved was the first to speak. He was tall, +blond, heavy of figure, and his beard hung upon his chest. His +dissatisfied eyes were cynical when he rallied his companion. A man of +brains this, but careless as the grass. + +"Quell, let us think this thing out carefully. It is nearly six o'clock. +At six o'clock the cells will be unlocked, and then,--well, McKracken +will damn our bones, for he gets a fat board fee from my people, and the +table is not so cursed good at the Hermitage that he misses a margin of +profit! What will he do? Set the dogs after us? No, he daren't; we're +not convicts--we're only mad folk." He smiled good-humouredly, though +his white brow was dented as if by harsh thoughts. + +Quell's little bloodshot eyes stared up into a narrow channel of +foliage, at the end of which was a splash of blue sky. He was +mean-appearing, with a horselike head, his mustache twisted into a +savage curl. His forehead was abnormal in breadth and the irritable +flashes of fire in his eyes told the story of a restless soul. The +nostrils expanded as he spoke:-- + +"We're only mad folk, as you say; nevertheless, the Lord High Keeper +will send his police patrol wagon after us in a jiffy. He went to bed +dead full last night, so his humour won't be any too sweet when he hears +that several of his boarders have vanished. He'll miss you more than me; +I'm not at the first table with you swells." + +Quell ended his speech with so disagreeable an inflection that Arved was +astonished. He looked around and spat at a beetle. + +"What's wrong with you, my hearty? I believe you miss your soft iron +couch. Or did you leave it this morning left foot foremost? Anyhow, +Quell, don't get on your ear. We'll push to town as soon as it's +twilight, and I know a little crib near the river where we can have all +we want to eat and drink. Do you hear--drink!" Quell made no answer. The +other continued:-- + +"Besides, I don't see why you've turned sulky simply because your family +sent you up to the Hermitage. It's no disgrace. In fact, it steadies the +nerves, and you can get plenty of booze." + +"If you have the price," snapped his friend. + +"Money or no money, McKracken's asylum--no, it's bad taste to call it +that; his retreat, ah, there's the word!--is not so awful. I've a theory +that our keepers are crazy as loons; though you can't blame them, +watching us, as they must, from six o'clock in the morning until +midnight. Say, why were you put away?" + +"Crazy, like yourself, I suppose." Quell grinned. + +"And now we're cured. We cured ourselves by flight. How can they call us +crazy when we planned the job so neatly?" + +Arved began to be interested in the sound of his own voice. He searched +his pockets and after some vain fumbling found a half package of +cigarettes. + +"Take some and be happy, my boy. They are boon-sticks indeed." Quell +suddenly arose. + +"Arved, what were you sent up for, may I ask?" + +The poet stretched his big legs, rolled over on his back again, and +scratching his tangled beard, smoked the cigarette he had just lighted. +In the hot hum of the woods there was heard the occasional dropping of +pine cones as the wind fanned lazy music from the leaves. They could not +see the sun; its power was felt. Perspiration beaded their shiny faces +and presently they removed collars and coats, sitting at ease in +shirt-sleeves.... Arved's tongue began to speed:-- + +"Though I've only known you twenty-four hours, my son, I feel impelled +to tell you the history of my happy life--for happiness has its +histories, no matter what the poets say. But the day is hot, our time +limited. Wait until we are recaptured, then I'll spin you a yarn." + +"You expect to get caught for sure?" + +"I do. So do you. No need to argue--your face tells me that. But we'll +have the time of our life before they gather us in. Anyhow, we'll want +to go back. The whole world is crazy, but ashamed to acknowledge it. We +are not. Pascal said men are so mad that he who would not be is a madman +of a new kind. To escape ineffable dulness is the privilege of the +lunatic; the lunatic, who is the true aristocrat of nature--the unique +man in a tower of ivory, the elect, who, in samite robes, traverses +moody gardens. Really, I shudder at the idea of ever living again in +yonder stewpot of humanity, with all its bad smells. To struggle with +the fools for their idiotic prizes is beyond me. The lunatic asylum--" + +"Can't you find some other word?" asked Quell, dryly. + +"--is the best modern equivalent for the tub of Diogenes--he who was the +first Solitary, the first Individualist. To dream one's dreams, to be +alone--" + +"How about McKracken and the keepers?" + +"From the volatile intellects of madmen are fashioned the truths of +humanity. Mental repose is death. All our modern theocrats, +politicians,--whose minds are sewers for the people,--and lawyers are +corpses, their brains dead from feeding on dead ideas. Motion is +life--mad minds are always in motion." + +"Let up there! You talk like the doctor chaps over at the crazy crib," +interrupted Quell. + +"Ah, if we could only arrange our dreams in chapters--as in a novel. +Sometimes Nature does it for us. There is really a beginning, a +development, a dnouement. But, for the most of us, life is a crooked +road with weeds so high that we can't see the turn of the path. Now, my +case--I'm telling you my story after all--my case is a typical one of +the artistic sort. I wrote prose, verse, and dissipated with true +poetic regularity. It was after reading Nietzsche that I decided to quit +my stupid, sinful ways. Yes, you may smile! It was Nietzsche who +converted me. I left the old crowd, the old life in Paris, went to +Brittany, studied new rhythms, new forms, studied the moon; and then +people began to touch their foreheads knowingly. I was suspected simply +because I did not want to turn out sweet sonnets about the pretty stars. +Why, man, I have a star in my stomach! Every poet has. We are of the +same stuff as the stars. It was Marlowe who said, 'A sound magician is a +mighty god.' He was wrong. Only the mentally unsound are really wise. +This the ancients knew. Even if Gerard de Nerval did walk the boulevards +trolling a lobster by a blue ribbon--that is no reason for judging him +crazy. As he truly said, 'Lobsters neither bark nor bite; and they know +the secrets of the sea!' His dreams simply overflowed into his daily +existence. He had the courage of his dreams. Do you remember his +declaring that the sun never appears in dreams? How true! But the moon +does, 'sexton of the planets,' as the crazy poet Lenau called it--the +moon which is the patron sky-saint of men with brains. Ah, brains! What +unhappiness they cause in this brainless world, a world rotten with +hypocrisy. A poet polishes words until they glitter with beauty, +charging them with fulminating meaning--straightway he is called mad by +men who sweat and toil on the stock exchange. Have you ever, my dear +Quell, watched those little, grotesque brokers on a busy day? No? Well, +you will say that no lunatic grimacing beneath the horns of the moon +ever made such ludicrous, such useless, gestures. And for what? Money! +Money to spend as idiotically as it is garnered. The world is crazy, I +tell you, crazy, to toil as it does. How much cleverer are the apes who +won't talk, because, if they did, they would be forced to abandon their +lovely free life, put on ugly garments, and work for a living. These +animals, for which we have such contempt, are freer than men; they are +the Supermen of Nietzsche--Nietzsche whose brain mirrored both a +Prometheus and a Napoleon." Quell listened to this speech with +indifference. Arved continued:-- + +"Nor was Nietzsche insane when he went to the asylum. His sanity was +blinding in its brilliancy; he voluntarily renounced the world of +foolish faces and had himself locked away where he would not hear its +foolish clacking. O Silence! gift of the gods, deified by Carlyle in +many volumes and praised by me in many silly words! My good fellow, +society, which is always hypocritical, has to build lunatic asylums in +self-defence. These polite jails keep the world in countenance; they +give it a standard. If _you_ are behind the bars--" + +"Speak for yourself," growled Quell. + +"Then the world knows that you are crazy and that _it_ is not. There is +no other way of telling the difference. So a conspiracy of fools, +lawyers, and doctors is formed. If you do not live the life of the +stupid: cheat, lie, steal, smirk, eat, dance, and drink--then you are +crazy! That fact agreed upon, the hypocrites, who are quite mad, but +cunning enough to dissemble, lock behind bolted doors those free souls, +the poets, painters, musicians--artistic folk in general. They brand our +gifts with fancy scientific names, such as Megalomania, Paranoia, _Folie +des grandeurs_. Show me a genius and I'll show you a madman--according +to the world's notion." + +"There you go again," cried Quell, arising to his knees. "Genius, _I_ +believe, is a disease of the nerves; and I don't mind telling you that I +consider poets and musicians quite crazy." + +Arved's eyes were blazing blue signals. + +"But, my dear Quell, are not all men mad at some time or another? Madly +in love, religiously mad, patriotically insane, and idiotic on the +subject of clothes, blood, social precedence, handsome persons, money? +And is it not a sign of insanity when one man claims sanity for his own +particular art? Painting, I admit, is--" + +"What the devil do you know about painting?" Quell roughly interposed; +"you are a poet and, pretending to love all creation,--altruism, I think +your sentimental philosophers call it,--have the conceit to believe you +bear a star in your stomach when it is only a craving for rum. I've +been through the game." + +He began to pace the sward, chewing a blade of grass. He spoke in +hurried, staccato phrases:-- + +"Why was I put away? Listen: I tried to paint the sun,--for I hate your +moon and its misty madness. To put this glorious furnace on canvas is, +as you will acknowledge, the task of a god. It never came to me in my +dreams, so I wooed it by day. Above all, I wished to express truth; the +sun is black. Think of an ebon sun fringed with its dazzling +photosphere! I tried to paint sun-rhythms, the rhythms of the quivering +sky, which is never still even when it seems most immobile; I tried to +paint the rhythms of the atmosphere, shivering as it is with chords of +sunlight and chromatic scales as yet unpainted. Like Oswald Alving in +Ibsen's Ghosts, my last cry will be for 'the sun.' How did my friends +act? What did the critics say? A black sun was too much for the world, +though astronomers have proven my theory correct. The doctors swore I +drank too much absinthe; the critics said a species of optical madness +had set in; that I saw only the peripheral tints--I was yellow and blue +crazy. Perhaps I was, perhaps I am. So is the fellow crazy who invented +wireless telegraphy; so is the man off his base who invents a folding +bird cage. We are all crazy, and the craziest gang are our doctors at +the Hermitage." He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. Arved rolled his +handsome head acquiescingly. + +"You poets and musicians are trying to compass the inane. You are trying +to duplicate your dreams, dreams without a hint of the sun. The painter +at least copies or interprets real life; while the composer dips his +finger in the air, making endless sound-scrolls--noises with long tails +and whirligig decorations like foolish fireworks--though I think the art +of the future will be pyrotechnics. Mad, mad, I tell you! But whether +mad or not matters little in our land of freedom, where all men are born +unequal, where only the artists are sad. They are useless beings, openly +derided, and when one is caught napping, doing something that offends +church or State or society, he is imprisoned. Mad, you know! No wonder +anarchy is thriving, no wonder every true artist is an anarch, unavowed +perhaps, yet an anarch, and an atheist." + +"Not so fast!" interrupted Arved. "I'm an anarchist, but I don't believe +in blowing up innocent policemen. Neither do you, Quell. You wouldn't +hurt a bartender! Give an anarchist plenty to drink, and he sheds his +anarchy like a shirt. There are, I have noticed, three stages in the +career of a revolutionist: destruction, instruction, construction. He +begins the first at twenty, at forty he is teaching, at sixty he +believes in society--especially if he has money in the bank." Quell +regarded the speaker sourly. + +"You are a wonder, Arved. You fly off on a wild tangent stimulated by +the mere sound of a word. Who said anything about dynamite-anarchy? +There's another sort that men of brains--madmen if you will--believe and +indirectly teach. Emerson was one, though he hardly knew it. Thoreau +realized it for him, however. Don't you remember his stern rebuke when +Emerson visited him in Concord jail: 'Henry, why art thou here?' meekly +inquired the mystic man. 'Ralph, why art thou _not_ here?' was the +counter-question. Thoreau had brave nerves. To live in peace in this +malicious swamp of a world we must all wear iron masks until we are +carted off to the _domino-park_; pious people call it the cemetery. Now, +I'm going to sleep. I'm tired of all this jabbering. We are crazy for +sure, or else we wouldn't talk so much." + +Arved grumbled, "Yes, I've noticed that when a man in an asylum begins +to suspect his keepers of madness he's mighty near lunacy himself." + +"You have crazy blue eyes, Arved! Where's that flask--I'm dry again! +Let's sleep." + +They drained the bottle and were soon dozing, while about them buzzed +the noon in all its torrid splendour. + +When they awoke it was solid night. They yawned and damned the darkness, +which smelt like stale india-rubber, so Quell said. They cursed life and +the bitter taste in their mouths. Quell spoke of his thirst in words +that startled the easy-going Arved, who confessed that if he could rid +himself of the wool in his throat, he would be comparatively happy. Then +they stumbled along, bumping into trees, feeling with outstretched arms, +but finding nothing to guide them save the few thin stars in the torn +foliage overhead. Without watches, they could catch no idea of the hour. +The night was far spent, declared Arved; he discovered that he was very +hungry. Suddenly, from the top of a steep, slippery bank they pitched +forward into the highroad. + +Arved put out his hand, searching for his comrade. "Quell, Quell!" he +whispered. Quell rose darkly beside him, a narrow lath of humanity. +Locking arms, both walked briskly until, turning a sharp, short corner, +they beheld, all smiling in the night, a summer garden, well lighted and +full of gay people, chattering, singing, eating, drinking--happy! The +two fugitives were stunned for a moment by such a joyful prospect. Tears +came slowly to their eyes, yet they never relaxed their gait. Arriving +at an outlying table and seats, they bethought themselves of their +appearance, of money, of other disquieting prospects; but, sitting down, +they boldly called a waiter. + +Luckily it was a country girl who timidly took their order for beer and +sandwiches. And they drank eagerly, gobbling the food as soon as it +came, ordering more so noisily that they attracted attention. The beer +made them brave. As they poured down glass after glass, reckless of the +reckoning, insolent to the servant, they began wrangling over the +subject that had possessed their waking hours. + +"Look here, Quell!" Arved exclaimed crustily, "you said I had crazy blue +eyes. What about your own red ones? Crazy! Why, they glow now like a +rat's. Poets may be music-mad, drunk with tone--" + +"And other things," sneered the painter. + +"--but at least their work is great when it endures; it does not fade +away on rotten canvas." + +"Now, I know you ought to be in the Brain-College, Arved, where your +friends could take the little green car that goes by the grounds and see +you on Sunday afternoons if weather permits." + +His accent seemed deliberately insulting to Arved, who, however, let it +pass because of their mutual plight. If they fell to fighting, detection +would ensue. So he answered in placatory phrases:-- + +"Yes, my friend, we both belong to the same establishment, for we are +men of genius. As the cat said to Alice, 'We must be mad or else we +shouldn't be here.' I started to tell you why my people thought I had +better take the cure. I loved the moon too much and loathed sunlight. If +I had never tried to write lunar poetry--the tone quality of music +combined with the pictorial evocation of painting--I might be in the +bosom of my family now instead of--" + +"Drinking with a crazy painter, eh?" Quell was very angry. He shouted +for drinks so rapidly that he alarmed the more prudent Arved; and as +they were now the last guests, the head waiter approached and curtly +bade them leave. In an instant he was dripping with beer thrown at +him--glass and all--by the irate Quell. A whistle sounded, two other +waiters rushed out, and the battle began. Arved, aroused by the sight of +his friend on the ground with three men hammering his head, gave a roar +like the trumpeting of an elephant. A chair was smashed over a table, +and, swinging one-half of it, he made a formidable onslaught. Two of the +waiters were knocked senseless and the leader's nose and teeth crushed +in by the rude cudgel. The morose moon started up, a tragic hieroglyph +in the passionless sky. Quell, seeing its hated disk, howled, his face +aflame with exaltation. Then he leaped like a hoarsely panting animal +upon the poet; a moment and they were in the grass clawing each other. +And the moon foamed down upon them its magnetic beams until darkness, +caused by a coarse blanket, enveloped, pinioned, smothered them. When +the light shone again, they were sitting in a wagon, their legs tightly +bound.... + +They began singing. The attendant interrupted:-- + +"Will you fellows keep quiet? How can a man drive straight, listening to +your cackle?" + +Arved touched his temple significantly and nudged Quell. + +"Another one of us. Another rebel of the moon!" + +"Shut up or I'll gag you both!" imperiously commanded the doctor, as the +wheels of the ambulance cut the pebbly road. They were entering the +asylum; now they passed the porter's lodge. In the jewelled light of a +senescent moon, his wife and little daughter gazed at them curiously, +without semblance of pity or fear. Then, as if shot from the same vocal +spring-board, the voices of poet and painter merged into crazy +rhythmatic chanting:-- + +"Rebels of the moon, rebels of the moon! We are, we are, the rebels of +the moon!" + +And the great gates closed behind them with a brazen clangour--metal +gates of the moon-rebels. + + + + +V + +THE SPIRAL ROAD + + There can be nothing good, as we know it, nor anything evil, as we + know it, in the eye of the Omnipresent and the + Omniscient.--_Oriental Proverb._ + + +I + +THE STRAND OF DREAMS + +"I must see him if only for a minute. I can't go back to the city after +coming so far. Please--" but the girl's face disappeared and the rickety +door, which had been opened on a chain, was slammed after this +imperative speech, and Gerald Shannon found himself staring +exasperatedly at its rusty exterior. To have travelled on foot such a +distance only to be turned away like a beggar enraged him. Nor was the +prospect of returning over the path which had brought him to Karospina's +house a cheering one. He turned and saw that a low, creeping mist had +obliterated every vestige of the trail across the swamp lands. There was +no sun, and the twilight of a slow yellow day in late September would +soon, in complicity with the fog, leave him totally adrift on this +remote strand--he could hear the curving fall and hiss of the breakers, +the monotonous rumour of the sea. So he was determined to face +Karospina, even if he had to force his way into the house. + +Two hours earlier, at the little railway station, they had informed him +that the road was easy flatland for the greater part of the way. He had +offered money for a horse or even a wheel; but these were luxuries on +this bleak, poverty-ridden coast. As there was no alternative, Gerald +had walked rapidly since three o'clock. And he had not been told the +truth about the road; where the oozing, green, unwholesome waters were +not he stepped, sometimes sinking over his ankles in the soft mud. Not a +sign of humanity served him for comfort or compass. He had been assured +that if he kept his back to the sun he would reach his destination. And +he did, but not without many misgivings. It was the vision of a squat +tower-like building, almost hemmed in by a monster gas reservoir, +fantastic wooden galleries, and the gigantic silhouettes of strange +machinery, that relieved his mind. But this house and its surroundings +soon repelled him. His reception was the final disenchantment. + +He played a lively tattoo with his blackthorn stick on the panels of the +door. For five minutes this continued, interspersed with occasional loud +calls for Karospina. At last the siege was raised. After preliminary +unboltings, unbarrings, and the rattling of the chain, Gerald saw before +him a middle-aged man with a smooth face and closely shaven head, who +quietly asked his name and business. + +"I have a letter for you, Mr. Karospina--if you are that gentleman--and +as I have put myself to much trouble in getting to you, I think I +deserve a little consideration." + +"A letter, my worthy sir! And for me? Who told you to come here? How do +you know my name?" This angered the young man. + +"It is from Prince K. _The_ Prince. Now are you satisfied?" he added, as +his questioner turned red and then paled as if the news were too +startling for his nerves. + +"Come in, come in!" he cried. "Mila, Mila, here is a guest. Fetch tea to +the laboratory." He literally dragged Shannon within doors and led him +across a stone corridor to a large room, but not before he had bolted +and barred the entrance to his mysterious fortress. Seeing the other's +look of quiet amusement, he laughed himself:-- + +"Wolves, my dear sir, wolves, _human_ wolves, prowl on the beach at +night, and while I have no treasures, it is well to be on the safe side. +Mila, Mila, the tea, the tea." There was a passionate intensity in his +utterance that attracted Gerald from his survey of the chamber. He saw +that in the light Karospina was a much older man than he had at first +supposed. But the broad shoulders, the thick chest, and short, powerful +figure and bullet head belied his years. Incredulously his visitor asked +himself if this were the wonderful, the celebrated Karospina, chemist, +revolutionary, mystic, nobleman, and millionnaire. A Russian, he knew +that--yet he looked more like the monk one sees depicted on the canvases +of the early Flemish painters. His high, wide brow and deep-set, dark +eyes proclaimed the thinker; and because of his physique, he might have +posed as a prize-fighter. + +He took the letter and read it as the door opened and the girl came in +with the tea. She wore her hair braided in two big plaits which hung +between her shoulders, and her bold, careless glance from eyes sea-blue +made the Irishman forget his host and the rigours of the afternoon. A +Russian beauty, with bare, plump arms, and dressed in peasant costume; +but--a patrician! Her fair skin and blond hair filled him with +admiration. What the devil!--he thought, and came near saying it aloud. + +"My niece, Princess Mila Georgovics, Mr. Shannon." Gerald acknowledged +the introduction with his deepest bow. He was dazzled. He had come to +this dreary place to talk politics. But now this was out of the +question. And he began explaining to the Princess; Mila he had fancied +was some slattern waiting on the old fanatic of a prince. He told Mila +this in a few words, and soon the pair laughed and chatted. In the +meantime Karospina, who had finished the letter, began to pace the +apartment. Apparently he had forgotten the others. + +"Tea, tea, where's the tea?" he presently shouted. As they drank, he +said: "The prince asks an impossibility, Mr. Shannon. Say to him, _no_, +simply no; he will understand, and so will you, I hope. I'm done with +all militant movements. I'm converted to the peace party. What's the use +of liberty to people who won't know what to do with it when they get it? +Tolstoy is right. Let the peasant be shown how to save his soul--that +and a little to eat and drink and a roof are all he needs in this life." + +Gerald was startled. He had expected to find an "advanced" leader of the +Bakounine type. Instead, a man of the "vegetarian" order,--as he had +heard them called,--who talked religion instead of dynamite;--and after +all the bother of bringing the letter down to this remote country! +Decidedly the princess was more enjoyable than a reformed anarchist. She +was gazing at him seriously now, her society manner gone. Her nose, +rather large for the harmony of her face, palpitated with eagerness. +Evidently, thought Gerald, the young lady is the real revolutionist in +this curious household. He also ventured to say so to her, but she did +not meet his smiling declaration. Her uncle, irritated by his +interrupted discourse, exclaimed:-- + +"Never mind what the Princess Mila thinks, Mr. Shannon. Women change +their minds. The chief matter just now is that you cannot go away +to-night. You would lose your way, perhaps be drowned. Can you sleep on +a hard bed?" He was assured by Gerald that, if he had been turned away, +he would have slept in an outhouse, even under one of those windmills he +saw in such number on the strand. Karospina smiled. + +"Hardly there--that is, if you expected to awaken." Then he left the +room, saying that some one must see to the supper. His niece burst into +laughter. Gerald joined in. + +"He's always like that, fussy, nervous, but with a heart of gold, +Mr.--Mr. Shannon. Thank you. It's an Irish name, is it not? And you look +like an Irishman; a soldier, too, I fancy!" + +Gerald blushed. "A soldier in the cause of humanity," he answered, "but +no longer a hireling in the uniform of kings." He felt so foolish after +this brave bit of rhetoric that he kept his eyes on the floor. In an +instant she was at his side. + +"Give me your hand--_comrade_!" she said, with a peculiar intonation. +"Oh! if you only knew how I longed to meet the right men. Uncle is a +convert--no, hardly a backslider; but he swears by the regenerating +process instead of violence. Formerly the cleverest living chemist, he +now--oh! I shame to say it--he now indulges in firework displays instead +of manufacturing bombs with which to execute tyrants." She slowly +dropped his hand and her eyes wore a clairvoyant expression. He was +astounded. + +"Fireworks! Doesn't the prince hold by his old faith--he, a pupil of +Bakounine, Netschajew, and Kropotkin?" Just then the prince came in, +bearing a tray. He seemed happy. + +"Here, sit down, dear sir, and partake of a few things. We live so far +from civilization that we seldom get a good chicken. But eggs I can +offer you, eggs and ham, cooked by me on an electric machine." + +"You have no servants?" Gerald ventured. + +"Not one. I can't trust them near my--toys. The princess plays Chopin +mazourkas after she makes the beds in the morning, and in the afternoon +she is my assistant in the laboratory." Again the young man looked about +him. If the room was a laboratory, where were the retorts, the oven, the +phials, the jars, the usual apparatus of a modern chemist? He saw +nothing, except an old-fashioned electric fan and a few dusty books. The +fireworks--were those overgrown wheels and gaunt windmills and gas-house +the secret of the prince's self-banishment to this dreary coast? What +dreams did he seek to incarnate on this strand, in this queer tower, +locked away from the world with a charming princess--a fairy princess +whose heart beat with love for the oppressed, in whose hand he might +some time see the blazing torch of freedom? He, himself, was enveloped +by the hypnotism of the place. Mila spoke:-- + +"I fear I must leave you. I am studying to-night and--I go early to +rest. Pray dine as well as you can, with such a chef." She smiled +mischievously at her uncle, courtesied in peasant fashion to the +bewildered Gerald, who put out his hand, fain to touch hers, and +disappeared. The prince gazed inquiringly at the young man. + +"Revolutionists soon become friends, do they not? The Princess Mila is +part Russian, part Roumanian,--my sister married a Roumanian,--hence her +implacable political attitude. I can't lead her back to civilized +thinking. She sees war in the moon, sun, and stars. And I--I have +forsworn violence. Ah! if I could only make the prince change. +Bakounine's death had no effect; Netschajew's fate did not move him; nor +was Illowski's mad attempt to burn down Paris with his incendiary +symphony an example to our prince that those who take up the sword +perish by the sword. Ah, Tolstoy, dear Leon Nikolaievitch, you showed me +the true way to master the world by love and not by hate! Until I +read--but there, it's late. Come with me to your room. You may smoke and +sleep when you will. In the morning I will show you my--toys." They +shook hands formally and parted. + +His bed was hard, and his room cheerless, but anything, even a haymow, +rather than walking back to the station. After he went to his bed, he +rehearsed the day's doings from the three hours' ride in the train to +the tower. How weary he was! Hark--some one played the piano! A Chopin +mazourka! It was the princess. Mila! How lovely her touch!... Mila! What +a lovely name! A sleeping princess. A prince with such a sleepy head. +How the girl could play ... along the spiral road he saw the music glow +in enigmatic figures of fire.... + + +II + +THE PANACEA OF CORUSCATION + +He seemed to be uttering her name when he awoke. It was daylight; the +sun poured its rays over his face, and he asked himself how he could +have fallen asleep leaving the lamp burning on the table near his bed. +He must have slept long, for he felt rested, cheerful--happy. As he +dressed he speculated whether it was the sunshine, or the prospect of +going back to life, or--or--Did he wish to return so soon? He wondered +what Mila was doing. Then he went into the stone corridor and coughed as +a hint that he was up. Not a sound but the persistent fall at a distance +of some heavy metallic substance. It must be Karospina in his workshop, +at his rockets, pinwheels, torpedoes, and firecrackers. What a singular +change in a bloodthirsty revolutionist. And how childish! Had he +squandered his millions on futile experimentings? What his object, what +his scheme, for the amelioration of mankind's woes? Gerald's stomach +warned him that coffee and rolls were far dearer to him than the +downfall of tyranny's bastions, and impatiently he began whistling. The +rhythmic thud never ceased. He noticed an open door at the back of the +house, and he went out, his long legs carrying him about the yard, +toward the beach. The air was glorious, a soft breeze blowing landward +from the ocean. He almost forgot his hunger in the face of such a +spectacle. The breakers were racing in, and after crumbling, they +scudded, a film of green, crested by cottony white, across the hard sand +to the young man's feet. He felt exhilarated. And his hunger returned. +Then Mila's voice sounded near him. She carried a basket and fairly ran +in her eagerness. + +"Mr. Shannon, Mr. Shannon, good Prince Gerald--" he was amazed; where +could she have heard his Christian name?--"your breakfast. Wait--don't +swim the seas to New York for it. Here it is." She opened the basket and +handed him a jug of coffee and showed him the rolls inside. Without the +slightest embarrassment he thanked her and drank his coffee, walking; he +ate the bread, and felt, as he expressed it, like leading a forlorn +hope. They went on, the cutting sunshine and sparkling breeze alluring +them to vague distances. It was long after midday when they marched back +at a slower pace, Gerald swinging the basket like a light-hearted boy, +instead of the desperado he fancied himself. + +Entering the house, Mila hunted up some cold meat, and with fresh tea +and stale bread they were contented. The formidable pyrotechnist did not +appear, and so the young people enjoyed the day in each other's company. +She conducted him like a river through the lands of sociology, +Dostoewsky, and Chopin. She played, but made him sit in the hall, for +the piano was in her private room. And then they began to exchange +confidences. It was dusk before the prince returned, in the attire of a +workingman, his face and hands covered with soot and grease. A hard +day's labour, he said, and did not seem surprised to see Shannon. + +After supper he asked Gerald if he would smoke a pipe with him in his +laboratory. Mila must have bored him enough by this time! They lighted +their pipes; but Mila refused to be sent away. She sat down beside her +uncle and put her elbows on the table--white, strong arms she had, and +Gerald only took his eyes from their pleasing contemplation to lift them +to hers. He was fast losing what little prudence he had; he was a Celt, +and he felt that he had known Mila for a century. + +"Young man," said Prince Karospina, sharply, "you have the message I +gave you last night! Well--and you will say _no_, to my beloved friend +K., without knowing why. And you will think that you have been dealing +with a man whose hard head has turned to the mush of human kindness,--an +altruist. Ah! I know how you fellows despise the word. But what have +Kropotkin, Elise Reclus, Jean Grave, or the rest accomplished? To +build up, not to tear down, should be the object of the scientific +anarch. Stop! You need not say the earth has to be levelled and ploughed +before sowing the seed. That suits turnip fields, not the garden of +humanity. Educate the downtrodden into liberty, is my message, not the +slaughtering of monarchs. How am I going to go about it? Ah! that's my +affair, my dear sir. After I read a certain book by Tolstoy, I realized +that art was as potent an agent for mischief as the knout. Music--music +is rooted in sex; it works miracles of evil--" + +"Now, uncle, I won't hear a word against Chopin," said Mila, looking +toward Gerald for approval. + +"Music, Mila, in the hands of evil men is an instrument dangerous to +religion, to civilization. What of Illowski and his crazy attack on +Paris and St. Petersburg? You remember, Shannon! Leave Wagner out of the +question--there is no fusion of the arts in his music drama--only bad +verse, foolish librettos, dealing with monsters and gods, and +indifferent scene-painting. Moreover, this new music is not understood +by the world. Even if the whole of mankind could be assembled on the +roof of the world and at a preconcerted signal made to howl the +Marseillaise, it would not be educated to the heights I imagine. Stage +plays--Shakespeare has no message for our days; Ibsen is an +anarchist--he believes in placing the torpedo under the social ark. +Painting--it is an affair for state galleries and the cabinets of +wealthy amateurs. Literature is a dead art--every one writes and reads +and no one understands. Religion! Ah! Yes, religion; the world will be a +blackened cinder or cometary gas before the love of God is stamped from +its heart. But religion and art must go hand in hand. Divorced, art has +fallen into the Slough of Despond; else has been transformed into an +acrid poison wherewith men's souls are destroyed as if by a virulent +absinthe. United with religion, art is purified. All art sprang from +religion. All great art, from a Greek statue to a Gothic cathedral, from +a Bach fugue to Michael Angelo, was religious. Therefore, if we are to +reach the hearts of the people, we must make art the handmaid of +religion." He stopped for breath. Gerald interposed:-- + +"But, dear prince, you say 'art.' What art--painting, sculpture, +architecture, music, poetry, drama--?" + +"One art," harshly cried the now excited man, as he pounded the table +with his hard fist. "One art, _my_ art, the fusion of all the arts. I, +Prince Igorovitch Karospina, tell you that I have discovered the secret +of the arts never dreamed of by Wagner and his futile, painted music on +a painted stage; I have gone, not to art, but to nature--colour, fire, +the elements. The eye is keener than the ear, vision is easier +comprehended than tone. Ah! I have you interested at last." + +He began walking as if to overtake a missing idea. His niece watched him +cynically. + +"I fear you are boring Mr. Shannon," she said in her most birdlike +accents. Her uncle turned on her. + +"I don't care if I am. Go to bed! I am nearing the climax of a lifetime, +and I feel that I must talk to a sympathetic ear. You are not bored, +dear friend. I have pondered this matter for more than thirty years. I +have studied all the arts--painting particularly; and with colour, with +colourful design I mean to teach mankind the great lessons of the +masters and of religion." + +"Ah, you will exhibit in large halls, panoramic pictures, I suppose," +interrupted Shannon. + +"Nothing of the sort," was the testy reply. "For thousands of years the +world has been gazing upon dead stones and canvases, reading dead words. +Dead--all, I tell you, all of these arts. And painting is only in two +dimensions--a poor copy of nature. The theatre has its possibilities, +but is too restricted in space. Music is alive. It moves; but its +message is not articulate to _all_. I want an art that will be +understood and admired at a glance by the world from pole to pole. I +want an art that will live and move and tell a noble tale. I want an art +that will appeal to the eye by its colouring and the soul by its +beautiful designs. Where is that legend-laden art? Hitherto it has not +existed. I have found it. I have tracked it down until I am the master +who by a touch can liberate elemental forces, which will not destroy, +like those of Illowski's, but will elevate the soul and make mankind one +great nation, one loving brotherhood. Ah! to open once more those doors +of faith closed by the imperious dogmas of science--open them upon a +lovely land of mystery. Mankind must have mystery. And beyond each +mystery lies another. This will be our new religion." + +Gerald had caught the enthusiasm of this swelling prologue and rose, his +face alight with curiosity. + +"And that art is--is--?" he stammered. + +"That art is--pyrotechny." It was too much for the young man's nerves, +and he fell back in his chair, purple with suppressed laughter. Angrily +darting at him and catching his left shoulder in a vicelike grip, +Karospina growled: + +"You fool, how dare you mock something you know nothing of?" He shook +his guest roughly. + +"Uncle, uncle, be patient! Tell Mr. Shannon, and he, too, will become a +believer. I believe in you. I believe in him, Mr. Shannon. Don't sneer! +Tell him, uncle." Mila's words, almost imploring in their tone, calmed +the infuriated inventor, who left the room. He rentered in a moment, +his head dripping, and he was grinning broadly. + +"Whenever I encounter a refractory pattern in my fireworks--as you call +them--I am compelled to throw a bucket of water over it to quench its +too ardent spirits. I have just done the same to my own head, dear Mr. +Shannon, and I ask your pardon for my rudeness. Get some fresh tea, +Mila, strong tea, Mila." Pipes were relighted and the conversation +resumed. + +"I forgot in my obsession, in what Jacob Boehme calls 'the shudder of +divine excitement,' that I was talking to one of the uninitiated. I +suppose you think by pyrotechny I mean the old-fashioned methods of set +pieces, ghastly portraits in fire, big, spouting wheels, rockets, war +scenes from contemporary history, seaside stuff, badly done--and flowery +squibs. My boy, all that, still admired by our country cousins, is the +very infancy of my art. In China, where nearly everything was invented +ages ago, in China I learned the first principles, also the +possibilities of the art of fireworks; yes, call it by its humble title. +In China I have seen surprising things at night. Pagodas blown across +the sky, an army of elephants in pursuit, and all bathed in the most +divine hues imaginable. But their art suffers from convention. They +accomplish miracles considering the medium they work in--largely +gunpowder. And their art has no meaning, no message, no moral principle, +no soul. Years ago I discovered all the aids necessary to the +pyrotechnist. I am not a chemist for nothing. If I can paint a fair +imitation of a Claude Monet on canvas, I can also produce for you a +colourless gas which, when handled by a virtuoso, produces astonishing +illusions. In the open air, against the dark background of the horizon, +I can show you the luminous dots planewise of the Impressionists; or I +can give you the broad, sabrelike brushwork of Velasquez, or the +imperial tintings of Titian. I can paint pictures on the sky. I can +produce blazing symphonies. I will prove to you that colour is also +music. This sounds as if I were a victim to that lesion of the brain +called 'coloured-audition.' Perhaps! Not Helmholtz or Chevreul can tell +me anything new in the science of optics. I am the possessor of the +rainbow secrets--for somewhere in Iceland, a runic legend runs, there is +a region vast as night, where all the rainbows--worn out or to be +used--drift about in their vapoury limbo. I have the key to this land of +dreams. Over the earth I shall float my rainbows of art like a flock of +angels. With them I propose to dazzle the eyes of mankind, to arouse +sleeping souls. From the chords of the combined arts I shall extort +nobler cadences, nobler rhythms, for men to live by, for men to die +for!" + +Shannon was impressed. Through the smoke of his host's discourse he +discovered genuine fire. The philosopher took his hand and led him to +the window. + +"Stand there a moment!" he adjured. Mila joined him and after turning +the lamp to a pin-head of light, their shoulders touching--for the +window was narrow--they peered into the night. They were on the side of +the water. Suddenly Gerald exclaimed:-- + +"What's that light out at sea--far out? It looks like the moon!" + +"It is the sun," coolly replied his companion. They saw arise from the +waters a majestic, glowing sphere of light, apparently the size of the +sun. It flooded the country with its glare, and after sailing nearly in +front of the house it shrank into a scarlet cross not larger than a +man's hand. Then in a shower of sparks it ceased, its absence making the +blackness almost corporeal. Instinctively the hands of the two indulged +in a long pressure, and Mila quickly adjusted the lamp. But Gerald still +stood at the window a prey to astonishment, terror, stupefaction. + +Karospina entered. His face was slightly flushed and in his eyes there +burned the sombre fire of the fanatic. Triumphantly he regarded his +young friend. + +"That was only a little superfluous gas--nothing I cared to show you. +Read the newspapers to-morrow, and you will learn that a big meteor +burst off the north coast the night before, and fell into the sea." Then +he moved closer and whispered:-- + +"The time is at hand. Within three weeks--not later than the middle of +October--I shall make my first public test. 'Thus saith the Lord God to +the mountains and to the hills, to the rivers and to the valleys: +Behold, I, _even_ I, will bring a sword upon you, and I will destroy +your high places.'" + +His voice rose in passion, his face worked in anger, and he shook his +clenched fists at an imaginary universe. So this man of peace was a +destroyer, after all! Gerald aroused him. Again he asked pardon. Mila +was nowhere to be seen, and with a sinking at the heart new to his +buoyant temperament, Gerald bade the magician good night. It was +arranged that he would leave the next day, for, like Milton, he was +haunted by "the ghost of a linen decency." But that night he did not +sleep, and no sound of music came to his ears from Mila's chamber. Once +he tried to open his window. It was nailed down. + +A gray day greeted his tired eyes. In an hour he was bidding his friends +good-by and thanking them for their hospitality. He had hoped that Mila +would accompany him a few steps on his long journey, but she made no +sign beyond a despairing look at her uncle, who was surly, as if he had +felt the reaction from too prolonged a debauch of the spirit. Gerald lit +his pipe, kissed the hand of Mila with emphasis, and parted from them. +He had not gone a hundred yards before he heard soft footsteps tracking +him. He turned and was disappointed to see that it was only Karospina, +who came up to him, breathing heavily, and in his catlike eyes the fixed +expression of monomania. He stuttered, waving his arms aloft. + +"The time is at hand and the end of all things shall be accomplished. +You shall return for the great night. You shall hear of it in the world. +Tell K. that I said _no!_ He must be with us at the transfiguration of +all things, when mankind shall go up the spiral road of perfection." + +Gerald Shannon fairly ran to escape knowing more about the universal +panacea. And when he turned for the last time the sea and tower and man +were blotted out by wavering mists of silver. + + +III + +THE FIERY CHARIOT + +The young man soon heard of Karospina's project. A week before the event +the newspapers began describing the experiments of the new Russian +wonder-worker, but treated the matter with calm journalistic +obliviousness to any but its most superficial aspects. A scientific +pyrotechnist was a novelty, particularly as the experimentings were to +be given with the aid of a newly discovered gas. Strange rumours of +human levitations, of flying machines seen after dark at unearthly +heights, were printed. This millionnaire, who had expended fortunes in +trying to accomplish what Maxim and Langley had failed in achieving, +was a good peg upon which to hang thrilling gossip. He promised to +convince the doubting ones that at last man would come into the empire +of the air, and by means of fireworks. In searching carefully all the +published reports Gerald was relieved not to encounter the name of Mila. + +That celebrated afternoon he found himself, after the distressingly +crowded cars, in company with many thousands, all clamouring and +jostling on the road to the tower. This time there were vehicles and +horses, though not in any degree commensurate with the crowd; but the +high tax imposed by the speculators gave him an opportunity of securing +a seat with a few others in a carriage drawn by four horses. Gingerly +they made their way down the narrow road--time was not gained, for the +packed mass of humans refused to separate. Fuming at the delay, he was +forced to console himself with smoking and listening to the stories told +of Karospina and his miracles. They were exaggerated. Karospina here, +Karospina there--the name of this modern magician was hummed everywhere +in the brisk October air. A little man who occupied the seat with +Shannon informed him that he knew some one who had worked for Karospina. +He declared that it was no uncommon sight for the conjurer--he was +usually called by that name--to float like a furled flag over his house +when the sun had set. Also he had been seen driving in the sky a span +of three fiery horses in a fiery chariot across the waters of the bay, +while sitting by his side was the star-crowned Woman of the Apocalypse +clothed with the sun and the moon under her feet. Gerald held his +counsel; but the grandeur of the spectacle he had witnessed still shook +his soul--if he had not been the victim of a hallucination! The journey +seemed endless. + +At last the strand came into view with the squat tower, the rusting +machinery, and the reservoir back of the house. There were, however, +changes in the scene. Within a quarter of a mile of the beach tents were +set and booths erected. Seemingly all the city had rushed to this place, +and the plain, with its swampy surfaces, was dotted by masses of noisy +men and women. Gerald, finding that approach to the house was impossible +from the land side, made a wide detour, and on reaching the shore he was +gratified to find it empty. The local constabulary, powerless to fight +off the mob near the house, had devoted their energies to clearing the +space about the gas retorts. After much bother, and only by telling his +name, did he pass the police cordon. Once inside, he rushed to the back +door and found, oh! great luck--Mila. Dressed in white, to his taste she +was angelic. He had great difficulty in keeping his arms pinioned to his +side; but his eyes shone with the truth beating at the bars of his +bosom, and Mila knew it. He felt this and was light-headed in his +happiness. + +They greeted. Mila's face wore a serious expression. + +"I'm very glad you have come down. I think uncle will be glad also. I am +_happy_ to see you again; I have missed you these past weeks. But my +happiness is nothing just now, Gerald! [He started.] My uncle, you must +speak with him. From brooding so much over the Holy Scriptures, and the +natural excitement of his discoveries--they are so extraordinary, dear +friend, that he means always to keep them to himself, for he rightly +believes that the governments of the world would employ them for wicked +purposes, war, the destruction of weaker nations--he has become +overwrought. You may not know it, he has a very strong, sane head on his +shoulders; but this scheme for lifting up the masses, I suspect, may +upset his own equilibrium. And his constant study of the Apocalypse and +the Hebraic revelations--it has filled him with strange notions. +Understand me: a man who can swim in the air like a fish in the sea is +apt to become unstrung. He has begun to identify himself with the +prophets. He insists on showing biblical pictures,--worse still, +appearing in them himself." + +"How 'appearing in them'?" asked Gerald, wonderingly. + +"In actual person. I, too, have promised to go with him." + +"In a transparency of fire, you mean? Isn't it dangerous?" She hung her +head. + +"No, in mid air, in a fiery chariot," she murmured. + +"The Woman of the Apocalypse!" he cried. "Oh! Princess Mila, dearest +Mila Georgovics, promise me that you will not risk such a crazy +experiment." Gerald pressed his fingers to his throbbing temples. + +"It is no experiment at all," she said, in almost inaudible tones; +_"last night we flew over the house."_ He stared at her, his hands +trembling, and no longer able to play the incredulous. + +"But, dear friend, I fear one other thing; the gas which uncle has +discovered is so tenuous that it is a million times lighter than air; +but it is ever at a terrible tension--I mean it is dangerous if not +carefully treated. Last summer, one afternoon, a valve broke and a large +quantity escaped from the reservoir, luckily on the ocean side. It +caused a storm and water-spouts, and destroyed a few vessels. The +coruscating gas creates a vacuum into which the air rushes with +incredible velocity. So promise me that while we are flying you will +stay with the police at the gas machines and keep off the crowd. +Promise!" + +"But I shan't permit you to go up with this renegade to the +revolutionary cause--" he began impetuously. She put warning fingers to +her lips. In the white flowing robes of an antique priest, Karospina +came out to them and took Gerald by the hand. He was abstracted and +haggard, and his eyes glared about him. He chanted in a monotone:-- + +"The time is at hand. Soon you will see the Angels of the Seals. I shall +show the multitude Death on the Pale Horse and the vision of Ezekiel. +And you shall behold the star called Wormwood, the great star of the +third angel, which shall fall like a burning lamp upon the waters and +turn them bitter. And at the last you will see the chariot of Elijah +caught up to heaven in a fiery whirlwind. In it will be seated the +Princess Mila--we, the conquerors of the wicked world." + +"Yes, but only as an image, an illusion," ejaculated the unhappy lover, +"not in reality." + +"As she is," imperiously answered Karospina, and seizing Mila by the +arm, said, "Come!" She threw a kiss to Gerald and in her eyes were +tears. He saw them and could have wept himself. He followed the +sacrificial pair as far as the reservoir, muttering warnings in which +were mixed the fates of Phaethon and Simon Magus--that heretic who +mimicked the miracles of the apostles. + + * * * * * + +It was now dark; the order to extinguish all lights on the moor had been +obeyed. Only a panting sound as if from a wilderness of frightened +animals betrayed the presence of thousands. As long as the sun shone +there had been a babel of sound; at the disappearance of our parent +planet, a hushed awe had fallen with the night. Gone the rude joking and +wrangling, the crying of children, and the shrill laughter of the women. +A bitter breeze swept across from the waters, and the stars were mere +twinkling points. + +Then from the vault of heaven darted a ribbon of emerald fire. It became +a luminous spiral when it touched the sea of glass, which was like unto +a floor of crystal. This was the sign of Karospina's undertaking, his +symbol of the road to moral perfection. Gerald recalled Whistler's +pyrotechnical extravaganzas. Following this came a pale moon which +emerged from the north; a second, a third, a fourth, started up from the +points of the compass, and after wabbling in the wind like gigantic +balloons, merged overhead in an indescribable disk which assumed the +features of Michael Angelo's Moses. Here is a new technique, indeed, +thought Gerald; yet he could not detect its moral values. + +A golden landscape was projected on land and sea. A central aisle of +waters, paved by the golden rays of a lyric sun high overhead, was +embellished on either side by the marmoreal splendours of stately +palaces. An ilex inclined its graceful head to its liquid image; men +moved the blocks that made famous in the mouth of the world Queen Dido's +Carthage. Clouds of pearl-coloured smoke encircled the enchanting +picture. And the galleys came and went in this symphonic, glittering +spectacle. + +"Turner would have died of envy," said Gerald aloud. There was a +remarkable vibration of life, not as he had seen it in mechanical +bioscopes, but the vivid life of earth and sunshine. + +The scenes that succeeded were many: episodes from profane and sacred +histories; simulacra of the great saints. A war between giants and +pygmies was shown with all its accompanying horrors. The firmament +dripped crimson. The four cryptic creatures of Ezekiel's vision came out +of the north, a great cloud of "infolding fire" and the colour was +amber. A cyclopean and dazzling staircase thronged by moving angelic +shapes, harping mute harps, stretched from sea to sky, melting into the +milky way like the tail of a starry serpent. Followed the opening of the +dread prophetic seals; but, after an angel had descended from heaven, +his face as the sun and at his feet pillars of fire, the people, +prostrate like stalks of corn beaten by a tempest, worshipped in fear. +These things were supernatural. The heavens were displaying the glory of +God. + +Not knowing whether the signs in the skies might be construed as +blasphemous, and lost in fathomless admiration for the marvellous power +of the wizard, Gerald sought to get closer to Karospina and Mila. But +wedged in by uniformed men, and the darkness thick as an Egyptian +plague, he despairingly awaited the apotheosis. His eyes were sated by +the miracles of harmonies--noiseless harmonies. It _was_ a new art, and +one for the peoples of the earth. Never had the hues of the universe +been so assembled, grouped, and modulated. And the human eye, adapting +itself to the new synthesis of arabesque and rhythm, evoked order and +symbolism from these novel chords of colour. There were solemn mountains +of opalescent fire which burst and faded into flaming colonnades, and in +an enchanting turquoise effervescence became starry spears and scimiters +and sparkling shields, and finally the whole mass would reunite and +evaporate into brilliant violet auroras or seven-tailed, +vermilion-coloured comets. There were gleaming rainbows of unknown +tints--strange scales of chromatic pigments; "a fiery snow without +wind;" and once a sun, twice the size of our own, fell into the ocean; +and Gerald could have sworn that he felt a wave of heated air as if from +a furnace; that he heard a seething sound, as if white-hot metal had +come in contact with icy water. Consumed by anxiety for Mila's safety, +he wished that these soundless girandoles, this apocalypse of +architectural fire and weaving flame, would end. + +He had not long to wait. A shrewd hissing apprised him that something +unusual was about to occur. Like the flight of a great rocket a black +object quickly mounted to the zenith. It did not become visible for +several seconds; Gerald's nerves crisped with apprehension. The +apparition was an incandescent chariot; in it sat Karospina, and beside +him--oh! the agony of her lover--Mila Georgovics. As the fiery horses +swooped down, he could see her face in a radiant nimbus of meteors, +which encircled the equipage. Karospina proudly directed its course over +the azure route, and once he passed Gerald at a dangerously low curve +earthward, shouting:-- + +"The Spiral! The Spiral!" + +It was his last utterance; possibly through some flaw in the mechanism, +the chariot zig-zagged and then drove straight upon the reservoir. To +the reverberation of smashed steel and blinding fulguration the big +sphere was split open and Mila with Karospina vanished in the nocturnal +gulf. + +Gerald, stunned by the catastrophe, threw himself down, expecting a +mighty explosion; the ebon darkness was appalling after the +scintillating rain of fire. But the liberated gas in the guise of an +elongated cloud had rushed seaward, and there gathering density and +strength, assumed the shape of a terrific funnel, an inky spiral, its +gyrating sides streaked with intermittent flashes. Its volcanic roaring +and rapid return to land was a signal for vain flight--the miserable +lover knew it to be the flamboyant ether of the pyromaniac transformed +into a trumpeting tornado. And he hoped that it would not spare him, as +this phantasm twirled and ululated in the heavens, a grim portent of the +iron wrath of the Almighty. In a twinkling it had passed him, high in +the dome of heaven, only to erase in a fabulous blast the moaning +multitude. And prone upon the strand between the stormy waters and the +field of muddy dead, Gerald Shannon prayed for a second cataclysm which +might bring oblivion to him alone. + + + + +VI + +A MOCK SUN + + Where are the sins of yester-year? + + +I + + +The grating of the carriage wheels awoke her from the dream which had +lightly brushed away the night and the vision of the Arc de +Triomphe--looming into the mystery of sky and stars, its monumental +flanks sprawling across the Place de l'toile. She heard her name called +by Mrs. Sheldam as their coachman guided his horses through the gateway +of the Princesse de Lancovani's palace. + +"Now, Ermentrude! Wake up, dear; we are there," said Mrs. Sheldam, in +her kind, drawling tones. Mr. Sheldam sighed and threw away the +unlighted cigar he had bitten during the ride along the Champs lyses. +Whatever the evening meant for his wife and niece, he saw little +entertainment in store for himself; he did not speak French very well, +he disliked music and "tall talk"; all together he wished himself at the +Grand Htel, where he would be sure to meet some jolly Americans. Their +carriage had halted in front of a spacious marble stairway, lined on +either side with palms, and though it was a June night, the glass doors +were closed. + +Ermentrude's heart was in her throat, not because of the splendour, to +which she was accustomed; but it was to be her first meeting with a +noble dame, whose name was historic, at whose feet the poets of the +Second Empire had prostrated themselves, passionately plucking their +lyres; the friend of Liszt, Wagner, Berlioz, of Manet, Degas, Monet; the +new school--this wonderful old woman knew them all, from Goncourt and +Flaubert to Daudet and Maupassant. Had she not, Ermentrude remembered as +she divested herself of her cloak, sent a famous romancer out of the +house because he spoke slightingly of the Pope? Had she not cut the +emperor dead when she saw him with a lady not his empress? What a night +this would be in the American girl's orderly existence! And _he_ was to +be there, he had promised the princess. + +Her heart was overflowing when she was graciously received by the great +lady who stood in the centre of a group at the back of the +drawing-room--a lofty apartment in white and gold, the panels painted by +Baudry, the furniture purest Empire. She noted the height and majestic +bearing of this cousin of kings, noted the aquiline nose drooped over a +contracted mouth--which could assume most winning curves, withal shaded +by suspicious down, that echoed in hue her inky eyebrows. The eyes of +the princess were small and green and her glance penetrating. Her white +hair rolled imperially from a high, narrow forehead. + +Ermentrude bore herself with the utmost composure. She adored the Old +World, adored genius, but after all she was an Adams of New Hampshire, +her sister the wife of a former ambassador. It was more curiosity than +_gaucherie_ that prompted her to hold the hand offered her and +scrutinize the features as if to evoke from the significant, etched +wrinkles the tremendous past of this hostess. The princess was pleased. + +"Ah, Miss Adams," she said, in idiomatic English, "you have candid eyes. +You make me feel like telling stories when you gaze at me so +appealingly. Don't be shocked"--the girl had coloured--"perhaps I shall, +after a while." + +Mr. Sheldam had slipped into a corner behind a very broad table and +under the shaded lamps examined some engravings. Mrs. Sheldam talked in +hesitating French to the Marquis de Potachre, an old fellow of venerable +and burlesque appearance. His fierce little white mustaches were curled +ceilingward, but his voice was as timid as honey. He flourished his +wizened hand toward Miss Adams. + +"Charming! Delightful! She has something English in her _insouciant_ +pose, and is wholly American in her cerebral quality. And what +colouring, what gorgeous brown hair! What a race, madame, is yours!" + +Mrs. Sheldam began to explain that the Adams stock was famous, but the +marquis did not heed her. He peered at her niece through a gold-rimmed +monocle. The princess had left the group near the table and with two +young men slowly moved down the salon. Miss Adams was immediately +surrounded by some antiquated gentlemen wearing orders, who paid her +compliments in the manner of the eighteenth century. She answered them +with composure, for she was sure of her French, sure of herself--the +princess had not annihilated her. Her aunt, accompanied by the marquis, +crossed to her, and the old nobleman amused her with his saturnine +remarks. + +"Time was," he said, "when one met here the cream of Parisian wit and +fashion: the great Flaubert, a noisy fellow at times, I vow; Dumas +_fils_; Cabanel, Grme, Duran; ever-winning Carolus--ah, what men! Now +we get Polish pianists, crazy Belgians, anarchistic poets, and +Neo-impressionists. I have warned the princess again and again." + +"_Bcasse!_" interrupted the lady herself. "Monsieur Rajewski has +consented to play a Chopin nocturne. And here are my two painters, Miss +Adams--Messieurs Bla and Maugre. They hate each other like the Jesuits +and Jansenists of the good old days of Pascal." + +"She likes to display her learning," grumbled the marquis to Mrs. +Sheldam. "That younger man, Bla, swears by divided tones; his neighbour, +Maugre, paints in dots. One is always to be recognized a half-mile away +by his vibrating waterscapes--he calls them Symphonies of the Wet; the +other goes in for turkeys in the grass, fowls that are cobalt-blue +daubs, with grass a scarlet. It's awful on the optic nerves. +_Pointillisme_, Maugre names his stuff. Now, give me Corot--" + +"Hush, hush!" came in energetic sibilants from the princess, who rapped +with her Japanese walking-stick for silence. Mr. Sheldam woke up and +fumbled the pictures as Rajewski, slowly bending his gold-dust aureole +until it almost grazed the keyboard, began with deliberate accents a +nocturne. Miss Adams knew his playing well, but its poetry was not for +her this evening; rather did the veiled tones of the instrument form a +misty background to the human tableau. So must Chopin have woven his +magic last century, and in a salon like this--the wax candles burning +with majestic steadiness in the sculptured sconces; the huge fireplace, +monumental in design, with its dull brass garnishing; the subdued +richness of the decoration into which fitted, as figures in a frame, the +various guests. Even the waxed floor seemed to take on new +reverberations as the pianoforte sounded the sweet despair of the Pole. +To her dismay Ermentrude caught herself drifting away from the moment's +hazy charm to thoughts of her poet. It annoyed her, she sharply +reminded herself, that she could not absolutely saturate herself with +the music and the manifold souvenirs of the old htel; perhaps this may +have been the spell of Rajewski's playing.... + +The music ceased. A dry voice whispered in her ear:-- + +"Great artist, that chap Rajewski. Had to leave Russia once because he +wouldn't play the Russian national hymn for the Czar. Bless me, but he +was almost sent to Siberia--and in irons too. Told me here in this very +room that he was much frightened. They lighted fires in Poland to honour +his patriotism. He acknowledged that _he_ would have played twenty +national hymns, but he couldn't remember the Russian one, or never knew +it--anyhow, he was christened a patriot, and all by a slip of the +memory. Now, that's luck, isn't it?" + +She began to dislike this cynical old man with his depreciating tales of +genius. She knew that her idols often tottered on clay feet, but she +hated to be reminded of that disagreeable reality. She went to Monsieur +Rajewski and thanked him prettily in her cool new voice, and again the +princess nodded approval. + +"She is _chic_, your little girl," she confided in her deep tones to +Mrs. Sheldam, whose tired New England face almost beamed at the +compliment. + +"We were in Hamburg at the Zological Garden; I always go to see +animals," declaimed the princess, in the midst of a thick silence. "For +you know, my friends, one studies humanity there in the raw. Well, I +dragged our party to the large monkey cage, and we enjoyed +ourselves--immensely! And what do you think we saw! A genuine novelty. +Some mischievous sailor had given an overgrown ape a mirror, and the +poor wretch spent its time staring at its image, neglecting its food and +snarling at its companions. The beast would catch the reflection of +another ape in the glass and quickly bound to a more remote perch. The +keeper told me that for a week his charge had barely eaten. It slept +with the mirror held tightly in its paws. Now, what did the mirror mean +to the animal! I believe"--here she became very vivacious--"I really +believe that it was developing self-consciousness, and in time it would +become human. On our way back from Heligoland, where we were entertained +on the emperor's yacht at the naval manoeuvres, we paid another visit to +our monkey house. The poor, misguided brute had died of starvation. It +had become so vain, so egotistical, so superior, that it refused food +and wasted away in a corner, gazing at itself, a hairy Narcissus, or +rather the perfect type of your modern Superman, who contemplates his +ego until his brain sickens and he dies quite mad." + +Every one laughed. Mrs. Sheldam wondered what a Superman was, and +Ermentrude felt annoyed. Zarathustra was another of her gods, and this +brusquely related anecdote did not seem to her very spirituelle. But +she had not formulated an answer when she heard a name announced, a name +that set her heart beating. At last! The poet had kept his word. She was +to meet in the flesh the man whose too few books were her bibles of art, +of philosophy, of all that stood for aspiration toward a lovely ideal in +a dull, matter-of-fact world. + +"Now," said the princess, as if smiling at some hidden joke, "now you +will meet _my_ Superman." And she led the young American girl to Octave +Kroulan and his wife, and, after greeting them in her masculine manner, +she burst forth:-- + +"Dear poet! here is one of your adorers from overseas. Guard your +husband well, Madame Lys." + +So he was married. Well, that was not such a shocking fact. Nor was +Madame Kroulan either--a very tall, slim, English-looking blonde, who +dressed modishly and evidently knew that she was the wife of a famous +man. Ermentrude found her insipid; she had studied her face first before +comparing the mental photograph of the poet with the original. Nor did +she feel, with unconscious sex rivalry, any sense of inferiority to the +wife of her admired one. He was nearly forty, but he looked older; gray +hairs tinged his finely modelled head. His face was shaven, and with the +bulging brow and full jaw he was more of the German or Belgian than +French. Black hair thrown off his broad forehead accented this +resemblance; a composer rather than a prose-poet and dramatist, was the +rapid verdict of Ermentrude. She was not disappointed, though she had +expected a more fragile type. The weaver of moonshine, of mystic +phrases, of sweet gestures and veiled sonorities should not have worn +the guise of one who ate three meals a day and slept soundly after his +mellow incantations. Yet she was not--inheriting, as she did, a modicum +of sense from her father--disappointed. + +The conversation did not move more briskly with the entrance of the +Kroulans. The marquis sullenly gossiped with Mr. Sheldam; the princess +withdrew herself to the far end of the room with her two painters. +Rajewski was going to a _soire_, he informed them, where he would play +before a new picture by Carrire, as it was slowly undraped; no one less +in rank than a duchess would be present! A little stiffly, Ermentrude +Adams assured the Kroulans of her pleasure in meeting them. The poet +took it as a matter of course, simply, without a suspicion of posed +grandeur. Ermentrude saw this with satisfaction. If he had clay +feet,--and he must have them; all men do,--at least he wore his genius +with a sense of its responsibility. She held tightly her hands and +leaned back, awaiting the precious moment when the oracle would speak, +when this modern magician of art would display his cunning. But he was +fatuously commonplace in his remarks. + +"I have often told Madame Kroulan that my successes in Europe do not +appeal to me as those in far-away America. Dear America--how it must +enjoy a breath of real literature!" + +Mrs. Sheldam sat up primly, and Ermentrude was vastly amused. With a +flash of fun she replied:-- + +"Yes, America does, Monsieur Kroulan. We have so many Europeans over +there now that our standard has fallen off from the days of Emerson and +Whitman. And didn't America give Europe Poe?" She knew that this boast +had the ring of the amateur, but it pleased her to see how it startled +him. + +"America is the Great Bribe," he pursued. "You have no artists in New +York." + +"Nor have we New Yorkers," the girl retorted. "The original writing +natives live in Europe." + +He looked puzzled, but did not stop. "You have depressed literature to +the point of publication," he solemnly asserted. This was too much and +she laughed in mockery. Husband and wife joined her, while Mrs. Sheldam +trembled at the audacity of her niece--whose irony was as much lost on +her as it was on the poet. + +"But _you_ publish plays and books, do you not?" Ermentrude navely +asked. + +Madame Kroulan interposed in icy tones:-- + +"Mademoiselle Adams misunderstands. Monsieur Kroulan is the Grand +Disdainer. Like his bosom friend, Monsieur Mallarm, he cares little for +the Philistine public--" + +He interrupted her: "Lys, dear friend, you must not bore Miss Adams with +my theories of art and life. _She_ has read me--" + +Ermentrude gave him a grateful glance. He seemed, despite his +self-consciousness, a great man--how great she could not exactly define. +His eyes--two black diamonds full of golden reflections, the eyes of a +conqueror, a seer--began to burn little bright spots into her +consciousness, and, selfishly, she admitted, she wished the two women +would go away and leave her to interrogate her idol in peace. There were +so many things to ask him, so many difficult passages in The Golden +Glaze and Hesitations, above all in that great dramatic poem, The +Voices, which she had witnessed in Paris, with its mystic atmosphere of +pity and terror. She would never forget her complex feelings, when at a +Paris theatre, she saw slowly file before her in a Dream-Masque the +wraith-like figures of the poet, their voices their only corporeal gift. +Picture had dissolved into picture, and in the vapours of these crooning +enchantments she heard voices of various timbres enunciating in +monosyllables the wisdom of the ages, the poetry of the future. This +play was, for her, and for Paris, too, the last word in dramatic art, +the supreme _nuance_ of beauty. Everything had been accomplished: +Shakespeare, Molire, Ibsen; yet here was a new evocation, a fresh peep +at untrodden paths. In bliss that almost dissolved her being, the +emotional American girl reached her hotel, where she tried to sleep. +When her aunt told her of the invitation tendered by the princess, a +rare one socially, she was in the ninth heaven of the Swedenborgians. +Any place to meet Octave Kroulan! + +And now he sat near her signalling, she knew, her sympathies, and as the +fates would have it two dragons, her aunt and his wife, guarded the +gateway to the precious garden of his imagination. She could have cried +aloud her chagrin. Such an inestimable treasure was genius that to see +it under lock and key invited indignation. The time was running on, and +her great man had said nothing. He could, if he wished, give her a +million extraordinary glimpses of the earth and the air and the waters +below them, for his eyes were mirrors of his marvellous and +many-coloured soul; but what chance had he with a conjugal iceberg on +one side, a cloud of smoke--poor Aunt Sheldam--on the other! She felt in +her fine, rhapsodic way like a young priestess before the altar, ready +to touch with a live coal the lips of the gods, but withheld by a +malignant power. For the first time in her life Ermentrude Adams, +delicately nurtured in a social hothouse, realized in wrath the major +tyranny of caste. + +The evening wore away. Mrs. Sheldam aroused her husband as she cast a +horrified glance at the classic prints he had been studying. The +princess dismissed her two impressionists and came over to the poet. +She, too plainly, did not care for his wife, and as the party broke up +there was a sense of relief, though Ermentrude could not conceal her +dissatisfaction. Her joy was sincere when Madame Kroulan asked Miss +Adams and her aunt to call. It was slightly gelid, the invitation, +though accepted immediately by Ermentrude. The _convenances_ could look +out for themselves; she would not go back to America without an +interview. The princess raised her hand mockingly. + +"What, I go to one of your conferences! Not I, _cher pote_. Keep your +mysteries for your youthful disciples." She looked at Ermentrude, who +did not lower her eyes--she was triumphant now. Perhaps _he_ might say +something before they parted. He did not, but the princess did. + +"Beware, young America, of my Superman! You remember the story of the +ape with the mirror!" + +Ermentrude flushed with mortification. This princess was decidedly rude +at times. But she kept her temper and thanked the lady for a unique +evening. Her exquisite youth and grace pleased the terrible old woman, +who then varied her warning. + +"Beware," she called out in comical accents as they slowly descended the +naked marble staircase, "of the Sleeping Princess!" + +The American girl looked over her shoulder. + +"I don't think your Superman has a mirror at all." + +"Yes, but his princess holds one for him!" was the jesting reply. + +The carriage door slammed. They rolled homeward, and Ermentrude suffered +from a desperate sense of the unachieved. The princess had been +impertinent, the Kroulans rather banal. Mrs. Sheldam watched her +charge's face in the intermittent lights of the Rue de Rivoli. + +"I think your poet a bore," she essayed. Then she shook her +husband--they had reached their htel. + + +II + +It was the garden of a poet, she declared, as, with the Kroulans and +her aunt, Ermentrude sat and slowly fanned herself, watching the Bois de +Boulogne, which foamed like a cascade of green opposite this pretty +little house in Neuilly. The day was warm and the drive, despite the +shaded, watered avenues, a dusty, fatiguing one. Mrs. Sheldam had, +doubtfully, it is true, suggested the bourgeois comfort of the +Mtropolitain, but she was frowned on by her enthusiastic niece. What! +ride underground in such weather? So they arrived at the poet's not in +the best of humour, for Mrs. Sheldam had quietly chidden her charge on +the score of her "flightiness." These foreign celebrities were well +enough in their way, but--! And now Ermentrude, instead of looking +Octave Kroulan in the face, preferred the vista of the pale blue sky, +awash with a scattered, fleecy white cloud, the rolling edges of which +echoed the dazzling sunshine. The garden was not large, its few trees +were of ample girth, and their shadows most satisfying to eyes weary of +the city's bright, hard surfaces. There were no sentimental plaster +casts to disturb the soft harmonies of this walled-in retreat, and if +Ermentrude preferred to regard with obstinacy unusual in her mobile +temperament the picture of Paris below them, it was because she felt +that Kroulan was literally staring at her. + +A few moments after their arrival and with the advent of tea, he had +accomplished what she had fervently wished for the night she had met +him--he succeeded, by several easy moves, in isolating her from her +aunt, and, notwithstanding her admiration, her desire to tap with her +knuckles the metal of her idol and listen for a ring of hollowness, she +was alarmed. Yet, perversely, she knew that he would not exhibit his +paces before his wife--naturally a disinterested spectator--or before +her aunt, who was hardly "intimate" enough. The long-desired hour found +her disquieted. She did not have many moments to analyze these mixed +emotions, for he spoke, and his voice was agreeably modulated. + +"You, indeed, honour the poor poet's abode with your youth and your +responsive soul, Miss Adams. I thank you, though my gratitude will seem +as poor as my hospitality." She looked at him now, a little fluttered. +"You bring to me across seas the homage of a fresh nation, a fresh +nature." She beat a mental retreat at these calm, confident phrases; +what could he know of her homage? "And if Amiel has said, 'Un paysage +est un tat de l'me,' I may amend it by calling _my_ soul a state of +landscape, since it has been visited by your image." This was more +reassuring, if exuberant. + +"Man is mere inert matter when born, but his soul is his own work. +Hence, I assert: the Creator of man is--man." _Now_ she felt at ease. +This wisdom, hewn from the vast quarry of his genius, she had +encountered before in his Golden Glaze, that book which had built +temples of worship in America wherein men and women sought and found the +pabulum for living beautifully. He was "talking" his book. Why not? It +was certainly delightful plagiarism! + +"You know, dear young lady," he continued, and his eyes, with their +contracting and expanding disks, held her attention like a clear flame, +"do you know that my plays, my books, are but the drama of my conscience +exteriorized? Out of the reservoirs of my soul I draw my inspiration. I +have an sthetic horror of evidence; like Renan, I loathe the deadly +heresy of affirmation; I have the certitude of doubt, for are we poets +not the lovers of the truth decorated? When I built my lordly palace of +art, it was not with the ugly durability of marble. No; like the +Mohammedan who constructed his mosque and mingled with the cement +sweet-smelling musk, so I dreamed my mosque into existence with music +wedded to philosophy. Music and philosophy are the twin edges of my +sword. Ah! you smile and ask, Where is Woman in this sanctuary? She is +not barred, I assure you. My music--is Woman. Beauty is a promise of +happiness, Stendhal says. I go further: Life--the woman one has; +Art--the woman one loves!" + +She was startled. Her aunt and Madame Kroulan had retired to the end of +the garden, and only a big bee, brumming overhead, was near. He had +arisen with the pontifical air of a man who has a weighty gospel to +expound. He encircled with his potent personality the imagination of his +listener; the hypnotic quality of his written word was carried leagues +farther in effect by his trained, soothing voice. Flattered, no longer +frightened, her nerves deliciously assaulted by this coloured rhetoric, +Ermentrude yielded her intellectual assent. She did not comprehend. She +felt only the rhythms of his speech, as sound swallowed sense. He held +her captive with a pause, and his eloquent eyes--they were of an +extraordinary lustre--completed the subjugation of her will. + +"Only kissed hands are white," he murmured, and suddenly she felt a +velvety kiss on her left hand. Ermentrude did not pretend to follow the +words of her aunt and Madame Kroulan as they stopped before a bed of +June roses. Nor did she remember how she reached the pair. The one vivid +reality of her life was the cruel act of her idol. She was not conscious +of blushing, nor did she feel that she had grown pale. His wife treated +her with impartial indifference, at times a smile crossing her face, +with its implication--to Ermentrude--of selfish reserves. But this +hateful smile cut her to the soul--one more prisoner at his chariot +wheels, it proclaimed! Kroulan was as unconcerned as if he had written +a poetic line. He had expected more of an outburst, more of a rebuff; +the absolute snapping of the web he had spun surprised him. His choicest +music had been spread for the eternal banquet, but the invited one +tarried. Very well! If not to-day, to-morrow! He repeated a verse of +Verlaine, and with his wife dutifully at his side bowed to the two +Americans and told them of the pleasure experienced. Ermentrude, her +candid eyes now reproachful and suspicious, did not flinch as she took +his hand--it seemed to melt in hers--but her farewell was conventional. +In the street, before they seated themselves in their carriage, Mrs. +Sheldam shook her head. + +"Oh, my dear! What a woman! What a man! I have _such_ a story to tell +you. No wonder you admire these people. The wife is a genius--isn't she +handsome?--but the man--he is an angel!" + +"I didn't see his wings, auntie," was the curt reply. + + +III + +The Sheldams always stayed at the same htel during their annual visits +to Paris. It was an old-fashioned house with an entrance in the Rue +Saint-Honor and another in the Rue de Rivoli. The girl sat on a small +balcony from which she could view the Tuileries Gardens without turning +her head; while looking farther westward she saw the Place de la +Concorde, its windy spaces a chessboard for rapid vehicles, whose +wheels, wet from the watered streets, ground out silvery fire in the +sun-rays of this gay June afternoon. Where the Avenue des Champs lyses +began, a powdery haze enveloped the equipages, overblown with their +summer toilets, all speeding to Longchamps. It was racing day, and +Ermentrude, feigning a headache, had insisted that her uncle and aunt go +to the meeting. It would amuse them, she knew, and she wished to be +alone. Nearly a week had passed since the visit to Neuilly, and she had +been afraid to ask her aunt what Madame Kroulan had imparted to +her--afraid and also too proud. Her sensibility had been grievously +wounded by the plainly expressed feelings of Octave Kroulan. She had +reviewed without prejudice his behaviour, and she could not set down to +mere Latin gallantry either his words or his action. No, there was too +much intensity in both,--ah, how she rebelled at the brutal +disillusionment!--and there were, she argued, method and sequence in his +approach and attack. If she had been the average coquetting creature, +the offence might not have been so mortal. But, so she told herself +again and again,--as if to frighten away lurking darker thoughts, ready +to spring out and devour her good resolutions,--she had worshipped her +idol with reservations. His poetry, his philosophy, were so inextricably +blended that they smote her nerves like the impact of some bright +perfume, some sharp chord of modern music. Dangerously she had filed at +her emotions in the service of culture and she was now paying the +penalty for her ardent confidence. His ideas, vocal with golden +meanings, were never meant to be translated into the vernacular of life, +never to be transposed from higher to lower levels; this base betrayal +of his ideals she felt Kroulan had committed. Had he not said that love +should be like "un baiser sur un miroir"? Was he, after all, what the +princess had called him? And was he only a mock sun swimming in a +firmament of glories which he could have outshone? + +A servant knocked and, not receiving a response, entered with a letter. +The superscription was strange. She opened and read:-- + + DEAR AND TENDER CHILD: I know you were angry with me when + we parted. I am awaiting here below your answer to come to you and + bare my heart. Say yes! + +"Is the gentleman downstairs?" she asked. The servant bowed. The blood +in her head buzzing, she nodded, and the man disappeared. Standing there +in the bright summer light, Ermentrude Adams saw her face in the oval +glass, above the fireplace, saw its pallor, the strained expression of +the eyes, and like a drowning person she made a swift inventory of her +life, and, with the insane hope of one about to be swallowed up by the +waters, she grasped at a solitary straw. Let him come; she would have an +explanation from him! The torture of doubt might then be brought to an +end.... + +Some one glided into the apartment. Turning quickly, Ermentrude +recognized Madame Kroulan. Before she could orient herself that lady +took her by both hands, and uttering apologetic words, forced the amazed +girl into a chair. + +"Don't be frightened, dear young lady. I am not here to judge, but to +explain. Yes, I know my husband loves you. But do not believe in him. He +is a _terrific_ man." This word she emphasized as if doubtful of its +meaning. "Ah, if you but knew the inferno of my existence! There are so +many like you--stop, do not leave! You are not to blame. I, Lillias +Kroulan, do not censure your action. My husband is an evil man and a +charlatan. Hear me out! He has only the gift of words. He steals all his +profundities of art from dead philosophers. He is not a genuine poet. He +is not a dramatist. I swear to you that he is now the butt of artistic +Paris. The Princesse de Lancovani made him--she is another of his sort. +He _was_ the mode; now he is desperate because his day has passed. He +knows you are rich. He desires your money, not _you_. I discovered that +he was coming here this day. Oh, I am cleverer than he. I followed. Here +I am to save you from him--and from yourself--he is not now below in the +salon." + +"Please go away!" indignantly answered Ermentrude. She was furious at +this horrible, plain-spoken, jealous creature. Save her from herself--as +if ever she had wavered! The disinterested adoration she had entertained +for the great artist--what a hideous ending was this! The tall, blond +woman with the narrow, light blue eyes watched the girl. How could any +one call her handsome, Ermentrude wondered! Then her visitor noticed the +crumpled letter on the table. With a gesture of triumph she secured it +and smiling her superior smile she left, closing the door softly behind +her. + +Only kissed hands are white! Ermentrude threw herself on the couch, her +cheeks burning, her heart tugging in her bosom like a ship impatient at +its anchorage. And was this the sordid end of a beautiful dream?... + +"Do you know, dearest, we have had such news!" exclaimed Mrs. Sheldam as +she entered, and so charged with her happiness that she did not notice +the drawn features of her niece. "Charlie, Charlie will be here some +time next week. He arrives at Havre. He has just cabled his father. Let +us go down to meet the boy." Charlie was the only son of the Sheldams +and fonder of his cousin than she dare tell herself. She burst into +tears, which greatly pleased her aunt. + +In the train, eight days later, Ermentrude sat speechless in company +with her aunt and uncle. But as the train approached Havre she +remembered something. + +"Aunt Clara," she bravely asked, "do you recall the afternoon we spent +at the Kroulans'? What did Madame Kroulan tell you then? Is it a +secret?" She held tightly clenched in her hand the arm-rest at the side +of the compartment. + +"Oh, dear, no! The madame was very chatty, very communicative. It's +funny I've not told you before. She confessed that she was the happiest +woman on earth; not only was she married to a grand genius,--for the +life of me I can't see where _that_ comes in!--but he was a good man +into the bargain. It appears that his life is made weary by women who +pester him with their attentions. Even our princess--yes, _the_ +princess; isn't it shocking?--was a perfect nuisance until Mr. Kroulan +assured her that, though he owed much of his success in the world to +her, yet he would never betray the trust reposed in him by his wife. +What's the matter, dear, does the motion of the car affect you? It +_does_ rock! And _he_ shows her all the letters he gets from silly women +admirers--oh, these foreign women and their queer ways! And he tells her +the way they make up to him when he meets them in society." + +Ermentrude shivered. The princess also! And with all her warning about +the Superman! Now she understood. Then she took the hand of Mrs. +Sheldam, and, stroking it, whispered:-- + +"Auntie, I'm so glad I am going to Havre, going to see Charlie soon." +The lids of her eyes were wet. Mrs. Sheldam had never been so motherly. + +"You _are_ a darling!" she answered, as she squeezed Ermentrude's arm. +"But there is some one who doesn't seem to care much for Havre." She +pointed out Mr. Sheldam, who, oblivious of picturesque Normandy through +which the train was speeding, slept serenely. Ermentrude envied him his +repose. He had never stared into the maddening mirror which turned poets +into Supermen and--sometimes monsters. Had she herself not gazed into +this distorting glass? The tune of her life had never sounded so +discouragingly faint and inutile. Perhaps she did not posses the higher +qualities that could extort from a nature so rich and various as Octave +Kroulan's its noblest music! Perhaps his wife had told the truth to +Mrs. Sheldam and had lied to her! And then, through a merciful mist of +tears, Ermentrude saw Havre, saw her future. + + + + +VII + +ANTICHRIST + + To wring from man's tongue the denial of his existence is proof of + Satan's greatest power.--PRE RAVIGNAN. + + +The most learned man and the most lovable it has been my good fortune to +know is Monsignor Anatole O'Bourke--alas! I should write, was, for his +noble soul is gathered to God. I met him in Paris, when I was a music +student. He sat next to me at a Pasdeloup concert in the Cirque d'Hiver, +how many years ago I do not care to say. A casual exclamation betrayed +my nationality, and during the intermission we drifted into easy +conversation. Within five minutes he held me enthralled, did this +big-souled, large-brained Irishman from the County Tipperary. We +discussed the programme--a new symphonic poem by Rimski-Korsakoff, +Sadko, had been alternately hissed and cheered--and I soon learned that +my companion mourned a French mother and rejoiced in the loving presence +of a very Celtic father. From the former he must have inherited his +vigorous, logical intellect; the latter had evidently endowed him with a +robust, jovial temperament, coupled with a wonderful perception of +things mystical. + +After the concert we walked slowly along the line of the boulevards. It +was early May, and the wheel of green which we traversed, together with +the brilliant picture made by the crowds, put us both in a happy temper. +It was not long before Monsignor heard the confession of my ideals. He +smiled quickly when I raved of music, but the moment I drifted into the +theme of mysticism--the transposition is ever an easy one--I saw his +interest leap to meet mine. + +"So, you have read St. John of the Cross?" I nodded my head. + +"And St. Teresa, that marvellous woman? The Americans puzzle me," he +continued. "You are the most practical people on the globe and yet the +most idealistic. When I hear of a new religion, I am morally certain +that it is evolved in America." + +"A new religion!" I started. This phrase had often assailed me, both in +print and in the depths of my imagination. He divined my thought--ah! he +was a wonder-worker in the way he noted a passing _nuance_. + +"When we wear out the old one, it will be time for a new religion," he +blandly announced; "you Americans, because of your new mechanical +inventions, fancy you have free entry into the domain of the spiritual. +But come, my dear young friend. Here is my htel. Can't I invite you to +dinner?" We had reached the Boulevard Malsherbe and, as I was miles out +of my course, I consented. The priest fascinated me with his erudition, +which swam lightly on the crest of his talk. He was, so I discovered +during the evening, particularly well versed in the mystical writers, in +the writings of the Kabbalists and the books of the inspired Northman, +Swedenborg. As we sat drinking our coffee at one of the little tables in +the spacious courtyard, I revived the motive of a new religion. + +"Monsignor, have you ever speculated on the possible appearance of a +second Mahomet, a second Buddha? What if, from some Asiatic jungle, +there sallied out upon Europe a terrible ape-god, a Mongolian with +exotic eyes and the magnetism of a religious madman--" + +"You are speaking of Antichrist?" he calmly questioned. + +"Antichrist! Do you really believe in the Devil's Messiah?" + +"Believe, man! why, I have _seen_ him." + +I leaned back in my chair, wondering whether I should laugh or look +solemn. He noted my indecision, and his eyes twinkled--they were the +blue-gray of the Irish, the eyes of a seer or an amiable ironist. + +"Listen! but first let us get some strong cigars. Garon!" As we smoked +our panatelas he related this history:-- + +"You ask me if I believe in an Antichrist, thereby betraying your +slender knowledge of the Scriptures--you will pardon the liberty! I may +refer you not only to John's Epistles, to the revelations of the +dreamer of Patmos, but to so many learned doctors of the faith that it +would take a week merely to enumerate the titles of their works all +bearing on the mysterious subject. Our Holy Mother the Church has held +aloof from any doctrinal pronouncements. The Antichrist has been +predicted for the past thousand years. I recall as a boy poring over the +map of the world which a friend of my mother had left with her. This +lady my father called 'the angel with the moulting wings,' because she +was always in an ecstatic tremor over the second coming of the Messiah. +She would go to the housetop at least once every six months, and there, +with a band of pious deluded geese dressed in white flowing robes, would +inspect the firmament for favourable signs. Nothing ever happened, as we +know, yet the predictions sown about the borders of that strange-looking +chart have in a measure come true. + +"There were the grimmest and most resounding quotations from the +Apocalypse. 'Babylon is fallen, is fallen!' hummed in my ears for many a +day. And the pale horse also haunted me. What would I have given to hear +the music of that 'voice from heaven, as the voice of many waters, and +as the voice of great thunder.' I mean the 'harpers harping with their +harps' the 'new song before the throne, before the four beasts and the +elders.' It is recorded that 'no man could learn that song but the +hundred and forty _and_ four thousand, which were redeemed from the +earth.' That is a goodly multitude. Let us hope we shall be of it. +Learned Sir Thomas Browne asked what songs the sirens sang. I prefer to +hear that wonderful 'harpd' song. + +"But I wander. The fault lies in that wondrous map of the world, with +its pictured hordes of Russians sweeping down upon Europe and America +like a plague of locusts, the wicked unbaptized Antichrist at the head +of them, waving a cross held in reversed fashion. Don't ask me the +meaning of this crazy symbolism. The sect to which my mother's friend +belonged--God bless her, for she was a dear weak-minded lady--must have +set great store by these signs. I admit that as a boy they scared me. +Sitting here now, after forty years, I can still see those cryptograms. +However, to my tale. About ten years ago I was in Paris, and in my +capacity as Monsignor I had to attend a significant gathering at the +embassy of the Russian ambassador in this city of light." He waved his +left hand, from which I caught the purple fire of amethyst. + +"It was a notable affair, and I don't mind telling you now that it was +largely political. I had just returned from a secret mission at Rome, +and I was forced to mingle with diplomatic people. Prince Wronsky was +the representative of the Czar at that time in France, a charming man +with a flavour of _diablerie_ in his speech. He was a fervent Greek +Catholic, like most of his countrymen, and it pleased him to fence +mischievously with me on the various dogmas of our respective faiths. +He called himself _the_ Catholic; I was only a Roman Catholic. I told +him I was satisfied. + +"On this particular night he was rather agitated when I made my +salutations. He whispered to me that madame the princess had that very +day presented him with a son and heir. Naturally I congratulated him. +His restlessness increased as the evening wore on. At last he beckoned +to me--we were very old friends--to follow him into his library. There +he hesitated. + +"'I want you to do me a favour, an odd one; but as you are known to me +so long I venture to ask it. Do go upstairs and see my boy--' His tone +was that of entreaty. I smiled. + +"'Dear prince, I am, as a priest, hardly a judge of children. But if you +wish it--is there anything wrong with the little chap's health?' + +"'God forbid!' he ejaculated and piously crossed himself. We went to the +first _tage_ of his palace--he was gorgeously housed--and there he +said:-- + +"'Madame is in another wing of our apartments--go in here--the child is +attended by the nurse.' With that he pushed me through a swinging door +and left me standing in a semi-lighted chamber. I was very near ill +temper, I assure you, for my position was embarrassing. The room was +large and heavily hung with tapestries. A nurse, a hag, a witch, a dark +old gypsy creature, came over to me and asked me, in Russian:-- + +"'Do you wish to see his Royal Highness the King of Earth and Heaven?' +Thinking she was some stupid _moujik's_ wife, I nodded my head +seriously, though amused by the exalted titles. She put up a thin hand +and I tiptoed to a cradle of gold and ivory--it certainly seemed so to +my inexperienced eyes--the nurse parted the curtains, and there I saw--I +saw--but my son, you will think I exaggerate--I saw the most exquisite +baby in the universe. You laugh at an old bachelor's rhapsody! In +reality I don't care much for children. But that child, that supreme +morsel of humanity, was too much for me. I stood and stared and stood +and stared, and all the while the tiny angel was smiling in my eyes, oh! +such a celestial smile. From his large blue eyes, like flowers, he +smiled into my very soul. I was chained to the floor as if by lead. +Every fibre of my soul, heart, and brain went out to that little +wanderer from the infinite. It was a pathetic face, full of suppressed +sorrow--_Dieu_! but he was older than his father. I found my mind +beginning to wander as if hypnotized. I tried to divert my gaze, but in +vain. Some subtle emanation from this extraordinary child entered my +being, and then, as if a curtain were being slowly lowered, a mist +encompassed my soul; I was ceding, I felt, the immortal part of me to +another, and all the time I was smiling at the baby and the baby +smiling back. I remember his long blond hair, parted in the middle and +falling over his shoulders; but even that remarkable trait for an infant +a few hours old did not puzzle me, for my sanity was surely being +undermined by the persistent gaze of the boy. I vaguely recall passing +my hand across my breast as if to stop the crevice through which my +personality was filtering; I was certain that my soul was about to be +stolen by that damnable child. Then the nurse dropped something, and my +thoughts came back,--they were surely on the road to hell, for they were +red and flaming when I got hold of them,--and the spell, or whatever it +was, snapped. + +"I looked up and noticed the woman maliciously smiling--if it had been +in the days of the inquisition, I would have sent her to the faggots, +for she was a hell-hag. The child had fallen back in his cradle as if +the effort of holding my attention had exhausted him. Then it struck me +that there was something unholy about this affair, and I resolutely +strode to the crib and seized the baby. + +"'What changeling is this?' I demanded in a loud voice, for the being +that twisted in my grip was two or two hundred years old. + +"'Lay him down, you monster!' clamoured the nurse, as I held the +squirming bundle by both hands. It was a task--and I'm very strong. A +superhuman strength waged against my muscles; but I was an old football +half-back at the university, so I conquered the poor little devil. It +moaned like a querulous old man; the nurse, throwing her weight upon me, +forced me to let go my hold. As I did so the baby turned on its face, +its dainty robe split wide open, and to my horror I saw on its back, +between its angelically white shoulders, burnt in as if by branding +irons, the crucifix--and _upside down_!" + +I shuddered. I knew. He lowered his voice and spoke in detached phrases. + +"It was--oh! that I live to say it--it was the dreaded Antichrist--yes, +this Russian baby--it was predicted that he would be born in Russia--I +trembled so that my robes waved in an invisible wind. The reversed +cross--the mark of the beast--the sign by which we are to know the Human +Satan--the last opponent of Christianity. I confess that I was +discomposed at the sight of this little fiend, for it meant that the red +star, the baleful star of the north, would rise in the black heavens and +bloody war spread among the nations of the earth. It also meant that +doomsday was not far off, and, good Christian as I believe myself to be, +a shiver ran down my spine at the idea of Gabriel's trump and the +resurrection of the dead. Yes, I shan't deny it--so material are the +sons of men, I among them! And the very thought of Judgment Day and its +blasting horrors withered my heart. Still something had to be done, +prophecy or no prophecy. To fulfil the letter of the law this infernal +visitor was let loose from hell. There was one way, so I grasped--" + +"Great God, Monsignor, you didn't strangle the demon?" I cried. + +"No, no--something better. I rushed over to a marble wash-basin and +seized a ewer of water, and, going back to the crib, despite the frantic +remonstrances of the old sorceress, I baptized the Antichrist in the +name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Before my eyes I +saw the inverted cross vanish. Then I soundly spanked the presumptuous +youngster and, running down the staircase, I sought the prince and said +to him:-- + +"'Your boy is now a Roman, not a Greek Catholic. We are quits!'" + +The idea of a spanked Antichrist disconsolately roaming the earth, +unwilling to return to his fiery home for fear of a scolding, his guns +of evil spiked, his virus innocuous, his mission of spiritual +destruction a failure--for what could a baptized devil's child do but +pray and repent?--all this dawned upon me, and I burst into laughter, +the worthy Monsignor discreetly participating. His bizarre recital +proved to me that, despite his Gallic first name, Monsignor Anatole +O'Bourke hailed from the County Tipperary. + + + + +VIII + +THE ETERNAL DUEL + + What is the sorriest thing that enters Hell? + + --D.G. ROSSETTI, _Vain Virtues_. + + +The face set him to a strange wondering; he sat at the coffin and +watched it. His wife's face it was, and above the sorrow of irrevocable +parting floated the thought that she did not look happy as she lay in +her bed of death. Monross had seen but two dead faces before, those of +his father and mother. Both had worn upon the mask which death models an +expression of relief. But this face, the face of his wife, of the woman +with whom he had lived--how many years! He asked himself why he +shuddered when he looked down at it, shuddered and also flushed with +indignation. Had she ever been happy? How many times had she not voiced +her feelings in the unequivocal language of love! Yet she seemed so +hideously unhappy as she stretched before him in her white robes of +death. Why? What secret was this disclosed at the twelfth hour of life, +on the very brink of the grave? Did death, then, hold the solution to +the enigma of the conquering Sphinx! + +Monross, master of psychology, tormented by visions of perfection, a +victim to the devouring illusion of the artist,--Monross asked himself +with chagrin if he had missed the key in which had sounded the symphony +of this woman's life. This woman! His wife! A female creature, +long-haired, smiling, loquacious--though reticent enough when her real +self should have flashed out signals of recognition at him--this wife, +the Rhoda he had called day and night--what had she been? + +She had understood him, had realized his nobility of ideal, his gifts, +his occasional grandeur of soul,--like all artistic men he was desultory +in the manifestation of his talent,--and had read aloud to him those +poems written for another woman in the pitch-hot passion of his +youth--before he had met her. To her he had been always, so he told +himself, a cavalier in his devotion. Without wealth, he had kept the +soles of her little feet from touching the sidewalks of life. Upon her +dainty person he had draped lovely garments. Why then, he wondered, the +vindictive expression etched, as if in aqua fortis, upon her carved +features? + +Some Old World superstition held him captive as he gazed. Death is the +grand revealer, he thought; death alone stamps upon the crumbling canvas +of mortality the truth. Rhoda was dead. Yet her face was alive for the +first time. He saw its truth; and he shuddered, for he also discerned +the hate that had lurked a life long in its devious and smiling +expressions--expressions like a set of scenery pushed on and off as the +order of the play demanded. Oh, the misery of it all! He, Monross, poet, +lover, egoist, husband, to be confronted by this damnable defiance, this +early-born hate! What had he done! And in the brain cells of the man +there awakened a processional fleet of pictures: Rhoda wooed; Rhoda +dazzled; Rhoda won; Rhoda smiling before the altar; Rhoda resigned upon +that other altar; Rhoda, wife, mother; and Rhoda--dead! + +But Rhoda loved--again he looked at the face. The brow was virginally +placid, the drooping, bitter mouth alone telling the unhappy husband a +story he had never before suspected. Rhoda! Was it possible this tiny +exquisite creature had harboured rancour in her soul for the man who had +adored her because she had adored him? Rhoda! The shell of his egoism +fell away from him. He saw the implacable resentment of this tender girl +who, her married life long, had loathed the captain that had invaded the +citadel of her soul, and conqueror-like had filched her virgin zone. The +woman seemingly stared at the man through lids closed in death--the +woman, the sex that ages ago had feared the barbarian who dragged her to +his cave, where he subdued her, making her bake his bread and bear his +children. + +In a wide heaven of surmise Monross read the confirmation of his +suspicions--of the eternal duel between the man and the woman; knew +that Rhoda hated him most when most she trembled at his master bidding. +And now Rhoda lay dead in her lyre-shaped coffin, saying these ironic +things to her husband, when it was too late for repentance, too early +for eternity. + + + + +IX + +THE ENCHANTED YODLER + + +A MARIENBAD ELEGY + +I + +The remorseless rain had washed anew the face of the dark blue sky that +domed Marienbad and its curved chain of hills. Hugh Krayne threw open +his window and, leaning out, exclaimed, as he eagerly inhaled the soft +air of an early May morning:-- + +"At last! And high time!" For nine days he had waded through the wet +streets, heavily leaping the raging gutters and stopping before the door +of every optician to scrutinize the barometer. And there are many in +this pretty Bohemian health resort, where bad weather means bad temper, +with enforced confinement in dismal lodgings or stuffy _restaurations_, +or--last resort of the bored--the promenade under the colonnade, while +the band plays as human beings shuffle ponderously over the cold stones +and stare at each other in sullen desperation. + +But this day was a glorious one; in high spirits the Englishman left the +house on the Oberkreuzbrunnenstrasse and moved slowly toward the +springs. He was not thirty, but looked much older, for his weight was +excessive. An easy-going temperament, a good appetite, a well-filled +purse, and a conscience that never disturbed his night's slumber +contributed to this making of flesh. He waddled, despite his great +height, and was sufficiently sensitive to enjoy Marienbad as much for +its fat visitors as for its curative virtues. Here at least he was not +remarkable, while in London or Paris people looked at him sourly when he +occupied a stall at the theatre or a seat in a caf. Not only had he +elbow room in Marienbad, but he felt small, positively meagre, in +comparison with the prize specimens he saw painfully progressing about +the shaded walks or puffing like obese engines up the sloping roads to +the Rbezahl, the Egerlnder, the Panorama, or the distant Podhorn. + +The park of the Kreuzbrunnen was crowded, though the hour of six had +just been signalled from a dozen clocks in the vicinity. The crowd, +gathered from the four quarters of the globe, was in holiday humour, as, +glass in hand, it fell into line, until each received the water doled +out by uniformed officials. Occasionally a dispute as to precedence +would take place when the serpentine procession filed up the steps of +the old-fashioned belvedere; but quarrels were as rare as a lean man. A +fat crowd is always good-tempered, irritable as may be its individual +members. Hugh Krayne kept in position, while two women shoved him about +as if he were a bale of hay. He heard them abusing him in Bohemian, a +language of which he did not know more than a few words; their +intonations told him that they heartily disliked his presence. Yet he +could not give way; it would not have been Marienbad etiquette. At last +he reached the spring and received his usual low bow from the man who +turned the polished wheel--the fellow had an eye tuned for gratuities. +With the water in his glass three-fourths cold and one-fourth warm, a +small napkin in his left hand, the Englishman moved with the jaunty +grace of a young elephant down the smooth terraced esplanade that has +made Marienbad so celebrated. The sun was riding high, and the tender +green of the trees, the flashing of the fountains, and the music of the +band all caused Hugh to feel happy. He had lost nearly a pound since his +arrival the week before, and he had three more weeks to stay. What might +not happen! + +Just where the promenade twists under the shaded alleys that lead to the +Ferdinandsbrunnen, he saw four women holding hands. They were dressed in +Tyrolean fashion--pleated skirts, short enough to show white, plump +stockings, feet in slippers, upon the head huge caps, starched and +balloony; their massive white necks, well exposed, were encircled by +collars that came low on bodices elaborately embroidered. Behind them +marched several burly chaps, in all the bravery of the Austrian +Tyrol--the green alpine hat, with the feather at the back, the short +gray jacket, the bare knees, and the homespun stockings. Krayne regarded +curiously this strolling band of singers. Their faces seemed familiar to +him, and he rapidly recalled souvenirs of Salzburg and an open-air +concert. But this morning there was something that arrested his +attention in the group. It was a girl of eighteen or twenty, with a +brilliant complexion, large blue eyes, and a robust, shapely figure. As +she passed she gave him such an imploring look, such an appealing look, +that all his chivalric instincts rushed into the field of his +consciousness. He awkwardly dropped his tumbler. He turned around, half +expecting to see the big child still looking at him. Instead he gazed +upon the athletic backs of her male companions and to the unpleasant +accompaniment of hearty feminine laughter. Were these women laughing at +him? No fool like a fat one, he merrily thought, as he bought a new +glass at a bazaar, which a grinning, monkey-faced creature sold him at +the regular price redoubled. + +Before his meagre breakfast of one egg and a dry rusk, Krayne +endeavoured to evoke the features of the pretty creature who had so +strongly attracted him. He saw a tangle of black hair, a glance that +touched his heart with its pathos, a pair of soft, parted red lips, and +dazzling teeth. It was an impression sufficiently powerful to keep him +company all the forenoon. Fat men, he reasoned on the steep pass that +conducts to the Caf Forstwarte, are always sentimental, by no means +always amiable, and, as a rule, subject to sudden fancies. Ten years of +his sentimental education had been sown with adventures that had begun +well, caprices that had no satisfactory endings. He had fallen in love +with the girl who played Chopin on the piano, the girl who played +Mendelssohn on the violin, the girl who played Goltermann on the +violoncello. Then followed girls who painted, poetized, botanized, and +hammered metal. Once--an exception--he had succumbed to the charms of an +actress who essayed characters in the dumps--Ibsen soubrettes, +Strindberg servants, and Mxim Grky tramps. Yet he had, somehow or +other, emerged heart whole from his adventures among those masterpieces +of the cosmos--women. + +Certainly this might be another romance added to the long list of his +sentimental fractures. He ate his dinner, the one satisfactory meal of +the day allowed him by a cruel doctor, with the utmost deliberation. He +had walked three hours during the morning, and now, under the spacious +balconies of the Forstwarte, he knew that his beef and spinach would be +none the worse for a small bottle of very dry, light Vslauer. Besides, +his physician had not actually forbidden him a little liquid at the +midday meal. Just before bedtime he was entitled--so his dietetic +schedule told him--to one glass of Pilsner beer. Not so bad, after all, +this banting at Marienbad, he reflected. Anyhow, it was better than the +existence of those fellows at sea-shore and mountain, who gorged and +guzzled their summer away. Then he tried to remember among his London +club friends any who were as heavy as he, but he could not. Idly +smoking, he regarded the piazzas, with their tables and groups of obese +humanity, eating, drinking, and buzzing--little fat flies, he thought, +as he drew his waistcoat in, feeling quite haughty and slender. + +He read on a placard that the "Prger Bavarian Sextet" would give a +"grand" concert at the Hotel Bellevue this very afternoon. "Ah ha!" said +Krayne aloud, "that's the girl I saw!" Then he wasted several hours more +loitering about the beautiful park on the Kaiserstrasse and looking in +the shop windows at views of Marienbad on postal cards, at +yellow-covered French, German, and Russian novels, at pictures of kings, +queens, and actresses. He also visited the houses wherein Goethe, +Chopin, and Wagner had dwelt. It was four o'clock when he entered the +garden of the Bellevue establishment and secured a table. The waiter at +his request removed the other chairs, so he had a nook to himself. Not a +very large crowd was scattered around; visitors at Marienbad do not care +to pay for their diversions. In a few minutes, after a march had been +banged from a wretched piano--were pianos ever tuned on the Continent, +he wondered?--the sextet appeared, looking as it did in the morning, and +sang an Austrian melody, a capella. It was not very interesting. + +The women stood in front and yelled with a hearty will; the men roared +in the background. Krayne saw his young lady, holding her apron by the +sides, her head thrown back, her mouth well opened; but he could not +distinguish her individual voice. How pretty she was! He sipped his +coffee. Then came a zither solo--that abominable instrument of plucked +wires, with its quiver of a love-sick clock about to run down; this +parody of an olian harp always annoyed Krayne, and he was glad when the +man finished. A stout soprano in a velvet bodice, her arms bare and +brawny, the arms of a lass accustomed to ploughing and digging potatoes, +sang something about turtle doves. She was odious. Odious, too, was her +companion, in a duo through which they screamed and rumbled--"Verlassen +bin i." At last she came out and he saw by the programme that her name +was Rselein Gich. What an odd name, what an attractive girl! He +finished his coffee and frantically signalled his waitress. It was +against the doctor's orders to take more than one cup, and then the +sugar! Hang the doctor, he cried, and drank a second cup. + +She sang. Her voice was an unusually heavy, rich contralto. That she was +not an accomplished artiste he knew. He did not haunt opera houses for +naught, and, like all fat men who wear red ties in the forenoon, he was +a trifle dogmatic in his criticism. The young woman had the making of an +opera singer. What a Fricka, Brangaene, Ortrud, Sieglinde, Erda, this +clever girl might become! She was musical, she was dramatic in +temperament--he let his imagination run away with him. She only sang an +Oberbayerische yodel, and, while her voice was not very high, she +contrived a falsetto that made her English listener shiver. This yodel +seemed to him as thrilling as the "_Ho yo to ho!_" of Brunnhilde as she +rushes over the rocky road to Valhall. _La la liriti! La la lirita! +Hallali!_ chirped Rselein, with a final flourish that positively +enthralled Hugh Krayne. He applauded, beating with his stick upon the +table, his face flushed by emotion. Decidedly this girl was worth the +visit to Marienbad. + +And he noted with delight that Frulein Gich had left the stage. Basket +in hand, she went from table to table, selling pictures and programmes +and collecting admission fees. At last he would be able to speak with +the enchantress, for he prided himself on the purity of his German. +Smiling until she reached his table, she suddenly became serious when +she saw this big Englishman in the plaid suit and red necktie. Again he +felt the imploring glance, the soft lips parted in childish +supplication. It was too much for his nerves. He tossed into her basket +a gold piece, grabbed at random some pictures, and as her beseeching +expression deepened, her eyes moist with wonder and gratitude, he tugged +at a ring on his corpulent finger, and, wrenching it free, presented it +to her with a well-turned phrase, adding:-- + +"Thou hast the making of a great singer in thee, Frulein Rselein. I +wish I could help thee to fame!" + +The girl gave him an incredulous stare, then reddening, the muscles on +her full neck standing out, she ran like a hare back to her companions. +Evidently he had made an impression. The honest folk about him who +witnessed the little encounter fairly brimmed over with gossip. The +stout basso moved slowly to Krayne, who braced himself for trouble. Now +for it! he whispered to himself, and grasped his walking-stick firmly. +But, hat in hand, his visitor, a handsome blond man, approached and +thanked Hugh for his generosity. He was a lover of music, the yodler +assured him, and his wife and himself felt grateful for the interest he +displayed in Frulein Rselein, his wife's sister. Yes, she had a +remarkable voice. What a pity--but wouldn't the gentleman attend the +concert to be given that evening up at the Caf Alm? It was, to be sure, +rather far, the caf, but the moon would be up and if he could find his +way there he might do the company the honour of coming back with them. + +The Frulein would sing a lot for him--Bohemian, Tyrolean, French, and +German songs. Ah, she was versatile! The man did not speak like a +peasant, and seemed a shrewd, pleasant fellow. Hugh Krayne, in excellent +though formal German, assured the other of his pleasure and accepted the +invitation. Then he looked over at Rselein, who stood on the stage, +and as he did so she waved a crimson handkerchief at him as a friendly +sign. He took off his hat, touched significantly his own tie to indicate +a reciprocity of sentiment, and all aglow he ordered a third cup of +coffee. + +The cure could take care of itself. _Man lebt nur einmal!_ + + +II + +On his way to the Alm he met the fattest man in Marienbad, a former chef +of the German emperor, and gave him a friendly salute. He liked to see +this monster, who made the scales groan at six hundred pounds, more than +double his own weight, for it put him at ease with himself. But this +evening he felt uncomfortable. What if he were to reach such a climax in +adiposity What if in the years to come he should be compelled, as was +the unfortunate man from Berlin, to sit on a chair every five minutes, a +chair carried by an impudent boy! What--here his heart sank--if the +Frulein should mock his size! He walked so rapidly at this idea that +other victims of rotundity stopped to look at his tall figure and nodded +approval. Ach! Marienbad was wonderful! + +After he had found a seat at the Alm next to the low wall, across which +he could see a vast stretch of undulating country, lighted by a moon +that seemed to swing like a silver hoop in the sky, Krayne ordered +Pilsner. He was fatigued by the hilly scramble and he was thirsty. Oh, +the lovely thirst of Marienbad--who that hath not been within thy +hospitable gates he knoweth it not! The magic of the night was making of +him a poet. He could see his Tyrolean friends behind the glass partition +of the little hall. There would they sing, not in the open. It was +nearly the same, for presently the windows were raised and their voices +came floating out to him, the bourdon of Rselein's organ easily +distinguishable. Love had sharpened his ears. He drained his glass and +sent for another. He felt that he was tumbling down an abyss of passion +and that nothing in the world could save him. + +The intermission! He stood up to attract the attention of Herr Johan +Prger. Rselein saw him and at once neared him, but without the basket. +This delicacy pleased Krayne very much. It showed him that he was not on +the same footing as the public. He made the girl take a seat, and though +he felt the eyes of the crowd upon him, he was not in the least +concerned. London was far away and the season was too young for the +annual rush of his compatriots. Would the Frulein take something? She +accepted coffee, which she drank from a long glass with plenty of milk +and sugar. She again gazed at him with such a resigned expression that +he felt his starched cuffs grow warm from their contiguity to his +leaping pulses. + +"Yes, Frulein," he said, employing the familiar _du_, "thou hast +overcome me. Why not accept my offer?" Was this the prudent Hugh Krayne +talking? She smiled sweetly and shook her head. Her voice was delicious +in colour and intonation, nor did it betray humble origin. + +"I fear, dear sir, that what you offer is impossible. My sister, the +soprano, would never hear of such a thing. My brother, her husband, +would not allow it. And I owe them my living, my education. How could I +repay them if I left them now?" she hesitated. + +"Simply enough. You would be a singer at the opera some day, and take +them all to live with you. Is there no other reason?" He recollected +with a vivid sense of the disagreeable the lively antics of a lithe +youth in the company, who, at the close of the concert, executed with +diabolic dexterity what they called a _Schuhplattltanz_. This dance had +glued Krayne's attention, for Rselein was the young tenor singer's +partner. With their wooden sabots they clattered and sang, waving wildly +their arms or else making frantic passages of pretended love and +coquetry. It upset the Englishman to see the impudence of this common +peasant fellow grasping Rselein by the waist, as he whirled her about +in the boorish dance. Hence the clause to his question. She endured his +inquiring gaze, as she simply answered:-- + +"No, there is no other reason." She put her hand on the arm of her +companion and the lights suddenly became misty, for he was of an +apoplectic tendency. They talked of music, of the opera in Vienna and +Prague. She was born in Bavaria, not more than a day's ride from +Marienbad. You could almost see her country from the top of the +Podhornberg, in the direction of the Franconian Mountains, not far from +Bayreuth. The place was called Schnabelwaid, and it was very high, very +windy. Since her tenth year she had been singing--yes, even in the +chorus at the Vienna opera, with her sister and brother. They were no +common yodlers. They could sing all the music of the day. The yodling +was part of their business, as was the costume. Later, when she had +enough saved, she would study in Vienna for grand opera! + +He was enraptured. How romantic it all was! A free-born maiden--he was +certain she was reared in some old castle--wandering about earning money +for her musical education. What a picture for a painter! What a story +for a novelist! They were interrupted. The dancer, a young man with a +heavy shock of hair growing low on his forehead, under which twinkled +beady black eyes, had been sent to tell Frulein Rselein that her +colleagues were waiting for her. With a courtesy she went away. Krayne +now thoroughly hated the dancer. + +It was long after eleven when the concert was over and the party started +on its homeward trip. Krayne and Rselein walked behind the others, and +soon the darkness and the narrowness of the road forced him to tread +after the girl. The moon's rays at intervals pierced the foliage, +making lacelike patches of light in the gloom. At times they skirted the +edges of a circular clearing and saw the high pines fringing the +southern horizon; overhead the heavens were almost black, except where +great streams of stars swept in irregular bands. It was a glorious +sight, Krayne told Rselein--too sublime to be distracted by mere mortal +love-making, he mentally added. Nevertheless he was glad when they were +again in the woods; he could barely distinguish the girl ahead of him, +but her outline made his heart beat faster. Once, as they neared the +town, he helped her down a declivity into the roadway, and he could not +help squeezing her hand. The pressure was returned. He boldly placed her +arm within his, and they at last reached the streets, but not before, +panting with mingled fright and emotion, he solemnly kissed her. She did +not appear surprised. + +"Call me Rsie--thou!" she murmured, and her navet brought the ready +tears to his eyes. They made a rendezvous for the next morning on the +Promenade Platz. The only thing he did not like was the scowling face of +the dancer when he said good night to the others under the electric +lights of the Kreuzbrunnen. He was correct, then, in his premonition. + +That night Hugh Krayne dreamed he was a very skeleton for thinness--not +an unusual vision of fat men--and also a Tyrolean yodler, displaying +himself before a huge audience of gigantic human beings, who laughed so +loudly that he could not open his lips to frame the familiar words of +his song. In the despair of a frantic nightmare, his face streaming with +anguished tears, he forced his voice:-- + +_La, la, liriti! La, la, larita! Hallali!_ Then he awoke in triumph. Was +he not a yodler? + + +III + +He told her of his dream and strange ambition. She did not discourage +him. It could be settled easily enough. Why not join the company and +take a few lessons? "With such a teacher?" he had exclaimed, and his +gesture was so impassioned that the promenaders, with their shining +morning goblets of water, were arrested by the spectacle. Wonderful, +wonderful Marienbad! was the general comment! But Krayne was past +ridicule. He already saw Rselein his bride. He saw himself a yodler. +The cure? Ay, there was the rub. He laid bare his heart. She aided him +with her cool advice. She was very sensible. Her brother-in-law and her +sister would welcome him in their household, for he was a lover of music +and his intentions were honourable. Of course, he sighed, of course, and +fingered his red tie. Why not, she argued, remain at Marienbad for three +weeks more and complete his cure? Anyhow, he was not so stout! She +looked up at him archly. Again he saw mist. + +That settled it. For another three weeks he lived in a cloud of +expectation, of severe training, long walks, dieting, and Turkish baths. +No man worked harder. And he was rewarded by seeing his flesh melt away +a pound or two daily. When the company returned after its itinerary in +the neighbourhood Rsie was surprised to meet a man who did not weigh +much over two hundred pounds, healthy, vigorous, and at least five years +younger in appearance. She was very much touched. So was her sister. +There was a family consultation, and despite the surly opposition of the +dancer, Hugh Krayne was welcomed as a member of the Prger Bavarian +Sextette company. Forgetting the future he had arranged for Rsie, he +began his vocal lessons immediately. + +In July he sang for the first time in public at Eger. He was extremely +frightened, but as it was only a duo he managed fairly well. Then he +sang at Tepl, this time alone. His voice broke badly in the yodel and he +was jeered by a rude audience. He had grown very much thinner. His +doctor warned him against continuing the waters, and advised rice, +potatoes, and ale, but he did not listen. He now paid the bills of the +company while travelling. Rsie had confessed with tears that they were +fearfully poor. From that time he handed her his purse. He even placated +the jealous dancer with a gold watch and a box of hair pomade. Ah! how +he loathed the fellow's curly locks, his greasy familiarities! Rsie +told him this acrobat was necessary in the company until he could be +replaced. Already Hugh--she called him ""--could yodel better. Some day +he might, when thinner, dance better. Perhaps--again that appealing +glance, the corner of her lips faintly touched by the mysterious smile +of a Monna Lisa. Krayne redoubled his arduous training, practised +yodling in the forests, danced jigs on the pine-needles, and doubled his +allowance of the waters. + +They went to Carlsbad. He yodled. He was applauded. The dancer was in a +fine rage. Although Krayne had asked Rsie to buy a first-class +compartment on the railroad trip over and back, they went in a +third-class car. Prger declared that it was good enough for him, and he +didn't wish to spoil his troupe! His wife now held the purse-strings, as +Rsie was too engrossed with her art and Hugh too absorbed in his love +to notice such mere sublunary matters. The girl had promised nothing +positive for the future. She kept him on the brittle edge of nervous +expectation. The opposition of the dancer had been successfully met by +threats of dismissal; Hugh continued to lose flesh and gain in vocal and +pedal agility. + +He danced for the first time at Knigswart, not far from the chteau of +the Metternichs. It was August. So great was the applause that the +younger dancer was discharged. He left with muttered threats of +vengeance. The next day Krayne turned over all his business affairs to +the able hand of Frau Prger; he lived only for Rsie and his art.... + +September was at hand. The weather was so warm and clear, that the king +of England deferred his departure for a few days. One afternoon, just +before the leaves began to brown on the hills, there was a concert at +the garden of the Hotel Bellevue. The royal party attended. The yodling +was much praised, especially that of a good-looking young woman and her +escort, a very tall man of cadaverous aspect, his shanks like the wooden +stilts of the shepherds on the Bordeaux Landes. His face, +preternaturally emaciated and fatigued, opened to emit an amazing yodel. +When the _Schuhplattltanz_ was reached he surprised the audience by an +extraordinary exhibition. He threw his long legs about like billiard +cues, while his arms flapped as do windmills in a hard gale. He was +pointed out as a celebrity--once a monster Englishman, who had taken the +_Kur_; who was in love, but so poor that he could not marry. The girl +with him was certain to make a success in grand opera some day. Yes, +Marienbad was proud of Krayne. He was one of her show sons, a witness to +her curative powers. Proud also of the Bavarian Prger Sextette. Herr +Prger was reputed a rich man.... + +The night of that concert Marienbad saw the last of the Bavarian +sextette, which at midnight, joined by its old dancer with the tenor +voice, left in a third-class carriage for Vienna. Hugh Krayne, not +possessing enough to pay his passage, had not been invited; nor was he +informed of the sudden departure until a day later.... + + * * * * * + +On the road to the Alm, of moonlight nights, toiling visitors catch +glimpses of a human, almost a skeleton, dressed in rags, his head bare +as his feet, about his neck a flaming crimson handkerchief. He is known +to Marienbders as "The Man Who Stayed Too Long." He never addresses +passers-by; but as they lose sight of him they hear the woods resound +with his elegiac howl:-- + +_La la liriti! La la lirita! Hallali!_ + + + + +X + +THE THIRD KINGDOM + + +I + +A DOUBTER + +Brother Hyzlo sat in his cell and read. The gentle stillness of a rare +spring morning enveloped him with its benison. And the clear light fell +upon the large pages of a book in his hand,--the window through which it +streamed was the one link between the young recluse and the life of the +world. From it he could see the roofs of the city beneath him; when he +so wished, he might, without straining his gaze, distinguish the +Pantheon at the end of that triumphal avenue which spanned the Seine and +had once evoked for him visions of antique splendour. But Brother Hyzlo +no longer cared for mundane delights. His doubting soul was the +battle-field over which he ranged day and night searching for diabolic +opponents. Exterior existence had become for him a shadow; the only life +worth living was that of the spirit. + +In his book that fresh spring morning he read as if in the flare of a +passing meteor these disquieting words:-- + +"How were it if, some day or night, a demon stole after thee into thy +most solitary solitude, and said to thee: 'This life, as thou livest it +now, and hast lived it, thou shalt have to live over again, and not once +but innumerable times; and there will be nothing new in it, but every +pain and every pleasure and every thought and sigh, and everything in +thy life, the great and the unspeakably petty alike, must come again to +thee, and all in the same series and succession; this spider, too, and +this moonlight betwixt the trees and this moment likewise and I myself. +The eternal sand-glass of time is always turned again, and thou with it, +thou atom of dust'? Wouldst thou not cast thyself down and with gnashing +of teeth curse the demon who thus spoke? Or, hast thou ever experienced +the tremendous moment in which thou wouldst answer him: 'Thou art a god +and never heard I anything more divine'?" + +The book slipped from his hands. "Why not?" he murmured, "why not? There +is no such thing as chance. The law of probabilities is not a mere +fancy, but an austere need. Matter is ever in evolution. Energy alone is +indestructible. Radium has revealed this to us. In eternity when the +Infinite throws the dice, double-sixes are sure to come up more than +once. Miracles? But why miraculous? Infinity of necessity must repeat +itself, and then I, sitting here now, will sit here again, sit and doubt +the goodness of God, ay, doubt His existence.... How horrible!" He +paused in the whirl of his thoughts. + +"Yet how beautiful, for if the eternal recurrence be truth, then must +the great drama of the Redemption be repeated. Then will our foes be +convinced of Christianity and its reality. But shall we be conscious in +that far-off time of our anterior existence? Ah! hideous, coiling doubt. +What a demon is this Nietzsche to set whirring in the brains of poor, +suffering humanity such torturing questions! Better, far better for the +world to live and not to think. Thought is a disease, a morbid secretion +of the brain-cells. Ah! materialist that I am, I can no longer think +without remembering the ideas of Cabanis, that gross atheist. Why am I +punished so? What crimes have I committed in a previous +existence--Karma, again!--that I must perforce study the writings of +impious men? Yet I submitted myself as a candidate for the task, to save +my brethren in Christ from soiling their hearts. Heaven preserve me from +the blight of spiritual pride, but I believe that I am now a scapegoat +for the offences of my fellow-monks, and, thus, may redeem my own +wretched soul. Ah! Nietzsche--Antichrist." + +He arose and threw the volume across his cell. Then going to the window +regarded with humid gaze the world that sprawled below him in the +voluptuous sunshine. But so sternly was the inner eye fixed on the +things of the spirit that he soon turned away from the delectable +picture, and as he did so his glance rested upon a crucifix. He started, +his perturbed imagination again touched. + +"What if Nietzsche were right? The first Christian, the only Christian, +died on the cross, he has said. What an arraignment of our precious +faith, Jesus Christ, our Lord God! What sweet names are Thine! How could +Nietzsche not feel the music of that Hebrew-Greek combination? Perhaps +he did; perhaps he masked a profound love behind his hatred. Jesus our +Lord! Hebrew-Greek. But why Greek? Why ...?" Another pause in this +sequestered chamber where the buzzing of an insect could assume a +thunderous roar. "The eternal return. Why should Christ return? Must the +earth be saved again and again and a billion times again? Awful thought +of a God descending to a horrible death to cleanse the nameless myriads +from sins which they seek ever as flies treacle. More ghastly still is +the thought that the atheist Scandinavian put into the mouth of his +Julian the Apostate: When our Christ is not saving this earth from +eternal damnation then he may be visiting remote planets or inaccessible +stars, where coloured double suns of blinding brilliancy revolve +terrifically in twin harness. There, too, are souls to be rescued. What +a grand idea! It is Ibsen's, as is the interpretation of the Third +Kingdom. It should have been Nietzsche's. Why this antinomianism? Why +this eternal conflict of evil and good, of night and day, of sweet and +sour, of God and devil, of Ormuzd and Ahriman?" + +The exotic names transposed his thoughts to another avenue. If Christ is +to come again, and the holy word explicitly states that He will, why not +Buddha? Why not Brahma? Why not ...? Again a hiatus. This time something +snapped in his head. He sank back in his chair. Buddha! Was there ever a +Buddha? And if there was not, was there ever such a personality as +Christ's? Scholar that he was he knew that myth-building was a pastime +for the Asiatic imagination, great, impure, mysterious Asia--Asia the +mother of all religions, the cradle of the human race. To deny the +objective existence of Christ would set at rest all his doubts, one +overwhelming doubt swallowing the minor doubts. He had never speculated +at length upon the Christ legend, for did not Renan, yes, that silky +heretic, believe in the personality of Jesus, believe and lovingly +portray it? The Nietzsche doctrine of the eternal recurrence had so +worked upon his sensitive mental apparatus that he could have almost +denied the existence of Christ rather than deny that our universe +repeats itself infinitely. Eternity is a wheel, earthly events are the +spokes of this whirring wheel. It was the seeming waste of divine +material that shocked his nerves. One crucifixion--yes; but two or two +quintillions and infinitely more! + +Brother Hyzlo stared at the crucifix. Was it only a symbol, as some +learned blasphemers averred? The human figure so painfully extended +upon it was a God, a God who descended from high heaven to become a +shield between the wrath of His Father and humanity. Why? Why should the +God who created us grow angry with our shortcomings? We are His +handiwork. Are we then to blame for our imperfections? Is not Jesus, +instead of a mediator, rather a votive offering to the wounded vanity of +the great Jehovah? Was not Prometheus--a light broke in upon Hyzlo. +Prometheus, a myth, Buddha a myth. All myths. There were other +virgin-born saviours. Krishna, Mithra, Buddha. Vishnu had not one but +nine incarnations. Christianity bears alarming resemblances to +Mithraism. Mithra, too, was born in a cave. The dates of Christ's birth +and death may be astronomical: the winter and vernal equinoxes. But the +conflict of the authorities regarding these dates is mortifying. The +four gospels are in reality four witnesses warring against each other. +They were selected haphazard at a human council. They were not composed +until the latter part of the second century, and the synoptic gospels +are compilations from unknown writers, while the fourth gospel is a much +later work. And how colourless, imitative, is the New when compared to +the Old Testament,--echoing with the antiphonal thunders of Jehovah and +his stern-mouthed Prophets! The passage in Josephus touching on Christ +is now known to have been interpolated. Authentic history does not +record the existence of Christ. Not one of His contemporaries mentions +him. That tremendous drama in Galilee was not even commented upon by the +Romans, a nation keen to notice any deviation from normal history. The +Jewish records are doubtful, written centuries after His supposed death. +And they are malicious. What cannot happen in two centuries? Hyzlo +reflected sadly upon Moslemism, upon Mormonism, upon the vagaries of a +strange American sect at whose head was said to be a female pope. + +The similarity of circumstances in the lives of Buddha and Christ also +annoyed him. Both were born of virgins, both renounced the world, both +were saviours. There were the same temptations, the same happenings; +prophecies, miracles, celestial rejoicings, a false disciple, the seven +beatitudes--a reflection of the Oriental wisdom--an expiatory death and +resurrection. The entire machinery of the Christian church, its saints, +martyrs, festivals, ritual, and philosophies are borrowed from the +mythologies of the pagans. Sun-worship is the beginning of all +religions. To the genius of the epileptic Paul, or Saul,--founders of +religions are always epilepts,--a half Greek and disciple of the +Pharisee Gamaliel, who saw visions and put to the sword his enemies, to +Paul, called a saint, a man of overwhelming personal force, to this +cruel anarchist, relentless, half-mad fanatic and his theological +doctrines we owe the preservation and power of the Christian Church. At +first the Christians were the miserable offscourings of society, slaves, +criminals, and lunatics. They burrowed in the Catacombs, they fastened +themselves upon a decaying and magnificent civilization like the +parasites they were. A series of political catastrophes, a popular +uprising against the rotten emperors of decadent Rome, and the wide +growth of the socialist idea--these things and an unscrupulous man, +Constantine the Great, put the Christians firmly in the saddle. And soon +came cataracts of blood. If the tales of the imperial persecutions are +true, then hath Christianity been revenged a million fold; where her +skirt has trailed there has been the cruel stain of slaughter. It must +not be forgotten, too, that immorality of the grossest sort was promised +the deluded sectarians, compared with which the Mahometan paradise is +spiritual. And the end of the world was predicted at the end of every +century, and finally relegated to the millennial celebration of +Christianity's birth. When, in 1000 A.D., this catastrophe did +not occur, the faith received its first great shock. + +He summoned to his memory a cloud of witnesses, all contradictory. +Josephus was barred. Philo Judus, who was living near the centre of +things, an observer on the scent of the spiritual, a man acquainted with +the writings of Rabbi Hillel, and the father of Neoplatonism--never +mentions Jesus, nor does he speak of any religious uprising in Judea. +The passage in Virgil, which has through the doubtful testimony of +monkish writers been construed into a prophecy of a forthcoming Messiah, +Hyzlo, who was a scholar, knew to have been addressed to a son of +Virgil's intimate friend. Tacitus, too, has been interpolated. Seneca's +ideal man is not Jesus, for Jesus is Osiris, Horus, Krishna, Mithra, +Hercules, Adonis,--think of this beautiful young god's death!--Buddha. +Such a mock trial and death could not have taken place under the Roman +or Jewish laws. The sacraments derive from the Greeks, from the +Indians--the mysteries of Ceres and Bacchus, from the _Haoma_ sacrifice +of the Persians, originally Brahmanic. The Trinity, was it not a relic +of that ineradicable desire for polytheism implanted in the human bosom? +Was the crucifixion but a memory of those darker cults and blood +sacrifices of Asia, and also of the expiating goats sent out into the +wilderness? What became of that Hosanna-shouting crowd which welcomed +Christ on Palm Sunday? And there never were such places as Gethsemane +and Calvary. Alas! the Son of Man had indeed no spot to lay his head. +And why had He made no sign when on earth! Brother Hyzlo wept bitter +tears. + +But he wiped them away as he considered the similarity of the massacre +of the Innocents in Judea and the massacre of the male children ordered +by the wicked Indian Rajah of Madura, who feared the Krishna, just +conceived by divine agency. Yes, the chronicles were full of these gods +born of virgins, of crucifixions,--he could remember sixteen,--of these +solar myths. He caught tripping in a thousand cases the translations of +our holy books. The Ox and Ass legend at the Nativity he realized was +the Pseudo-Matthew's description to Habakkuk of the literal presence: +"In the midst of two animals thou shalt be known;" which is a +mistranslated Hebrew text in the Prayer ascribed to Habakkuk. It got +into the Greek Septuagint version of the Prophet made by Egyptian Jews +before 150 B.C. It should read, "in the midst of the years," +not "animals." "Ah!" cried Hyzlo, "in this as in important cardinal +doctrines have the faithful been the slaves of the learned and +unscrupulous pious forgers. Even the notorious Apollonius of Tyana +imitated the miracles of Christ--all of them. And what of that wicked +wizard, Simon Magus?" + +The very repetition of these miracles in all races, at all epochs, +pointed to the doctrine of recurrence. But back of all the negations, +back of the inexpugnable proof that no such man or God as Christ +existed, or was known to his contemporaries, Jewish and Roman, there +must have been some legend which had crystallized into a mighty +religion. Was He an agitator who preferred His obscurity that His glory +might be all the greater? There _must_ have been a beginning to the +myth; behind the gospels--though they are obviously imitated from the +older testaments, imitated and diluted--were unknown writings; previous +to these there was word of mouth and--and ...? + +The day had advanced, the sun was very warm. A shaft of light fell upon +the cold stone floor, and in its fiery particles darted myriads of +motes. Hyzlo followed their spiral flights, thinking all the while of +humanity which flashes from out the dark void, plays madly in the light, +only to vanish into the unknown night. His gaze was held by the +smoothness of the flagging at his feet. Then it became transformed into +marble, the walls of his cell widened, and he closed his eyes, so +blinding were the long ladders of light.... + + +II + +TWO DREAMERS + +He opened them ... the harbour with its army of galleys and pleasure +craft lay in the burning sunshine, its surface a sapphire blue. Overhead +the sky echoed this tone, which modulated into deeper notes of purple on +the far-away hills whose tops were wreathed in mist. Under his sandalled +feet was marble, back of him were the gleaming spires and towers of the +great city, and at his left was a mountain of shining marble, the +Pharos. + +"Alexandria?" he called out as he was jostled by a melon-seller, and +startled by the fluted invitations of a young girl--an antique statue +come to life. + +"Of course it is Alexandria," replied a deep, harsh voice at his elbow. +He turned. It was his friend Philo. + +"You have at last emerged from your day-dream, Hyzlo! I thought, as our +bark clove the water, that you were enjoying visions." And it seemed to +Hyzlo that he had just awakened from a bizarre dream of a monastic cell, +to more beautiful sights and shapes and sounds. The pair now traversed +the quay, past the signal masts, the fortified towers, pushing through +the throng of sailors, courtesans, philosophers, fruitsellers, soldiers, +beggars, and idle rich toward the spacious city. Past the palace to the +wall of the Canal, along the banks of the Royal Port, they finally +struck into a broad, deserted avenue. At its head was a garden wall. +Philo introduced himself and his companion through a low door and +presently they were both in an apartment full of parchments, glittering +brass and gold instruments all reposing on a wide, long table. + +"Hyzlo," said the Jewish philosopher, in his slightly accented Greek, "I +have long promised you that I would reveal to you my secret, my life +work. I am downcast by sadness. Rome is full of warring cults, Greek, +African, Babylonian, Buddhistic; the writings of the great teachers, the +masters, Heraclitus, Zeno, Anaxagoras, Plato, Socrates, Epictetus, +Seneca, are overlaid with heretical emendations. The religion of my +fellow-countrymen is a fiery furnace, Jerusalem a den of warring +thieves. The rulers of earth are weary and turn a deaf ear on their +peoples. The time is ripe for revolt. Sick of the accursed luxury and +debauchery, fearful of the threatening barbarians from Asia and the +boreal regions, who are hemming the civilized world, waiting like +vultures for the first sign of weakness to destroy everything, the +slaves in revolt--all these impending terrors assure me that the end of +the old order is at hand. But what will become of the new if there is no +central belief to steady the ensanguined hands of furious mobs? For +years I have bethought me of a drama, a gigantic world-drama which shall +embody all the myths of mankind, all the noblest thoughts of the +philosophers. I shall take the Buddha myth, surely the supreme myth, and +transpose its characters to Jerusalem. A humble Jew shall be _my_ +Buddha. He shall be my revenge on our conquerors; for my people have +been trampled upon by the insolent Romans, and who knows--a Jewish God, +a crucified God, may be worshipped in the stead of Jupiter and his vile +pantheon of gods and goddesses! _One_ God, the son of Jahveh who comes +upon earth to save mankind, is crucified and killed, is resurrected and +like Elijah is caught up to heaven in a fiery chariot. But you know the +usual style of these Asiatic legends! They are all alike; a virgin +birth, a miraculous life, and transfiguration. That sums up myths from +Adonis to Krishna, from Krishna to Buddha; though Monotheism comes from +the Hebrews, the Trinity from the Indians, and the _logos_ was +developed by Plato. Where I am original is that I make my hero a +Jew--the Jews are still half-cracked enough to believe in the coming of +a Messiah. And to compass a fine dramatic moment I have introduced an +incident I once witnessed in Alexandria at the landing of King Agrippa, +when the populace dressed up a vagabond named Karabas as a mock king and +stuck upon his head papyrus leaves for a crown, in his hand a reed for a +sceptre, and then saluted him as king. I shall make my Jew-God seized by +the Jews, his own blood and kin, given over to the Romans, mocked, +reviled, and set aside for some thief who shall be called Karabas. Then, +rejected, he shall be crucified, he a god born of a virgin, by the very +people who are looking for their Messiah. He is their Messiah; yet they +know it not. They shall never know it. That shall be their tragedy, the +tragedy of my race, which, notwithstanding the prophecies, turned its +back upon the Messiah because he came not clothed in the purple of +royalty. Is that not a magnificent idea for a drama?" + +"Excellent," answered Hyzlo, in a critical tone; "but continue!" + +"You seem without enthusiasm, Hyzlo. I tell you that schylus, +Sophocles, or Euripides never conceived a story more infinitely dramatic +or pathetic, or--thanks to my Hebraic blood--so suffused with tragic +irony. I shall make a very effective tableau at the death; on some +forbidding stony hill near Jerusalem I shall plant my crucified hero, +and near him a converted courtesan--ah! what a master of the theatre I +am!--in company with a handful of faithful disciples. The others have +run away to save their cowardly skins in the tumult. The mobs that +hailed him as King of the Jews now taunt him, after the manner of all +mobs. His early life I shall borrow outright from the Buddha legends. He +shall be born of a virgin; he shall live in the desert; as a child he +shall confute learned doctors in the temple; and later in the desert he +shall be tempted by a demon. All this is at hand. My chief point is the +philosophies in which I shall submerge my characters. + +"My hero shall be the _logos_ of Heraclitus with the superadded +authority of the Hebrew high priest. You may recall the fact that I +greatly admire the Essenes and their system. My deity is a pure essence; +not Jehovah the protector or avenger. The _logos_, or mediator, I have +borrowed from the writings of the Greek philosophers. This _logos_ +returns to the bosom of God after the sacrifice. Greek philosophy +combined with Hebraic moral principles! Ah! it is grand synthesis; +Seneca with his conception of a perfected humanity, Lucretius, +Manlius--who called, rightfully too, Epicurus a god--and Heraclitus with +the first idea of a _logos_: all these ancient ideas I have worked into +my romantic play, including the old cult of the Trinities; the +Buddhistic: Buddha, Dharma, and Saingha; the Chinese: Heaven, Earth, +and Emperor; the Babylonian: Ea, the father, Marduk, the son, and the +Fire God, Gibil, who is also the Paraclete. So my philosophy is merely a +continuation and modification of that taught by Heraclitus and Plato, +but with a Jewish background--for _mine_ is the only moral nation. The +wisdom of the Rabbis, their Monotheism and ethics, are all there." His +eyes were ablaze. + +"You are very erudite, Philo Judus!" exclaimed his listener; "but, tell +me, is there no actual foundation for your Jewish god?" Hyzlo eagerly +awaited a reply, though he could not account for this curiosity. + +"Yes," answered Philo, lightly, "there is, I freely acknowledge, a +slight foundation. Some years ago in Jerusalem they arrested a +poverty-stricken fanatic, the son of a Jewess. His father was said to +have been an indigent and aged carpenter. This Joshua, or Ieshua, was +driven out of Jerusalem, and he took refuge among a lot of poor +fishermen on Lake Gennesareth. There he joined a sect called the +Baptists, because their founder, a socialist named Ioakanaan, poured +water on the heads of the converted. Ieshua never married and was +suspected of idolatrous practices, which he had absorbed from hermits of +the Egyptian Thebad. Josephus, a wise friend and companion of my youth, +wrote me these details. He said that Ieshua disappeared after his mad +attempt to take Jerusalem by storm, riding--as is depicted the Bona +Dea--on the back of a humble animal. Yet, if you wish to appeal to the +common folk, make your hero a deposed king or divinity, who walks +familiarly among the poor, as walked the gods at the dawn of time with +the daughters of men. I depict my protagonist as a half-cracked Jew. I +call him Iesus Christos--after Krishna; and this poor man's god proposes +to redeem the world, to place the lowly in the seats of the mighty--he +is an Anarchos, as they would say in Athens. He promises the Kingdom of +God to those who follow him; but only a few do. He is the friend of +outcasts, prostitutes, criminals. And though he does not triumph on +earth, nevertheless he is the spiritual ruler of earth; he is the Son of +the Trinity which comprises the Father and Holy Ghost. The contending +forces to my hero will be incarnated by Pontius Pilatus, the Roman +governor, and Judas of Kerioth, a very dangerous and powerful Hebrew +politician--a man of very liberal ideas, one who believed in the +supremacy of the West. What a glorious play it will make! I have named +it The Third Kingdom, Hyzlo. What a glorious idea it is, Hyzlo--the +greatest drama the world has ever witnessed!" + + +III + +THE DOVE + +"The greatest drama the world has ever witnessed" ... mumbled his +disciple.... The sun still shone on the cold stone flagging, and upon +the wall facing him hung the crucifix. But the motes no longer danced +merrily in the light. Evening was setting in apace, and Hyzlo, accepting +one dream as equal in veracity with the other, crossed to the embrasure +and, his elbows on the sill, watched the sun--looking like a +sulphur-coloured cymbal--sink behind the sky-line. He was still in the +same attitude when the blue of the heavens--ah! but not that gorgeous, +hard Alexandrian blue--melted into peacock and cool saffron hues. He +mused aloud:-- + +"By the very nature of his mental organs man can never grasp reality. It +is always the sensation, never the real thing, he feels. The +metaphysicians are right. We can never know the actual world outside of +ourselves. We are imprisoned in a dream cage; the globe itself is a cage +of echoes. Science, instead of contradicting religion, has but affirmed +its truths. Matter is radiant energy--matter is electric phenomenon. The +germ-plasma from which we stem--the red clay of Genesis--is eternal. The +individual is sacrificed to the species. The species never dies. And how +beautifully logical is the order of our ancestry as demonstrated by the +science of embryology. Fish, batrachians, reptiles, mammals; in which +latter are included the marsupials as well as lemurs, primates, Man. And +after what struggles Man assumed an erect position and looked into the +eyes of his mate! After Man? Nietzsche preaches that man is a link +between the primate and Superman; Superman--the angels! But intelligence +in man may be an accident caused by over-nutrition, the brain developing +from rich phosphors. If this were so--how would fall to earth our house +of pride! Are we so close to the animal? But Quinton proves that _after_ +man in the zological series comes the bird. Birds--half reptiles, half +angels. Angels! Do evolution and revelation meet here on common ground? +Or was Joachim, the Abbot of Flores, inspired when he wrote of the Third +Kingdom, that Kingdom in which the empire of the flesh is swallowed up +in the empire of the spirit; that Third Kingdom in which the +twin-natured shall reign, as Ibsen declares; the Messiah--neither +Emperor nor Redeemer, but the Emperor-God. The slime shall become sap +and the sap become spirit! From gorilla to God! Man in the coming Third +Kingdom may say: "I, too, am a god." But is this not blasphemous? And +after the wheel of the universe has again revolved, will I see, as +foresaw Nietzsche, the selfsame spider, the same moonlight? There is +nothing new under the sun, says Ecclesiastes. Wretched man is never to +know the entire truth but will be always at daggers drawn with his +destiny. After classic Paganism came romantic Christianity; after the +romantic will the pendulum swing back--or--alas! is there coming another +horde of atheists with a new Attila at their head?" + +He threw himself before the crucifix and sobbed. + +"Lord Jesus, Our Christ! Thou art the real Christ and not the fiction of +that supersubtle Greek-Jewish and boastful philosopher in Alexandria! +Make for me, O God, a sign! Give me back in all its purity my faith; +faith, noblest gift of all! Oh! to hear once more the thrilling of the +harps divine, whereon the dawn plays, those precursors of the Eternal +Harmony! _Gloria in Excelsis_." He remained prostrate, his heart no +longer battered by doubts and swimming in blissful love for his +crucified God. The celestial hurricane subsided in his bosom; he arose +and again interrogated the heavens. The stars in the profound splendours +of the sky stared at him like the naked eyes of _houris_. Suddenly a +vast white cloud sailed over the edge of the horizon and as it +approached his habitation assumed the shape of a monstrous dove, its +fleecy wings moving in solemn rhythms. In the resurgence of his hopes +this apparition was the coveted sign from the Almighty. + +And flat upon the floor of his cell, his face abased in the dust, Hyzlo +worshipped in epileptic frenzy, crying aloud, after the manner of the +sad-tongued Preacher:-- + +"The thing that hath been, it _is_ that which shall be!" + + + + +XI + +THE HAUNTED HARPSICHORD + +[In the Style of Mock-Medival Fiction] + + +I told Michael to look sharply to his horse. It was dusk; a few bits of +torn clouds, unresolved modulations of nebulous lace, trembled over the +pink pit in the west, wherein had sunk the sun; and one evening star, +silver pointed, told the tale of another spent day. + +Michael was surly, I was impatient, and the groom, who lagged in the +rear, whistled softly; but I knew that both men were tired and hungry, +and so were the horses. The road, hard and free from dust, echoed the +resilient hoof-falls of our beasts. The early evening was finely cool, +for it was the month of September. We had lost our way. Green fields on +either side, and before us the path declined down a steep slope, that +lost itself in huddled foliage. + +Michael spoke up:-- + +"We are astray. I knew this damnable excursion would lead to no good." + +I gently chided him. "Pooh, you braggart! Even Arnold, who rides a brute +a world too wide for him, has not uttered a complaint. Brave Michael, if +her ladyship heard you now!" + +His face grew hard as he muttered:-- + +"Her ladyship! may all the saints in the calendar watch over her +ladyship! But I wish she had never taken you at your hot-headed word. +Then we would not have launched upon this madcap adventure." + +I grew stern. "Her ladyship, I bid you remember, my worthy man, is our +mistress, and it ill behooves you to question her commands, especially +in the presence of a groom." + +Michael growled, and then the sudden turn in the road startled our +horses on a gallop, and for a quarter of an hour we thrashed our way +ahead in the twilight. We had entered a small thicket when an +ejaculation from Arnold--who had been riding abreast--brought us all up +to a sharp standstill. + +"There's a light," said the groom, in a most tranquil manner, pointing +his heavy crop stick to the left. How we had missed seeing the inn from +the crest of the hill was strange. A hundred yards away stood a low, +red-tiled house, with lights burning downstairs, and an unmistakable air +of hostlery for man and beast. We veered at once in our course, and in a +few minutes were hallooing for the host or the hostler. + +"Now I hope that you are satisfied, my friend," I said exultantly to +Michael, who only grunted as he swung off his animal. Arnold followed, +and soon we were chatting with an amiable old man in a white cap and +apron, who had run out of the house when we shouted. + +"Amboise?" he answered me when I told him of our destination. "Amboise; +why, sirrah, you are a good five leagues from Amboise! Step within and +remain here for the night. I have plenty of convenience for you and your +suite." + +I glanced at Michael, but he was busily employed in loosening his +pistols from the holster, and Arnold, in company with a lame man, led +the horses to the stable. There was little use in vain regrets. The +_other_ had the start of the half-day, and surely we could go no further +that night. I gritted my teeth as the little fat landlord led us into +the house. + +In half an hour we were smoking our pipes before a lively fire--the +night had grown chilly--and enjoying silent recollections of a round of +beef and several bottles of fortifying burgundy. + +Our groom had gone to bed, and I soon saw that I could get nothing out +of Michael for the present. He stared moodily into the fire. I noticed +that his pistols were handy. The host came in and asked my permission to +join us. He felt lonely, he explained, for he was a widower, and his +only son was away in the world somewhere. I was very glad to ease myself +with gossip; my heart was not quite at peace with this expedition of +ours. I knew what her ladyship asked of us was much, so much that only a +bold spirit and a thirst for the unknown could pardon the folly of the +chase. + +I bade the innkeeper to take a seat at the fire, and soon we fell to +chatting like ladies' maids. He was a Norman and curious as a cat. He +opened his inquiries delicately. + +"You have ridden far and fast to-day, my sir. Your horses were all but +done for. Yet there is no cloud of war in the sky and you are too far +from Paris to be honourable envoys. I hope you like our country?" + +I dodged his tentative attempt at prying by asking him a question +myself. + +"You don't seem to have many guests, good host? Yet do I hardly wonder +at it. You are all but swallowed up in the green and too far from the +main travelled road." + +The little man sighed and said in sad accents: "Too true, yet the +Scarlet Dragon was once a thriving place, a fine money-breeding house. +Before my son went away--" + +I interrupted him. "Your son, what is he, and where is he now?" + +The other became visibly agitated and puffed at his pipe some minutes +before replying. + +"Alas! worthy sir," he said at last in a lower key, "my son dare not +return here for reasons I cannot divulge. Indeed, this was no cheerful +house for the boy. He had his ambitions and he left me to pursue them." + +"What does he do, this youngster?" interrupted Michael, in his gruffest +tones. The landlord started. + +"Indeed, good sir, I could not tell you, for I know not myself." + +"Humph!" grunted my sullen companion; but I observed his suspicious +little eyes fixed persistently on the man of the inn. + +I turned the talk, which had threatened to languish. The old man did not +relish the questions about his son, and began deploring the poor crops. +At this juncture an indefinable feeling that we were losing time in +stopping at this lonely place came over me. I am not superstitious, but +I swear that I felt ill at ease and confused in my plans. + +On bended knee I had sworn to my lady that I would bring back to her the +fugitive unharmed, and I would never return to her empty-handed, +confessing failure. Michael's queer behaviour disconcerted me. From the +outset of the chase he had turned sour and inaccessible, and now he was +so ill-tempered that I feared he would pick a quarrel at the slightest +provocation with our host. + +With a strange sinking at the heart I asked about our horses. + +"They will be attended to, my sirs; my servant is a good boy. He is +handy, although he can't get about lively, for he was thrown in a turnip +field from our only donkey." + +I was in no mood for this sort of chatter and quizzed the fellow as to +our beds. + +"We must be off early in the morning; we have important business to +transact at Amboise before the sun sets to-morrow," I testily remarked. + +"At Amboise--h'm, h'm! Well, I don't mind telling you that you can reach +Amboise by stroke of noon; and so you have business at Amboise, eh?" + +I saw Michael's brow lower at this wheedling little man's question, and +answered rather hastily and imprudently:-- + +"Yes, business, my good man, important business, as you will see when we +return this road to-morrow night with the prize we are after." + +Michael jumped up and cried "Damnation!" and I at once saw my mistake. +The landlord's manner instantly altered. He looked at me triumphantly +and said:-- + +"Beds, beds! but, my honoured sirs, I have no beds in the house. I +forgot to tell you that no guest has been upstairs in years, for certain +reasons. Indeed, sirs, I am so embarrassed! I should have told you at +once I have only a day trade. My regular customers would not dare to +stop here over night, as the house,"--here a cunning, even sinister, +look spread over the fellow's fat face--"the house bears an evil +reputation." + +Michael started and crossed himself, but not I. I suspected some deep +devilry and determined to discover it. + +"So ho? Haunted, eh? Well, ghosts and old women's stories shan't make me +budge until dawn. Go fetch more wine and open it here, mine host of the +Scarlet Dragon," I roared. The little man was nonplussed, hesitated a +moment, and then trotted off. + +I saw that Michael was at last aroused. + +"What diabolical fooling is this? If the place is haunted, I'm off." + +"I'm damned if I am," I said quite bravely, and more wine appeared. We +both sat down. + +The air had become nipping, and the blaze on the hearth was reassuring. +Besides, the wind was querulous, and I didn't fancy a ride at midnight, +even if my lady's quest were an urgent one. + +Michael held his peace as the wine was poured out, and I insisted on the +landlord drinking with us. We finished two bottles, and I sent for more. +I foresaw that sleep was out of the question, and so determined to make +a night of it. + +"Touching upon this ghost," I began, when the other bade me in God's +name not to jest. There were some things, he said, not to be broached in +honest Christian company. + +"A fig for your scruples!" I cried, emptying my glass; my head was hot +and I felt bold. "A fig, I say, for your bogie-man nonsense! Tell me at +what time doth this phantom choose to show itself." The landlord +shivered and drew his seat closer to the fire. + +"Oh, sir, do not jest! What I tell you is no matter for rude laughter. +Begging your pardon for my offer, if you will be patient, I will relate +to you the story, and how my misfortune came from this awful visitant." + +Even Michael seemed placated, and after I nodded my head in token of +assent the landlord related to us this story:-- + + * * * * * + +Once upon a time, sirs, when the great and good Louis, sixteenth of his +name, was King of France, this domain was the property of the Duke of +Langlois. The duke was proud and rich, and prouder and haughtier was his +duchess, who was born Berri. Ah! they were mighty folk then, before the +Revolution came with its sharp axes to clip off their heads. This inn +was the stable of the chteau, which stood off yonder in the woods. +Alas! nothing remains of it to-day but a few blackened foundations, for +it was burned to the earth by the red devils in '93. But at the time I +speak of, the chteau was a big, rich palace, full of gay folk; all the +nobility came there, and the duchess ruled the land. + +She was crazy for music, and to such lengths did she go in her madness +that she even invited as her guests celebrated composers and singers. +The duke was old-fashioned and hated those crazy people who lived only +to hum and strum. He would have none of them, and quarrels with his +duchess were of daily occurrence. Indeed, sirs, so bad did it become +that he swore that he would leave the house if Messire Gluck, or Messire +Piccini, or any of the other strolling vagabonds--so the duke called +them--entered his chteau. And he kept his word, did the duke. The +Chevalier Gluck, a fine, shapely man, was invited down by the duchess +and amused her and her guests by playing his wonderful tunes on the +beautiful harpsichord in the great salon. + +The duke would have none of this nonsense and went to Paris, where he +amused himself gambling and throwing gold into his mistresses' laps. The +duchess kept right on, and then the gossips of the neighbourhood began +to wag their busy tongues. The lady of the chteau was getting very fine +pleasure from the company of the handsome Austrian chevalier. It was +whispered that the Queen Marie Antoinette had looked with favourable +eyes upon the composer, and, furthermore, had lent him certain moneys to +further his schemes for reforming the stage. + +Reform, forsooth! all he cared for was the company of the duchess, and +he vowed that he could make better music at the chteau than up in noisy +Paris. On a fine afternoon it is said that it was no uncommon sight to +see the chevalier, all togged up in his bravest court costume, sword and +all, sitting at his harpsichord, playing ravishing music. This was out +in the pretty little park back of the chteau, and the duchess would sit +at Gluck's side and pour out champagne for him. All this may have been +idle talk, but at last the duke got wind of the rumours, and one night +he surprised the pair playing a duo at the harpsichord, and stabbed them +both dead. + +Since then the chteau was burned down, but the place has been haunted. +I, myself, good gentlemen, have heard ghostly music, and I swear to +you-- + +"Oh, my God, listen, listen!" + +"What pagan nonsense!" blurted out Michael. + +I cautioned silence, and we all listened. The old man had slid off his +chair, and his face was chalky white. Michael's ugly mouth was half +opened in his black beard, and I confess that I felt rather chilly. + +Music, faint, tinkling, we certainly heard. It came with the wind in +little sobs, and then silence settled upon us. + +"It's the Chevalier Gluck, and he is playing to his duchess out in the +fields. See, I will open the door and show you," whispered the fat +landlord. + +He went slowly to the door, and we followed him breathlessly. The door +was pushed open, and we peered out. The wind was still high, and the +moon rode among rolling boulders of yellow, fleecy clouds. + +"There, there, over yonder, look; Mother of Christ, look at the ghost!" +the old man pointed a shaking hand. + +Just then the moonlight was blackened by a big cloud, and we heard the +tinkling music of a harpsichord again, but could see naught. The sounds +were plainer now, and presently resolved into the rhythmic accents of a +gavotte. But it seemed far away and very plaintive! + +"Hark," said Michael, in a hoarse voice. "That's the gavotte from +Pagliacci. Listen! Don't you remember it?" + +"Pshaw!" I said roughly, for my nerves were all astir. "It's the Alceste +music of Gluck." + +"Look, look, gentlemen!" called our host, and as the moon glowed again +in the blue we saw at the edge of the forest a white figure, saw it, I +swear, although it vanished at once and the music ceased. I started to +follow, but Michael and the old man seized my arms, the door was closed +with a crash, and we found ourselves staring blankly into the fire, all +feeling a bit shaken up. + +It was Michael's turn to speak. "You may do what you please, but I stay +here for the night, no sleep for me," and he placed his pistols on his +knee. + +I looked at the landlord and I thought I saw an expression of +disappointment on his face, but I was not sure. He made some excuse +about being tired and went out of the room. We spent the rest of the +night in gloomy silence. We did not speak five words, for I saw that +conversation only irritated my companion. + +At dawn we walked into the sweet air and I called loudly for Arnold, who +looked sleepy and out of sorts when he appeared. The fat old man came to +see us off and smilingly accepted the silver I put into his hand for our +night's reckoning. + +"Au revoir, my old friend," I said as I pressed the unnecessary spur +into my horse's flank. "Au revoir, and look out for the ghost of the +gallant Chevalier Gluck. Tell him, with my compliments, not to play +such latter-day tunes as the gavotte from Pagliacci." + +"Oh, I'll tell him, you may be sure," said he, quite dryly. + +We saluted and dashed down the road to Amboise, where we hoped to +capture our rare prize. + +We had ridden about a mile when a dog attempted to cross our path. We +all but ran the poor brute down. + +"Why, it's lame!" exclaimed Arnold. + +"Oh, if it were but a lame man, instead of a dog!" fervently said the +groom, who was in the secret of our quest. + +A horrid oath rang out on the smoky morning air. Michael, his wicked +eyes bulging fiercely, his thick neck swollen with rage, was cursing +like the army in Flanders, as related by dear old Uncle Toby. + +"Lame man! why, oddsbodkins, that hostler was lame! Oh, fooled, by God! +cheated, fooled, swindled and tricked by that scamp and scullion of the +inn! Oh, we've been nicely swindled by an old wives' tale of a ghost!" + +I stared in sheer amazement at Michael, wondering if the strangely spent +night had upset his reason. He could only splutter out between his awful +curses:-- + +"Gluck, the rascal, the ghost, the man we're after! That +harpsichord--the lying knave--that tune--I swear it wasn't Gluck--oh, +the rascal has escaped again! The ghost story--the villain was told to +scare us out of the house--to put us off the track. A thousand devils +chase the scamp!" And Michael let his head drop on the pommel of his +saddle as he fairly groaned in the bitterness of defeat. + +I had just begun a dignified rebuke, for Michael's language was +inexcusable, when it flashed upon me that we had been, indeed, duped. + +"Ah," I cried, in my fury, "of course we were taken in! Of course his +son was the lame hostler, the very prize we expected to bag! O Lord! +what will we say to my lady? We are precious sharp! I ought to have +known better. That stuff he told us! Langlois, pshaw, Berri--pouf! A +Berri never married a Langlois, and I might have remembered that Gluck +wasn't assassinated by a jealous duke. What shall we do?" + +We all stood in the middle of the road, gazing stupidly at the lame dog +that gave us the clue. Then Arnold timidly suggested:-- + +"Hadn't we better go back to the inn?" + +Instantly our horses' heads were turned and we galloped madly back on +our old tracks. Not a word was uttered until we reined up in front of +the lonely house, which looked more haunted by daylight than it did the +night before. + +"What did I tell you?" suddenly cried Michael. + +"What do you mean?" I asked. + +"Over there, you blind bat!" he said, coarsely and impatiently; and +pulling out his pistol he fired thrice, and a low, melodious sound +followed the reports of his weapon. When the smoke cleared away I saw +that he had hit an old harpsichord which stood against a tree, facing +the house. + +"The ghost!" we yelled, and then we laughed consumedly. But the shots +that winged the old-fashioned instrument had a greater result. The fat +host appeared on the edge of the forest, and he waved a large napkin as +a flag of truce. With him was the lame hostler. + +"Mercy, gentlemen, mercy, we beseech you!" he cried, and we soon +surrounded both and bound them securely. + +"You will pay dearly for the trick you put upon us, my man," said +Michael, grimly, and, walking our horses, we went by easy stages toward +the castle, towing our prisoners along. + +When I fetched the lame man to my lady, her face glowed with joy, and +her Parisian eyes grew brilliant with victory. + +"So you tried to escape?" she cruelly asked of the poor, cowering +wretch. "You will never get another chance, I'll warrant me. Go, let the +servants put you to work in the large music room first. Begin with the +grands, then follow with the uprights. Thank you, gentlemen both, for +the courage and finesse you displayed in this desperate quest. I'll see +that you are both suitably rewarded." I fancied that Michael regarded +me sardonically, but he held his peace about the night's adventures. + +We had indeed reason to feel flattered at the success of the dangerous +expedition. Had we not captured, more by sheer good luck than strategy, +the only piano-tuner in medival France? + + + + +XII + +THE TRAGIC WALL + + +I + +BY THE DARK POOL + +It was not so high, the wall, as massive, not so old as moss-covered. +After Rudolph Ct, the painter, had achieved celebrity with his +historical canvas, The Death of the Antique World, now in the Louvre, he +bought the estate of Chalfontaine, which lies at the junction of two +highroads: one leading to Ecouen, the other to Villiers-le-Bel. Almost +touching the end of the park on the Ecouen side there is a little lake, +hardly larger than a pool, and because of its melancholy +aspect--sorrowful willows hem it about, drooping into stagnant +waters--Monsieur Ct had christened the spot: The Dark Tarn of Auber. He +was a fanatical lover of Poe, reading him in the Baudelaire translation, +and openly avowing his preference for the French version of the great +American's tales. That he could speak only five words of English did not +deter his associates from considering him a profound critic of +literature. + +After his death his property and invested wealth passed into the hands +of his youthful widow, a charming lady, a native of Burgundy, and--if +gossip did not lie--a former model of the artist; indeed, some went so +far as to assert that her face could be seen in her late husband's +masterpiece--the figure of a young Greek slave attired as a joyous +bacchante. But her friends always denied this. Her dignified bearing, +sincere sorrow for her dead husband, and her motherly solicitude for her +daughter left no doubt as to the value of all petty talk. It was her +custom of summer evenings to walk to the pool, and with her daughter +Berenice she would sit on the broad wall and watch the moon rise, or +acknowledge the respectful salutations of the country folk with their +bran-speckled faces. In those days Villiers-le-Bel was a dull town a +half-hour from Paris on the Northern Railway, and about two miles from +the station. + +The widow was not long without offers. Her usual answer was to point out +the tiny Berenice, playing in the garden with her nurse. Then a +landscape painter, one of the Barbizon group, appeared, and, as a former +associate of Rudolph Ct, and a man of means and position, his suit was +successful. To the astonishment of Villiers-le-Bel, Madame Valerie Ct +became Madame Thophile Mineur; on the day of the wedding little +Berenice--named after a particularly uncanny heroine of Poe's by his +relentless French admirer--scratched the long features of her +stepfather. The entire town accepted this as a distressing omen and it +was not deceived; Berenice Ct grew up in the likeness of a determined +young lady whose mother weakly endured her tyranny, whose new father +secretly feared her. + +At the age of eighteen she had refused nearly all the young painters +between Ecouen and Domaine de Vallires; and had spent several summers +in England, and four years at a Lausanne school. She feared neither man +nor mouse, and once, when she saw a famous Polish pianist walking on his +terrace at Morges, she took him by the hand, asked for a lock of his +hair, and was not refused by the amiable virtuoso. After that Berenice +was the acknowledged leader of her class. The teachers trembled before +her sparkling, wrathful black eyes. At home she ruled the household, and +as she was an heiress no one dared to contradict her. Her contempt for +her stepfather was only matched by her impatience in the company of +young men. She pretended--so her intimates said--to loathe them. +"Frivolous idiots" was her mildest form of reproof when an ambitious boy +would trench upon her pet art theories or attempt to flirt. She called +her mother "the lamb" and her stepfather "the parrot"--he had a long +curved nose; all together she was very unlike the pattern French girl. +Her favourite lounging place was the wall, and after she had draped it +with a scarlet shawl and perched herself upon it, she was only too +happy to worry any unfortunate man who presented himself. + +The night Hubert Falcroft called at Chalfontaine Mademoiselle lise +Evergonde told him that her cousin, Madame Mineur, and Berenice had gone +in the direction of the pool. He had walked over from the station, +preferring the open air to the stuffy train. So a few vigorous steps +brought to his view mother and daughter as they slowly moved, encircling +each other's waist. The painter paused and noted the general loveliness +of the picture; the setting sun had splashed the blue basin overhead +with delicate pinks, and in the fretted edges of some high floating +cloud-fleece there was a glint of fire. The smooth grass parquet swept +gracefully to the semicircle of dark green trees, against the foliage of +which the virginal white of the gowns was transposed to an ivory tone by +the blue and green keys in sky and forest. + +"By Jove!" he exclaimed, "paint in the foreground a few peacocks +languidly dragging their gorgeous tails, and you have a Watteau or a +Fragonard--no, a Monticelli! Only, Monticelli would have made the +peacocks the central motive with the women and trees as an arabesque." + +He was a portraitist who solemnly believed in the principle of +decoration--character must take its chances when he painted. Falcroft +was successful with women's heads, which he was fond of depicting in +misty shadows framed by luxurious accessories. They called him the +Master of Chiffon, at Julien's; when he threw overboard his old friends +and joined the new crowd, their indignation was great. His title now was +the Ribbon Impressionist, and at the last salon of the Independents, +Falcroft had the mortification of seeing a battalion of his former +companions at anchor in front of his picture, The Lady with the Cat, +which they reviled for at least an hour. He was an American who had +lived his life long in France, and only showed race in his nervous, +brilliant technic and his fondness for bizarre subjects.... + +He had not stood many minutes when a young voice saluted him:-- + +"Ah, Monsieur Falcroft. Come, come quickly. Mamma is delighted to see +you!" His mental picture was decomposed by the repeated waving of the +famous shawl, which only came into view as Berenice turned. Hubert +regretted that she had not worn it--the peacocks could have been +exchanged for its vivid note of scarlet. Pretending not to have heard +her speech, he gravely saluted the mother and daughter. But Berenice was +unabashed. + +"Mamma was wondering if you would visit us to-night, Monsieur Falcroft, +when I saw you staring at us as if we were ghosts." A burst of malicious +laughter followed. + +"Berenice, Berenice," remonstrated her mother, "when will you cease such +tasteless remarks!" She blushed in her pretty matronly fashion and put +her hand on her daughter's mouth. + +"Don't mind her, Madame Mineur! I like to meet a French girl with a +little unconventionality. Berenice reminds me now of an English girl--" + +"Or one of your own countrywomen!" interrupted Berenice; "and +please--_Miss_, after this, I am a grown young lady." He joined in the +merriment. She was not to be resisted and he wished--no, he did not +wish--but he thought, that if he were younger, what gay days he might +have. Yet he admired her mother much more. Elaine Ct-Mineur was an +old-fashioned woman, gentle, reserved, and at the age when her beauty +had a rare autumnal quality--the very apex of its perfection; in a few +years, in a year, perhaps, the change would come and crabbed winter set +in. He particularly admired the oval of her face, her soft brown eyes, +and the harmonious contour of her head. He saw her instantly with a +painter's imagination--filmy lace must modulate about her head like a +dreamy aureole; across her figure a scarf of yellow silk; in her hands +he would paint a crystal vase, and in the vase one rose with a heart of +sulphur. And her eyes would gaze as if she saw the symbol of her +age--the days slipping away like ropes of sand from her grasp. He could +make a fascinating portrait he thought, and he said so. Instantly +another peal of irritating laughter came from Berenice:-- + +"Don't tell papa. He is _so_ jealous of the portrait he tried to make of +mamma last summer. You never saw it! It's awful. It's hid away behind a +lot of canvases in the atelier. It looks like a Czanne still-life. I'll +show it to you sometime." Her mother revealed annoyance by compressing +her lips. Falcroft said nothing. They had skirted the pool in single +file, for the path was narrow and the denseness of the trees caused a +partial obscurity. When they reached the wall, the moon was rising in +the eastern sky. + +"_L'heure exquise_," murmured Madame Mineur. Berenice wandered down the +road and Hubert helped her mother to the wall, where he sat beside her +and looked at her. He was a big, muscular man with shaven cheeks, dark +eyes, and plenty of tumbled hair, in which flecks of gray were showing. +He had been a classmate of Thophile Mineur, for whose talents or +personality he had never betrayed much liking. But one day at a +_djener_, which had prolonged itself until evening, Mineur insisted on +his old friend--the Burgundy was old, too--accompanying him to +Villiers-le-Bel, and not without a motive. He knew Falcroft to be rich, +and he would not be sorry to see his capricious and mischievous +stepdaughter well settled. But Falcroft immediately paid court to Madame +Mineur, and Berenice had to content herself with watching him and making +fun to her stepfather of the American painter's height and gestures. +The visit had been repeated. Berenice was amused by a dinner _en ville_ +and a theatre party, and then Hubert Falcroft became a friend of the +household. When Mineur was away painting, the visits were not +interrupted. + +"Listen," said Madame Mineur; "I wish to speak with you seriously, my +dear friend." She made a movement as if to place her hand on his +shoulder, but his expression--his face was in the light--caused her to +transfer her plump fingers to her coiffure, which she touched +dexterously. Hubert was disappointed. + +"I am listening," he answered; "is it a sermon, or consent--to that +portrait? Come, give in--Elaine." He had never called her by this name +before, and he anxiously awaited the result. But she did not relax her +grave attitude. + +"You must know, Monsieur Falcroft, what anxieties we undergo about +Berenice. She is too wild for a French girl, too wild for her age--" + +"Oh, let her enjoy her youth," he interrupted. + +"Alas! that youth will be soon a thing of the past," she sighed. +"Berenice is past eighteen, and her father and I must consider her +future. Figure to yourself--she dislikes young men, eligible or not, and +you are the only man she tolerates." + +"And I am hopelessly ineligible," he laughingly said. + +"Why?" asked the mother, quietly. + +"Why! Do you know that I am nearing forty? Do you see the pepper and +salt in my hair? After one passes twoscore it is time to think of the +past, not of the future. I am over the brow of the hill; I see the easy +decline of the road--it doesn't seem as long as when I climbed the other +half." He smiled, threw back his strong shoulders, and inhaled a huge +breath of air. + +"Truly you are childish," she said; "you are at the best part of your +life, of your career. Yes, Thophile, my husband, who is so chary in his +praise, said that you would go far if you cared." Her low, warm voice, +with its pleading inflections, thrilled him. He took her by the wrist. + +"And would it please _you_, if I went far?" She trembled. + +"Not too far, dear friend--remember Berenice." + +"I remember no one but you," he impatiently answered; and relaxing his +hold, he moved so that the moonlight shone on her face. She was pale. In +her eyes there were fright and hope, decision and delight. He admired +her more than ever. + +"Let me paint you, Elaine, these next few weeks. It will be a surprise +for Mineur. And I shall have something to cherish. Never mind about +Berenice. She is a child. I am a middle-aged man. Between us is the +wall--of the years. Never should it be climbed. While you--" + +"Be careful--Hubert. Thophile is your friend." + +"He is not. I never cared for him. He dragged me out here after he had +been drinking too much, and when I saw you I could not stay away. Hear +me--I insist! Berenice is nice, but the wall is too high for her to +climb; it might prove a--" + +"How do you know the wall is too steep for Berenice?" the girl cried as +she scaled the top with apish agility, where, after a few mocking steps +in the moonlight, she sank down breathless beside Hubert, and laughed so +loudly that her mother was fearful of hysteria. + +"Berenice! Berenice!" she exclaimed. + +"Oh, Berenice is all right, mamma. Master Hubert, I want you to paint my +portrait before papa returns--that's to be in four weeks, isn't it?" The +elder pair regarded her disconcertedly. + +"Oh, you needn't look so dismal. I'll not tell tales out of school. +Hubert and mamma flirting! What a glorious jest! Isn't life a jest, +Hubert? Let's make a bargain! If you paint mamma, you paint me, also. +Then--you see--papa will not be jealous, and--and--" She was near tears +her mother felt, and she leaned over Hubert and took the girl's hand. +She grazed the long fingers of the painter, who at once caught both +feminine hands in his. + +"Now I have you both," he boasted, and was shocked by a vicious tap on +the cheek--Berenice in rage pulled her left hand free. Silence ensued. +Hubert prudently began to roll another cigarette, and Madame Mineur +retreated out of the moonlight, while Berenice turned her back and soon +began to hum. The artist spoke first: + +"See here, you silly Berenice, turn around! I want to talk to you like a +Dutch uncle--as we say in the United States. Of course I'll paint you. +But I begin with your mother. And if you wish me to like you better than +ever, don't say such things as you did. It hurts your--mother." His +voice dropped into its deepest bass. She faced him, and he saw the +glitter of wet eyelashes. She was charming, with her hair in disorder, +her eyes two burning points of fire. + +"I beg your pardon, mamma; I beg your pardon, Hubert. I'll be good the +rest of this evening. Isn't it lovely?" She sniffed in the breeze with +dilating nostrils, and the wild look of her set him to wondering how +such a gentle mother could have such a gypsy daughter. Perhaps it was +the father--yes, the old man had been an Apache in his youth according +to the slang of the studios. + +"But you must paint me as I wish, not as you will," resumed Berenice. "I +hate conventional portraits. Papa Mineur chills me with his cabinet +pictures of haughty society ladies, their faces as stiff as their +starched gowns." + +"Oh, Berenice, will you never say polite things of your father?" + +"Never," she defiantly replied. "He wouldn't believe me if I did. No, +Hubert, I want to pose as Ophelia. Oh, don't laugh, please!" They could +not help it, and she leaped to the grass and called out:-- + +"I don't mean a theatrical Ophelia, singing songs and spilling flowers; +I mean Ophelia drowned--" she threw herself on the sward, her arms +crossed on her bosom, and in the moonlight they could see her eyes +closed as if by death. + +"Help me down, Hubert. That girl will go mad some day." He reached the +earth and he gave her a hand. Berenice had arisen. Sulkily she said:-- + +"Shall I step into the Dark Tarn of Auber and float for you? I'll make a +realistic picture, my Master Painter--who paints without imagination." +And then she darted into the shrubbery and was lost to view. Without +further speech the two regained the path and returned to the house. + + +II + +THE CRIMSON SPLASH + +When loise was asked by Berenice how long Monsieur Mineur would remain +away on his tour, she did not reply. Rather, she put a question herself: +why this sudden solicitude about the little-loved stepfather. Berenice +jokingly answered that she thought of slipping away to Switzerland for +a _vacance_ on her own account. loise, who was not agreeable looking, +viewed her charge suspiciously. + +"Young lady, you are too deep for me. But you'll bear watching," she +grimly confessed. Berenice skipped about her teasingly. + +"I know something, but I won't tell, unless you tell." + +"What is it?" + +"Will you tell?" + +"Yes." + +"When is he coming back, and where is he now?" she insisted. + +"Your father, you half-crazy child, expects to return in a month--by the +first of June. And if you wish to wire or write him, let me know." + +"Now I won't tell you _my_ secret," and she was off like a gale of wind. +loise shook her head and wondered. + +In the atelier Hubert painted. Elaine sat on a dais, her hands folded in +her lap; about her head twisted nun's-veiling gave her the old-fashioned +quality of a Cosway miniature--the very effect he had sought. It was to +be a "pretty" affair, this picture, with its subdued lighting, the face +being the only target he aimed at; all the rest, the suave background, +the gauzy draperies, he would brush in--suggest rather than state. + +"I'll paint her soul, that sensitive soul of hers which tremulously +peeps out of her eyes," he thought. Elaine was a patient subject. She +took the pose naturally and scarcely breathed during the weary sittings. +He recalled the early gossip and sought to evoke her as a professional +model. But he gave up in despair. She was hopelessly "ladylike," and to +interpret her adequately, only the decorative patterns of earlier +men--Mignard, Van Loo, Nattier, Largillire--would translate her native +delicacy. + +For nearly four weeks he had laboured on the face, painting it in with +meticulous touches only to rub it out with savage disgust. To transcribe +those tranquil, liquid eyes, their expression more nave than her +daughter's--this had proved too difficult a problem for the usually +facile technique of Falcroft. Give him a brilliant virtuoso theme and he +could handle it with some of the sweep and splendour of the early +Carolus Duran or the brutal elegance of the later Boldini. But Madame +Mineur was a pastoral. She did not express nervous gesture. She was +seldom dynamic. To "do" her in dots like the _pointillistes_ or in +touches after the manner of the earlier impressionists would be +ridiculous. Her abiding charm was her repose. She brought to him the +quiet values of an eighteenth-century eclogue--he saw her as a divinely +artificial shepherdess watching an unreal flock, while the haze of +decorative atmosphere would envelop her, with not a vestige of real life +on the canvas. Yet he knew her as a natural, lovable woman, a mother who +had suffered and would suffer because of her love for her only child. +It was a paradox, like many other paradoxes of art. + +The daughter--ah! perhaps she might better suit his style. She was +admirable in her madcap carelessness and exotic colouring. Decidedly he +would paint her when this picture was finished--if it ever would be. + +Berenice avoided entering the studio during these sittings. She no +longer jested with her mother about the picture, and with Hubert she +preserved such an air of dignity that he fancied he had offended her. He +usually came to Villiers-le-Bel on an early train three or four times a +week and remained at Chalfontaine until ten o'clock. Never but once had +a severe storm forced him to stay overnight. Since the episode on the +wall he had not attempted any further advances. He felt happy in the +company of Elaine, and gazing into her large eyes rested his spirit. It +was true--he no longer played with ease the rle of a soul-hunter. His +youth had been troubled by many adventures, many foolish ones, and now +he felt a calm in the midway of his life and that desire for domestic +ease which sooner or later overtakes all men. He fancied himself +painting Elaine on just such tranquil summer afternoons under a soft +light. And oh! the joys of long walks, discreet gossip, and dinners at a +well-served table with a few chosen friends. Was he, after all, longing +for the flesh-pots of the philistine--he, Hubert Falcroft, who had +patrolled the boulevards like other sportsmen of midnight! + +At last the picture began to glow with that inner light he had so +patiently pursued. Elaine Mineur looked at him from the canvas with +veiled sweetness, a smile almost enigmatic lurking about her lips. +Deepen a few lines and her expression would be one of contented +sleekness. _That_ Hubert had missed by a stroke. It was in her eyes that +her chief glory abided. They were pathetic without resignation, liquid +without humidity, indescribable in colouring and form. Their full cup +and the accents which experience had graven under them were something he +had never dreamed of realizing. It was a Cosway; but a Cosway broadened +and without a hint of genteel namby-pamby or overelaborate finesse. +Hubert was fairly satisfied. Madame Mineur had little to say. During the +sittings she seldom spoke, and if their eyes met, the richness of her +glance was a compensation for her lack of loquacity. Hubert did not +complain. He was in no hurry. To be under the same roof with this +adorable woman was all that he asked. + +The day after he had finished his picture, he returned to Chalfontaine +for the midday breakfast. Berenice was absent--in her room with a +headache, her mother explained. The weather was sultry. He questioned +Elaine during the meal. Had Berenice's temper improved? They passed out +to the balcony where their coffee was served, and when he lighted his +cigarette, Madame Mineur begged to be excused. She had promised Cousin +loise to pay some calls. He strolled over the lawn, watching the +hummocks of white clouds which piled up in architectural masses across +the southern sky. Then he remembered the portrait and mounted to the +atelier. As he put his hand on the knob of the door he thought he heard +some one weeping. Suddenly the door was pulled from his grasp and +Berenice appeared. Her hair hung on her shoulders. She was in a white +dressing-gown. Her face was red and her eyes swollen. She did not +attempt to move. Affectionately Hubert caught her in his arms and asked +about her headache. + +"It is better," she answered in scarcely audible accents. + +"Why, you poor child! I hope you are not going to be ill! Have you been +racing in the sun without your hat?" + +"No. I haven't been out of doors since yesterday." + +"What's the matter, little Berenice? Has some one been cross with her?" +She pushed him from her violently. + +"Hubert Falcroft, when you treat me as a woman and not as a child--" + +"But I am treating you as a woman," he said. Her dark face became +tragic. She had emerged from girlhood in a few hours. And as he held her +closer some perverse spirit entered into his soul. Her vibrating youth +and beauty forced him to gaze into her blazing eyes until he saw the +pupils contract. + +"Let me go!" she panted. "Let me free! I am not a doll. Go to your +portrait and worship it. Let me free!" + +"And what if I do not?" Something of her rebellious feeling filled his +veins. He felt younger, stronger, fiercer. He put his arms about her +neck and, after a silent battle, kissed her. Then she pushed by him and +disappeared. He could see nothing, after the shock of the adventure, for +some moments, and the semi-obscurity of the atelier was grateful to his +eyes. A picture stood on the easel, but it was not, he fancied, the +portrait. He went to the centre of the room where hung the cords that +controlled the curtains covering the glass roof. Then in the flood of +light he barely recognized the head of Elaine. It was on the easel, and +with a sharp pain at his heart he saw across the face a big crimson +splash. + + * * * * * + + +III + +MOON-RAYS + +The dewy brightness of tangled blush roses had faded in the vague +twilight; through the aisles of the little wood leading to the pool the +light timidly flickered as Hubert and Elaine walked with the hesitating +steps of perplexed persons. They had not spoken since they left the +house--there in a few hurried words he told her of the accident and +noted with sorrow the look of anguish in her eyes. Without knowing why, +they went in the direction of the wall. + +There was no moon when they reached the highroad. It would rise later, +Elaine said in her low, slightly monotonous voice. Hubert was so stunned +by the memory of his ruined picture that he forgot his earlier encounter +with Berenice--that is, in describing it he had failed to minutely +record his behaviour. But in the cool evening air his conscience became +alive and he guiltily wondered whether he dare tell his misconduct--no, +imprudence? Why not? She regarded him as a possible husband for +Berenice--but how embarrassing! He made up his mind to say nothing; when +the morrow came he would write Elaine the truth and bid her good-by. He +could not in honour continue to visit this home where resided the woman +he loved--with a jealous daughter. Why jealous? What a puzzle, and what +an absurd one! He helped Elaine to a seat on the wall and sat near her. +For several minutes neither spoke. They were again facing the pool, +which looked in the dusk like a cracked mirror. + +"It is not clear yet to me," murmured Elaine. "That the unfortunate +child has always been more or less morbid and sick-brained, I have been +aware. The world, marriage, and active existence will mend all that, I +hope. I fear she is a little spoilt and selfish. And she doesn't love me +very much. She has inherited all her father's passion for Poe's tales. +My dear friend, she is jealous--that's the only solution of this +shocking act. She disliked the idea of my portrait from the start. You +remember on this spot hardly a month ago she challenged you to paint her +as the drowned Ophelia!--and all her teasing about Monsieur Mineur and +his jealousy, and--" + +"Our flirtation," added Hubert, sadly. + +"Oh, pray do not say such a thing! She is so hot-headed, so fond of you. +Yes, I saw it from the beginning, and your talk about the insurmountable +wall of middle-age did not deceive me. I only hope that will not be a +tragic wall for her, for you--or for me...." + +Her words trailed into a mere whisper. He put his hand over hers and +again they were silent. About them the green of the forest had been +transformed by the growing night into great clumps of velvety darkness +and the vault overhead was empty of stars. June airs fanned their +discontent into mild despair, and simultaneously they dreamed of another +life, of a harmonious existence far from Paris, into which the phantom +of Thophile Mineur would never intrude. Yet they made no demonstration +of their affection--they would have been happy to sit and dream on this +moon-haunted wall, near this nocturnal pool, forever. Hubert pictured +Berenice in her room, behind bolted doors, lying across the bed weeping, +or else staring in sullen repentance at the white ceiling. Why had she +indulged in such vandalism? The portrait was utterly destroyed by the +flaring smear laid on with a brush in the hand of an enraged young +animal. What sort of a woman might not develop from this tempestuous +girl! He knew that he had mortally offended her by his rudeness. But it +was after, not before, the cruel treatment of his beloved work. Yet, how +like a man had been his rapid succumbing to transitory temptation! For +it was transitory--of that he was sure. The woman he loved, with a +reverent love, was next to him, and if his pulse did not beat as +furiously at this moment as earlier in the day, why--all the better. He +was through forever with his boyish recklessness. + +"Another peculiar thing," broke in Elaine, as if she had been thinking +aloud, "is that Berenice has been pestering loise for her father's +address." + +"Her father's address?" echoed her companion. + +"Yes; but whether she wrote to him loise could not say." + +"Why should she write to him? She dislikes him--dislikes him almost as +much--" he was about to pronounce his own name. She caught him up. + +"Yes, that is the singular part of this singular affair. She felt +slighted because you painted my portrait before hers. I confess I have +had my misgivings. You should have been more considerate of her +feelings, Hubert, my friend." She paused and sighed. For him the sigh +was a spark that blew up the magazine of his firmest resolves. He had +been touching her hands fraternally. His arm embraced her so that she +could not escape, as this middle-aged man told his passion with the +ardour of an enamoured youth. + +"You dare not tell me you do not care for me! Elaine--let us reason. I +loved you since the first moment I met you. It is folly to talk of +Mineur and my friendship for him. I dislike, I despise him. It is folly +to talk of Berenice and her childish pranks. What if she did cruelly +spoil my work, _our_ work! She will get over it. Girls always do get +over these things. Let us accept conditions as they are. Say you love +me--a little bit--and I'll be content to remain at your side, a friend, +_always_ that. I'll paint you again--much more beautifully than before." +He was hoarse from the intensity of his feelings. The moon had risen and +tipped with its silver brush the tops of the trees. + +"And--my husband? And Berenice?" + +"Let things remain as they are." He pressed her to him. A crackling in +the underbrush and a faint plash in the lake startled them asunder. They +listened with ears that seemed like beating hearts. There was no +movement; only a night bird plaintively piped in the distance and a +clock struck the quarter. + +Elaine, now thoroughly frightened, tried to get down from the wall. +Hubert restrained her, and as they stood thus, a moaning like the wind +in autumnal leaves reached them. The moon-rays began to touch the water, +and suddenly a nimbus of light formed about a floating face in the pool. +The luminous path broadened, and to their horror they saw Berenice, her +hair outspread, her arms crossed on her young bosom, lying in the little +lake. Elaine screamed:-- + +"My God! My God! It is Berenice!--Berenice, I am punished for my +wickedness to you!" Hubert, stunned by the vision, did not stir, as the +almost fainting mother gripped his neck. + +And then the eyes of the whimsical girl opened. A malicious smile +distorted her pretty face. Slowly she arose, a dripping ghost in white, +and pointing her long, thin fingers in the direction of the Ecouen road +she mockingly cried:-- + +"There is some one to see your portrait at last, dear Master Painter." +And saying this she vanished in the gloom, instantly followed by her +agitated mother. + +Hubert turned toward the wall, and upon it he recognized the stepfather +of Berenice. After staring at each other like two moon-struck wights, +the American spoke:-- + +"I swear that I, alone, am to blame for this--" The other wore the grin +of a malevolent satyr. His voice was thick. + +"Why apologize, Hubert? You know that it has been my devoted wish that +you marry Berenice." He swayed on his perch. Hubert's brain was in a +fog. + +"Berenice!" said he. + +"Yes--Berenice. Why not? She loves you." + +"Then--you--Madame Mineur--" stammered Hubert. The Frenchman placed his +finger on his nose and slyly whispered:-- + +"Don't be afraid! I'll not tell my wife that I caught Berenice with you +alone in the park--you Don Juan! Now to the portrait--I must see that +masterpiece of yours. Berenice wrote me about it." He nodded his head +sleepily. + +"Berenice wrote you about it!" was the mechanical reply. + +"I'll join you and we'll go to the house." He tried to step down, but +rolled over at Hubert's feet. + +"What a joke is this champagne," he growled as he was lifted to his +tottering legs. "We had a glorious time this afternoon before I left +Paris. Hurrah! You're to be my son-in-law. And, my boy, I don't envy +you--that's the truth. With such a little demon for a wife--I pity you, +pity you--hurrah!" + +"I am more to be despised," muttered Hubert Falcroft, as they moved away +from the peaceful moonlit wall. + + + + +XIII + +A SENTIMENTAL REBELLION + + I came not to send peace, but a sword.... I am come to send fire on + the earth. + + +I + +Her living room was a material projection of Yetta Silverman's soul. The +apartment on the north side of Tompkins Square, was small, sunny, and +comfortable. From its windows in spring and summer she could see the +boys and girls playing around the big, bare park, and when her eyes grew +tired of the street she rested them on her beloved books and pictures. +On one wall hung the portraits of Herzen, Bakounine and Kropotkin--the +Father, Son, and Holy Ghost of the anarchistic movement, as she piously +called them. Other images of the propaganda were scattered over the +walls: Netschajew--the St. Paul of the Nihilists--Ravachol, Octave +Mirbeau, Jean Grave, Reclus, Spies, Parsons, Engels, and Lingg--the last +four victims of the Haymarket affair, and the Fenians, Allen, Larkin, +and O'Brien, the Manchester martyrs. Among the philosophers, poets, and +artists were Schopenhauer, Tolstoy, Max Stirner--a rare drawing--Ibsen, +Thoreau, Emerson--the great American individualists--Beethoven, Zola, +Richard Strauss, Carlyle, Nietzsche, Gorky, Walt Whitman, Dostoiewsky, +Mazzini, Rodin, Constantin Meunier, Shelley, Turgnieff, Bernard Shaw, +and finally the kindly face and intellectual head of the lawyer who so +zealously defended the Chicago anarchists. This diversified group, +together with much revolutionary literature, poems, pamphlets, the works +of Proudhon, Songs Before Sunrise, by Swinburne, and a beautiful etching +of Makart's proletarian Christ, completed, with an old square +pianoforte, the ensemble of an individual room, a room that expressed, +as her admirers said, the strong, suffering soul of Yetta Silverman, +Russian anarchist, agitator, and exile. + +"Come in," she cried out in her sharp, though not unpleasant, voice. A +thin young man entered. She clapped her hands. + +"Oh, so you changed your mind!" He looked at her over his glasses with +his weak, blue eyes, the white of which predominated. Simply dressed, he +nevertheless gave the impression of superior social station. He was of +the New England theological-seminary type--narrow-chested, gaunt as to +visage, by temperament drawn to theology, or, in default of religious +belief, an ardent enthusiast in sociology. The contracted temples, +uncertain gaze, and absence of fulness beneath the eyes betrayed the +unimaginative man. Art was a sealed book to him, though taxation fairly +fired his suspicious soul. He was nervous because he was dyspeptic, and +at one time of his career he mistook stomach trouble for a call to the +pulpit. And he was a millionnaire more times than he took the trouble to +count. + +"Yes," he timidly replied, "I _did_ change my wavering mind--as you call +that deficient organ of mine--and so I returned. I hope I don't disturb +you!" + +"No, not yet. I am sitting with my hands folded in my lap, like the +women of your class--_ladies_, you call them." She accented the title, +without bitterness. A cursory estimate of her appearance would have +placed her in the profession of a trained nurse, or perhaps in the +remotest analysis, a sewing woman of superior tastes. She was small, +wiry, her head too large for her body; but the abounding nervous +vitality, the harsh fire that burned in her large brown eyes, and the +firm mouth would have attracted the attention of the most careless. Her +mask, with its high Slavic cheek-bones and sharp Jewish nose, proclaimed +her a magnetic woman. In her quarter on the far East Side the children +called her "Aunt Yetta." She was a sister of charity in the guise of a +revolutionist. + +"You sit but you think, and _my_ ladies never think," he answered, in +his boyish voice. He seemed proud to be so near this distinguished +creature. Had she not been sent to Siberia, driven out of France and +Germany, and arrested in New York for her incendiary speeches? She +possessed the most extraordinary power over an audience. Once, at Cooper +Union, Arthur had seen her control a crazy mob bent on destroying the +building because a few stupid police had interfered with the meeting. +Among her brethren Yetta Silverman was classed with Louise Michel, +Sophia Perowskaia, and Vera Zassoulitch, those valiant women, true +guardian angels, veritable martyrs to the cause. He thought of them as +he watched the delicate-looking young woman before him. + +Arthur was too chilly of blood to fall in love with her; his admiration +was purely cerebral. He was unlucky enough to have had for a father a +shrewd, visionary man, that curious combination of merchant and dreamer +once to be found in New England. A follower of Fourier, a friend of +Emerson, the elder Wyartz had gone to Brook Farm and had left it in a +few months. Dollars, not dreams, was his true ambition. But he +registered his dissatisfaction with this futile attempt by christening +his only son, Arthur Schopenhauer; it was old Wyartz's way of getting +even with the ideal. Obsessed from the age of spelling by his +pessimistic middle name, the boy had grown up in a cloudy compromise of +rebellion and the church. For a few years he vacillated; he went to +Harvard, studied the Higher Criticism, made a trip abroad, wrote a +little book recording the contending impulses of his pale, harassed +soul--Oscillations was the title--and returned to Boston a mild anarch. +Emerson the mystic, transposed to the key of France, sometimes makes +bizarre music. + +She arose and, walking over to him, put her hand nonchalantly on his +shoulder. + +"Arthur, comrade, what do you mean to do with yourself--come, what will +all this enthusiasm bring forth?" He fumbled his glasses with his thumb +and index finger--a characteristic gesture--and nervously regarded her +before answering. Then he smiled at his idea. + +"We might marry and fight the great fight together like the Jenkins +crowd." + +"Marry!" she exclaimed--her guttural Russian accent manifested itself +when she became excited--"marry! You are only a baby, Arthur +Schopenhauer Wyartz--_Herrgott_, this child bears _such_ a name!--and +while I am sure the thin Yankee blood of the Jenkins family needed a +Jewish wife, and a Slav, I am not that way of thinking for myself. I am +married to the revolution." Her eyes dwelt with reverence on her new +Christian saints, those Christs of the gutter, who had sacrificed their +lives in the modern arena for the idea of liberty, who were thrown to +the wild beasts and slaughtered by the latter-day pagans of wealth, and +barbarians in purple. He followed her glance. It lashed him to jerky +enthusiasm. + +"I am not joking," he earnestly asserted, "so pardon my rashness. Only +believe in my sincerity. I am no anarch on paper. I am devoted to your +cause and to you, Yetta, to my last heart's blood. Do you need my +wealth? It is yours. You can work miracles with millions in America. +Take it all." + +"It's not money we need, but men," she answered darkly. "Your millions, +which came to you innocently enough, represent the misery of--how many? +Let the multi-millionnaires give away their money to found theological +colleges and libraries--_my_ party will have none of it. Its men are +armed by the ideas that we prefer. I don't blame the rich or the +political tyrants--the mob has to be educated, the unhappy proletarians, +who have so long submitted to the crack of the whip that they wouldn't +know what to do with their freedom if they had it. All mobs believe +alike in filth and fire, whether antique slaves free for their day's +Saturnalia, or the Paris crowds of '93. Their ideas of happiness are +pillage, bloodshed, drunkenness, revenge. Every popular uprising sinks +the _people_ deeper in their misery. Every bomb thrown discredits the +cause of liberty." + +Astonished by this concession, Arthur wondered how she had ever earned +her reputation as the Russian "Red Virgin," as an unequivocal terrorist. +Thus he had heard her hailed at all the meetings which she addressed. +But she did not notice his perturbation, she was following another +train. + +"You Americans do not love money as much as the Europeans--who hoard it +away, who worship it on their naked knees; but you do something +worse--you love it for the sake of the sport, a cruel sport for the +poor. You go into speculation as the English go after big game. It is a +sport. This sport involves food--and you gamble with wheat and meat for +counters, while starving men and women pay for the game. America is yet +rich enough to afford this sport, but some day it will become crowded +like Europe, and then, beware! Wasn't it James Hinton who said that +'Overthrowing society means an inverted pyramid getting straight'? + +"And America," she continued, "bribes us with the gilded sentimental +phrases of Rousseau, Mirabeau, and Thomas Paine woven into your national +constitution, with its presumptuous declaration that all men are born +free and equal--shades of Darwin and Nietzsche!--and that universal +suffrage is a panacea for all evils. In no country boasting itself +Christian is there a system so artfully devised for keeping the _poor_ +free and unequal, no country where so-called public opinion, as +expressed in the press, is used to club the majority into submission. +And you are all proud of this liberty--a liberty at which the despised +serf in Russia or the man of the street in London sneers--there is +to-day more _individual_ liberty in England and Germany than in the +United States. Don't smile! I can prove it. As for France or Italy--they +are a hundred years ahead of you in municipal government. But I shan't +talk blue-books at you, Arthur!" + +"Why not, why not?" he quickly interposed. "You always impress me by +your easy handling of facts. And why won't my money be of use to the +social revolution?" Scornfully she started up again and began walking. + +"Why? Because convictions can't be bought with cash! Why! Because +philanthropy is the most selfish of vices. You may do good here and +there--but you do more harm. You create more paupers, you fine +gentlemen, with your Mission houses and your Settlement workers! You are +trying to cover the ugly sores with a plaster of greenbacks. It won't +heal the sickness--it won't heal it, I tell you." Her eyes were flaming +and she stamped the floor passionately. + +"We workers on the East Side have a name for you millionnaires. We call +you the White Mice. You have pretty words and white lies, pretty ways +and false smiles. Lies! lies! lies! You are only giving back, with the +aid of your superficial fine ladies, the money stolen from the true +money earners. You have discovered the Ghetto--you and the impertinent +newspaper men. And like the reporters you come down to use us for +'copy.' You live here in comfort among us and then go away, write a book +about our wretchedness and pose as altruistic heroes in your own silly +set. How I loathe that word--altruism! As if the sacrifice of your +personality does not always lead to self-deception, to hypocrisy! It is +an excuse for the busybody-rich to advertise their charities. If they +were as many armed as Briareus or the octopus, their charity would be +known to each and every hand on their arms. These sentimental anarchs! +They even marry our girls and carry them off to coddle their conscience +with gilded gingerbread. Yet they would turn their backs on Christ if he +came to Hester Street--Christ, the first modern anarch, a +destructionist, a proletarian who preached fire and sword for the evil +rich of his times. Nowadays he would be sent to Blackwell's Island for +six months as a disturber of the peace or for healing without a license +from the County Medical Association!" + +"Like Johann Most," he ventured. She blazed at the name. + +"No jokes, please. Most, too, has suffered. But I am no worshipper of +bombs--and beer." This made him laugh, but as the laugh was not echoed +he stared about him. + +"But Yetta,--we must begin somewhere. I wish to become--to +become--something like you.--" + +She interrupted him roughly: + +"To become--you an anarch! You are a sentimental rebel because your +stomach is not strong enough for the gourmands who waste their time at +your clubs. If your nerves were sound you might make a speech. But the +New England conscience of your forefathers--they were nearly all +clergymen, weren't they?--has ruined your strength. The best thing you +can do, my boy, is to enter a seminary and later go to China as a +missionary; else turn literary and edit an American edition of Who's Who +in Hell! But leave our East Side alone. Do you know what New York +reminds me of? Its centre is a strip of green and gold between two +smouldering red rivers of fire--the East and West Sides. If they ever +spill over the banks, all the little parasites of greater parasites, the +lawyers, brokers, bankers, journalists, ecclesiastics, and middle men, +will be devoured. Oh, what a glorious day! And oh, that terrible night +when we marched behind the black flag and muffled drums down Broadway, +that night in 1887 when the four martyrs were murdered, the hero Lingg +having killed himself. What would you have done in those awful times?" + +"Try me," he muttered, as he pulled down his cuffs, "try me!" + +"Very well, I'll try you. Like Carlo Cafiero, the rich Italian anarch, +you must give your money to us--every cent of it. Come with me to-night. +I address a meeting of the brethren at Schwab's place--you know, the +saloon across the street, off the square. We can eat our supper there, +and then--" + +"Try me," he reiterated, and his voice was hoarse with emotion, his +pulse painfully irregular. + + +II + +Notwithstanding his vows of heroism, Arthur could not force himself to +like the establishment of Schwab, where the meeting was to take place. +It was a beer-saloon, not one of those mock-medival uptown palaces, but +a long room with a low ceiling, gaslit and shabby. The tables and chairs +of hard, coarse wood were greasy--napkins and table-cloths were not to +be mentioned, else would the brethren suspect the presence of an +aristocrat. At the upper end, beyond the little black bar, there was a +platform, upon it a table, a pianoforte, and a stool. Still he managed +to conceal his repugnance to all these uninviting things and he sipped +his diluted Rhine wine, ate his sandwich--an unpalatable one--under the +watchful eyes of his companion. By eight o'clock the room was jammed +with working-people, all talking and in a half dozen tongues. +Occasionally Yetta left him to join a group, and where she went silence +fell. She was the oracle of the crowd. At nine o'clock Arthur's head +ached. He had smoked all his Turkish cigarettes, the odour of which +caused some surprise--there was a capitalist present and they knew him. +Only Yetta prevented disagreeable comment. The men, who belonged to the +proletarian class, were poorly dressed and intelligent; the women wore +shawls on their heads and smoked bad cigarettes. The saloon did not +smell nice, Arthur thought. He had offered Yetta one of his imported +cigarettes, but she lighted a horrible weed and blew the smoke in his +face. + +At ten o'clock he wished himself away. But a short, stout man with a +lopsided face showing through his tangled beard, stood up and said in +German:-- + +"All who are not _our_ friends, please leave the house." + +No one stirred. The patron went from group to group saluting his +customers and eying those who were not. Whether any password or signal +was given Arthur could not say. When the blond, good-natured Schwab +reached him, Yetta whispered in his ear. The host beamed on the young +American and gave him a friendly poke in the back; Arthur felt as if he +had been knighted. He said this to Yetta, but her attention was +elsewhere. The doors and windows were quickly shut and bolted. She +nudged his elbow--for they were sitting six at the table, much to his +disgust; the other four drank noisily--and he followed her to the top of +the room. A babble broke out as they moved along. + +"It's Yetta's new catch. Yetta's rich fellow. Wait until she gets +through with him--poor devil." These broken phrases made him shiver, +especially as Yetta's expression, at first enigmatic, was now openly +sardonic. What did she mean? Was she only tormenting him? Was this to be +his test, his trial? His head was almost splitting, for the heat was +great and the air bad. Again he wished himself home. + +They reached the platform. "Jump up, Arthur, and help me," she +commanded. He did so. But his discomfiture only grew apace with the +increased heat--the dingy ceiling crushed him--and the rows in front, +the entire floor seemed transformed to eyes, malicious eyes. She told +him to sit down at the piano and play the Marseillaise. Then standing +before the table she drew from her bosom a scarlet flag, and accompanied +by the enthusiastic shoutings she led the singing. Arthur at the +keyboard felt exalted. Forgotten the pains of a moment before. He +hammered the keys vigorously, extorting from the battered instrument a +series of curious croakings. Some of the keys did not "speak," some gave +forth a brazen clangour from the rusty wires. No one cared. The singing +stopped with the last verse. + +"Now La Ravachole for our French brethren." This combination of +revolutionary lyrics--a Ira and Carmagnole--was chanted fervidly. Then +came for the benefit of the German the stirring measures from the +Scotch-German John Henry Mackay's Sturm:-- + + Das ist der Kampf, den allnchtlich + Bevor das Dunkel zerrinnt, + Einsam und gramvoll auskmpt + Des Jahrhunderts verlorenes Kind. + +Yetta waved her long and beautifully shaped hands--they were her +solitary vanity. The audience became still. She addressed them at first +in deliberate tones, and Arthur noted that the interest was genuine--he +wondered how long his fat-witted club friends could endure or +appreciate the easy manner in which Yetta Silverman quoted from great +thinkers, and sprinkled these quotations with her own biting +observations. + +"Richard Wagner--who loved humanity when he wrote Siegfried and +regretted that love in Parsifal! + +"Richard Wagner--who loved ice-cream more than Dresden's +freedom--Wagner: the Swiss family bell-ringer of '48! + +"To Max Stirner, Ibsen, and Richard Strauss belongs the twentieth +century! + +"Nietzsche--the anarch of aristocrats! + +"Karl Marx--or the selfish Jew socialist! + +"Lassalle--the Jew comedian of liberty! + +"Bernard Shaw--the clever Celt who would sacrifice socialism for an +epigram. + +"Curse all socialists!" she suddenly screamed. + +Arthur, entranced by the playful manner with which she disposed of +friend and foe, was aghast at this outbreak. He saw another Yetta. Her +face was ugly and revengeful. She sawed the air with her thin arms. + +"Repeat after me," she adjured her hearers, "the Catechism of Sergei +Netschajew, but begin with Herzen's noble motto: 'Long live chaos and +destruction!'" + +"Long live chaos and destruction!" was heartily roared. + +The terrific catechism of the apostle Netschajew made Arthur shake with +alternate woe and wrath. It was bloody-minded beyond description. Like +a diabolic litany boomed the questions and answers:-- + +"Day and night we must have but one thought--inexorable destruction." +And Arthur recalled how this pupil of Bakounine had with the assistance +of Pryow and Nicolajew beguiled a certain suspected friend, Ivanow, into +a lonely garden and killed him, throwing the body into a lake. After +that Netschajew disappeared, though occasionally showing himself in +Switzerland and England. Finally, in 1872, he was nabbed by the Russian +government, sent to Siberia, and--! + +_Ugh!_ thought Arthur, what a people, what an ending! And Yetta--why did +she now so openly proclaim destruction as the only palliative for social +crime when she had so eloquently disclaimed earlier in the day the +propaganda by force, by dagger, and dynamite?--He had hardly asked +himself the question when there came a fierce rapping of wooden clubs at +door and window. Instantly a brooding hush like that which precedes a +hurricane fell upon the gathering. But Yetta did not long remain silent. + +"Quick, Arthur, play the Star-Spangled Banner! It's the police. I want +to save these poor souls--" she added, with a gulp in her throat; +"quick, you idiot, the Star-Spangled Banner." But Arthur was almost +fainting. His ringers fell listlessly on the keys, and they were too +weak to make a sound. The police! he moaned, as the knocking deepened +into banging and shouting. What a scandal! What a disgrace! He could +never face his own world after this! To be caught with a lot of crazy +anarchists in a den like this!--Smash, went the outside door! And the +newspapers! They would laugh him out of town. He, Arthur Schopenhauer +Wyartz, the Amateur Anarch! He saw the hideous headlines. Why, the very +daily in which some of his fortune was invested would be the first to +mock him most! + +The assault outside increased. He leaped to the floor, where Yetta was +surrounded by an excited crowd. He plucked her sleeve. She gazed at him +disdainfully. + +"For God's sake, Yetta, get me out of this--this awful scrape. My +mother, my sisters--the disgrace!" She laughed bitterly. + +"You poor chicken among hawks! But I'll help you--follow me." He reached +the cellar stairs, and she showed him a way by which he could walk +safely into the alley, thence to the street back of their building. He +shook her hand with the intensity of a man in the clutches of the ague. + +"But you--why don't you go with me?" he asked, his teeth chattering. + +The brittle sound of glass breaking was heard. She answered, as she took +his feverish hand:-- + +"Because, you brave revolutionist, I must stick to my colours. +Farewell!" And remounting the stairs, she saw the bluecoats awaiting +her. + +"I hope the police will catch him anyhow," she said. It was her one +relapse into femininity, and as she quietly surrendered she did not +regret it. + + +III + +Old Koschinsky's store on the avenue was the joy of the neighbourhood. +For hours, their smeary faces flattened against the glass, the children +watched the tireless antics of the revolving squirrels; the pouter +pigeons expand their breasts into feathered balloons; the goldfish, as +they stolidly swam, their little mouths open, their eyes following the +queer human animals imprisoned on the other side of the plate-glass +window. Canary birds by the hundreds made the shop a trying one for +sensitive ears. There were no monkeys. Koschinsky, whose heart was as +soft as butter, though he was a formidable revolutionist--so he swore +over at Schwab's--declared that monkeys were made in the image of +tyrannical humans. He would have none of them. Parrots? There were +enough of the breed around him, he told the gossiping women, who, with +their _scheitels_, curved noses, and shining eyes, lent to the quarter +its Oriental quality. + +It was in Koschinsky's place that Arthur first encountered Yetta. He was +always prowling about the East Side in search of sociological prey, and +the modest little woman with her intelligent and determined face +attracted him strongly. They fell into easy conversation near a cage of +canaries, and the acquaintance soon bloomed into a friendship. A week +after the raid on Schwab's, Arthur, very haggard and nervous, wandered +into Koschinsky's. The old man greeted him:-- + +"Hu! So you've just come down from the Island! Well--how did you like it +up there? Plenty water--eh?" The sarcasm was too plain, and the young +man, mumbling some sort of an answer, turned to go. + +"Hold on there!" said Koschinsky. "I expect a very fine bird soon. You'd +better wait. It was here only last night; and the bird asked whether you +had been in." Arthur started. + +"For me? Miss Silverman?" + +"I said a bird," was the dogged reply. And then Yetta walked up to +Arthur and asked:-- + +"Where have you been? Why haven't you called?" He blushed. + +"I was ashamed." + +"Because you were so, so--frightened, that night?" + +"Yes." + +"But nothing came of the affair. The police could get no evidence. We +had no flags--" + +"That scarlet one I saw you with--what of it?" She smiled. + +"Did you look in your pockets when you got home? I stuffed the flag in +one of them while we were downstairs." He burst into genteel laughter. + +"No, I threw off my clothes in such disgust that night that I vowed I +would never get into them again. I gave the suit to my valet." + +"Your valet," she gravely returned; "he may become _one of us_." + +"Fancy, when I reached the house--I went up in a hansom, for I was +bareheaded--my mother was giving the biggest kind of a ball. I had no +end of trouble trying to sneak in unobserved." + +She regarded him steadily. "Isn't it strange," she went on, "how the +bull-dog police of this town persecute us--and they _should_ be +sympathetic. They had to leave their own island because of tyranny. Yet +as soon as they step on this soil they feel themselves self-constituted +tyrants. Something of the sort happened with your own ancestors--" she +looked at him archly--"the Pilgrim Fathers were not very tolerant to the +Quakers, the Jews, Catholics, or any sect not their own. Now you do not +seem to have inherited that ear-slicing temperament--" + +"Oh, stop, Yetta! Don't make any more fun of me. I confess I am +cowardly--I hate rows and scandals--" + +"'What shall it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his +liberty?'" + +"Yes, I know. But this was such a nasty little affair. The newspapers +would have driven me crazy." + +"But suppose, for the sake of argument," she said, "that the row would +not have appeared in the newspapers--what then?" + +"What do you mean? By Jove, there was nothing in the papers, now that I +come to think of it. I went the next morning out to Tuxedo and +forgot--what do you mean by this mystery, Yetta?" + +"I mean this--suppose, for the sake of further argument, I should tell +you that there was no row, no police, no arrests!" He gasped. + +"O-h, what an ass I made of myself. So that was your trial! And I +failed. Oh, Yetta, Yetta--what shall I say?" The girl softened. She took +both his hands in her shapely ones and murmured:-- + +"Dear little boy, I treated you roughly. Forgive me! There was a real +descent by the police--it was no deception. That's why I asked you to +play the Star-Spangled Banner--" + +"Excuse me, Yetta; but why did you do that? Why didn't you meet the +police defiantly chanting the Marseillaise? That would have been +braver--more like the true anarchist." She held down her head. + +"Because--because--those poor folks--I wanted to spare them as much +trouble with the police as possible," she said in her lowest tones. + +"And why," he pursued triumphantly, "why did you preach bombs after +assuring me that reform must come through the spiritual propaganda?" She +quickly replied:-- + +"Because our most dangerous foe was in the audience. You know. The man +with the beard who first spoke. He has often denounced me as lukewarm; +and then you know words are not as potent as deeds with the +proletarians. One assassination is of more value than all the philosophy +of Tolstoy. And that old wind-bag sat near us and watched us--watched +me. That's why I let myself go--" she was blushing now, and old +Koschinsky nearly dropped a bird-cage in his astonishment. + +"Yetta, Yetta!" Arthur insisted, "wind-bag, you call your comrade? Were +you not, just for a few minutes, in the same category? Again she was +silent. + +"I feel now," he ejaculated, as he came very close to her, "that we must +get outside of these verbal entanglements. I want you to become my +wife." His heart sank as he thought of his mother's impassive, high-bred +air--with such a figure for a Fifth Avenue bride! The girl looked into +his weak blue eyes with their area of saucer-like whiteness. She shook +her stubborn head. + +"I shall never marry. I do not believe in such an institution. It +degrades women, makes tyrants of men. No, Arthur--I am fond of you, +perhaps--" she paused,--"so fond that I might enter into any relation +but marriage,--that never!" + +"And I tell you, Yetta, anarchy or no anarchy, I could never respect the +woman if she were not mine legally. In America we do these things +differently--" he was not allowed to finish. + +She glared at him, then she strode to the shop door and opened it. + +"Farewell to you, Mr. Arthur Schopenhauer Wyartz, amateur anarchist. +Better go back to your mother and sisters! _Mein Gott_, Schopenhauer, +too!" He put his Alpine hat on his bewildered head and without a word +went out. She did not look after him, but walked over to the old +bird-fancier and sat on his leather-topped stool. Presently she rested +her elbows on her knees and propped her chin with her gloveless hands. +Her eyes were red. Koschinsky peeped at her and shook his head. + +"Yetta--you know what I think!--Yetta, the boy was right! You shouldn't +have asked him for the Star-Spangled Banner! The Marseillaise would have +been better." + +"I don't care," she viciously retorted. + +"I know, I know. But a nice boy--_so_ well fixed." + +"I don't care," she insisted. "I'm married to the revolution." + +"Yah, yah! the revolution, Yetta--" he pushed his lean, brown forefinger +into the cage of an enraged canary--"the revolution! Yes, Yetta +Silverman, the revolution!" She sighed. + + + + +XIV + +HALL OF THE MISSING FOOTSTEPS + + So I saw in my dream that the man began to run. + + --_Pilgrim's Progress_. + + +I + +As the first-class carriage rolled languidly out of Balak's only railway +station on a sultry February evening, Pobloff, the composer, was not +sorry. + +"I wish it were Persia instead of Ramboul," he reflected. Luga, his +wife, he had left weeping at the station; but since the day she +disappeared with his orchestra for twenty-four hours, Pobloff's +affection had gradually cooled; he was leaving the capital without a +pang on a month's leave of absence--a delicate courtesy of the king's +extended to a brother ruler, though a semi-barbarous one, the khedive of +Ramboul. + +Pobloff was not sad nor was he jubilantly glad. The journey was an easy +one; a night and day and the next night would see him, God willing,--he +crossed himself,--in the semi-tropical city of Nirgiz. From Balak to +Nirgiz, from southeastern Europe to Asia Minor! + +The heir-apparent was said to be a music-loving lad, very much under +the cunning thumb of his grim old aunt, who, rumour averred, wore a +black beard, and was the scourge of her little kingdom. All that might +be changed when the prince would reach his majority; his failing health +and morbid melancholy had frightened the grand vizier, and the king of +Balakia had been petitioned to send Pobloff, the composer, designer of +inimitable musical masques, Pobloff, the irresistible interpreter of +Chopin, to the aid of the ailing youth. + +So this middle-aged David left his nest to go harp for a Saul yet in his +adolescence. What his duties were to be Pobloff had not the slightest +idea. He had received no special instructions; a member of the royal +household bore him the official mandate and a purse fat enough to soothe +his wife's feelings. After appointing his first violin conductor of the +Balakian Orchestra during his absence, the fussy, stout, good-natured +Russian (he was born at Kiew, 1865, the biographical dictionaries say) +secured a sleeping compartment on the Ramboul express, from the windows +of which he contemplated with some satisfaction the flat land that +gradually faded in the mists of night as the train tore its way noisily +over a rude road-bed. + + +II + +Pobloff slept. He usually snored; but this evening he was too fatigued. +He heard not the sudden stoppages at lonely way stations where hoarse +voices and a lantern represented the life of the place; he did not heed +the engine as it thirstily sucked water from a tank in the heart of the +Karpakians; and he was surprised, pleased, proud, when a hot February +sun, shining through his window, awoke him. + +It was six o'clock of a fine morning, and the train was toiling up a +precipitous grade to the spine of the mountain, where the down-slope +would begin and air-brakes rule. Pobloff looked about him. He scratched +his long nose, a characteristic gesture, and began wondering when coffee +would be ready. He pressed the bell. The guard entered, a miserable +bandit who bravely wore his peaked hat with green plumes la Tyrol. He +spoke four tongues and many dialects; Pobloff calculated his monthly +salary at forty roubles. + +"No, Excellency, the coffee will be hot and refreshing at Kerb, where we +arrive about seven." He cleared his throat, put out his hand, bowed low, +and disappeared. The composer grumbled. Kerb!--not until that wretched +eyrie in the clouds! And such coffee! No matter. Pobloff never felt in +robuster health; his irritable nerves were calmed by a sound night's +sleep. The air was fresher than down in the malarial valley, where stood +the shining towers of Balak; he could see them pinked by the morning sun +and low on the horizon. All together he was glad.... + +Hello, this must be Kerb! A moment later Pobloff bellowed for the +guard; he had shattered the electric annunciator by his violence. Then, +not waiting to be served, he ran into the vestibule, and soon was on the +station platform, inhaling huge drafts of air into his big chest. Ah! It +was glorious up there. What surprised him was the number of human beings +clambering over the steps, running and gabbling like a lot of animals +let loose from their cages. The engineer beside his quivering machine +enjoyed his morning coffee. And there were many turbaned pagans and some +veiled women mixed with the crowd. + +The sparkling of bright colours and bizarre costumes did not disturb +Pobloff, who had lived too long on anonymous borders, where Jew, +Christian, Turk, Slav, African, and outlandish folk generally melted +into a civilization which still puzzled ethnologists. + +A negro, gorgeously clad, guarding closely a slim female, draped from +head to foot in virginal white, attracted the musician. The man's face +was monstrous in its suggestion of evil, and furthermore shocking, +because his nose was a gaping hole. Evidently a scimiter had performed +this surgical operation, Pobloff mused. + +The giant's eyes offended him, they so stared, and threateningly. + +Pobloff was not a coward. After his adventure in Balak, he feared +neither man nor devil, and he insolently returned the black fellow's +gaze. They stood about a buffet and drank coffee. The young woman--her +outlines were girlish--did not touch anything; she turned her face in +Pobloff's direction, so he fancied, and spoke at intervals to her +attendant. + +"I must be a queer-looking bird to this Turk and her keeper--probably +some Georgian going to a rich Mussulman's harem in company with his +eunuch," Pobloff repeated to himself. + +A gong was banged. Before its strident vibrations had ceased troubling +the thin morning air, the train began to move slowly out of Kerb. +Pobloff again was glad. + +He remained on the rear platform of his car as long as the white +station, beginning to blister under a tropical sun, was in sight. Then +he sought his compartment. His amazement and rage were great when he +found the two window seats occupied by the negro and the mysterious +creature. Pobloff's bag was tumbled in a corner, his overcoat, hat, and +umbrella tossed to the other end of the room. The big black man bared +his teeth smilingly, the shrouded girl shrank back as if in fear. + +"Well, I'll be--!" began the composer. Then he leaned over and pushed +the button, the veins in his forehead like whipcords, his throat parched +with wrath. But to no avail--the bell was broken. Pobloff's first +impulse was to take the smiling Ethiopian by the neck and pitch him out. +There were several reasons why he did not: the giant looked dangerous; +he plainly carried a brace of pistols, and at least one dagger, the +jewelled handle of which flashed over his glaring sash of many tints. +And then the lady--Pobloff was very gallant, too gallant, his wife said. +The bell would not ring! What was he to do? He soon made up his mind, +supple Slav that he was. With a muttered apology he sank back and closed +his eyes in polite despair. + +His consternation was overwhelming when a voice addressed him in +Russian, a contralto voice of some indefinable timbre, the voice of a +female, yet not without epicene intonations. His eyes immediately +opened. From her gauze veiling the young woman spoke:-- + +"We are sorry to derange you. The guard made a mistake. Pardon!" The +tone was slightly condescending, as if the goddess behind the cloud had +deigned to notice a mere mortal. Her attendant was smiling, and to +Pobloff his grin resembled a newly sliced watermelon. But her voice +filled him with ecstasy. His ear, as sensitive as the eye of a Claude +Monet, noted every infinitesimal variation in tone-colour, and each +shade was a symbol for the fantastic imagination of this poetic +composer. The girlish voice affected him strangely. It pierced his soul +like a poniard. It made his spine chilly. It evoked visions of white +women languorously moving in processional attitudes beneath the chaste +rays of an implacable moon. The voice modulated into crisp morning +inflections:-- + +"You are going far, Excellency?" She knew him! And the slave who +grinned and grinned and never spoke--what was _he_? She seemed to follow +Pobloff's thought. + +"Hamet is dumb. His tongue was cut at the same time he lost his nose. It +all happened at the siege of Yerkutz." + +Pobloff at last found words. + +"Poor fellow!" he said sympathetically, and then forgot all about the +mutilated one. "You are welcome to this compartment," he assured her in +his oiliest manner. "What surprises me is that I did not see your Serene +Highness when we left Balak." She started at the title that he bestowed +upon her, and he inwardly chuckled. Clever dog, Pobloff, clever dog! Her +eyes were brilliant despite obstructing veils. + +"I was _en route_ to Balak yesterday, but my servant became ill and I +stopped over night at Kerb." Pobloff was entranced. She was undoubtedly +a young dame of noble birth and her freedom, the freedom of a European +woman, delighted him. It also puzzled. + +"How is it--?" he asked. + +But they had begun that fearful descent, at once the despair and delight +of engineers. The mountain fell away rapidly as the long, clumsy train +raced down its flank at a breakneck pace. Pobloff shivered and clutched +the arms of his seat. He saw nothing but deep blue sky and the tall top +of an occasional tree. The racket was terrific, the heat depressing. She +sat in her corner, apparently sleeping, while the giant smiled, always +smiled, never removing his ugly eyes from the perspiring countenance of +Pobloff. + +As they neared earth's level, midday was over. Pobloff hungered. Before +he could go in search of the ever absent guard, the woman suddenly sat +up, clapped her hands, and said something; but whether it was Turkish, +Roumanian, or Greek, he couldn't distinguish. A hamper was hauled from +under the seat by the servant, and to his joy Pobloff saw white rolls, +grapes, wine, figs, and cheese. He bowed and began eating. The others +looked at him and for a moment he could have sworn he heard faint +laughter. + +"I am so hungry," he said apologetically. "And you, Serenity, won't you +join me?" He offered her fruit. It was declined with a short nod. He was +dying to smoke, and, behold! priceless Turkish tobacco was thrust into +his willing hand. He rolled a stout cigarette, lighted it. Then a sigh +reached his ears. "The lady smokes," he thought, and slyly chuckled. + +A sound of something tearing was heard, and a pair of beautiful hands +reached for the tobacco. In a few moments the slender fingers were +pressing a cigarette; the slave lighted a wax fusee; the lady took it, +put the cigarette in a rent of her veil, and a second volume of odorous +vapour arose. Pobloff leaned back, stupefied. A Mohammedan woman smoking +in a Trans-Caucasian railway carriage before a Frank! Stupendous! He +felt unaccountably gay. + +"This is joyful," he said aloud. She smoked fervently. "Western manners +are certainly invading the East," he continued, hoping to hear again +that voice of marvellous resonance. She smoked. "Why, even Turkish women +have been known to study music in Paris." + +"I am not a Turk," she said in her deepest chest tones. + +"Pardon! A Russian, perhaps? Your accent is perfect. I am a Russian." +She did not reply. + +The day declined, and there was no more conversation. As the train +devoured leagues of swampy territory, villages were passed. The +journey's end was nearing. Soon meadows were seen surrounding +magnificent villas. A wide, shallow river was crossed, the Oxal; Pobloff +knew by his pocket map that Nirgiz was nigh. And for the first time in +twenty-four hours he sorrowed. Despite his broad invitations and +unmistakable hints, he could not trap his travelling companion into an +avowal of her identity, of her destination. Nothing could be coaxed from +the giant, and it was with a sinking heart--Pobloff was very +sentimental--that he saw the lights of Nirgiz; a few minutes later the +train entered the Oriental station. In the heat, the clamour of half a +thousand voices, yelling unknown jargons, his resolution to keep his +companions in view went for naught. Beset by jabbering porters, he did +not have an opportunity to say farewell to the veiled lady; with her +escort she had disappeared when the car stopped--and without a word of +thanks! Pobloff was wretched. + + +III + +It was past nine o'clock as he roamed the vast garden surrounding the +Palace of a Thousand Sounds--thus named because of the tiny bells +tinkling about its marble dome. He had eaten an unsatisfying meal in a +small antechamber, waited upon by a stupid servant. And worse still, the +food was ill cooked. On presenting his credentials, earlier in the +evening, the grand vizier, a sneaky-appearing man, had welcomed him +coldly, telling him that her Serene Highness was too exhausted to +receive so late in the day; she had granted too many audiences that +afternoon. + +"And the prince?" he queried. The prince was away hunting by moonlight, +and could not be seen for at least a day. In the interim, Pobloff was +told to make himself at home, as became such a distinguished composer +and artistic plenipotentiary of Balakia's king. Then he was bowed out of +the chamber, down the low malachite staircase, into his supper room. It +was all very disturbing to a man of Pobloff's equable disposition. + +He thought of Luga, his little wife, his dove; but not long. She did not +appeal to his heart of hearts; she was a coquette. Pobloff sighed. He +was midway in his mortal life, a dangerous period for susceptible +manhood. He lifted moist eyes to the stars; the night was delicious. He +rested upon a cushioned couch of stone. About him the moonlight painted +the trees, until they seemed like liquefied ermine; the palace arose in +pyramidal surges of marble to the sky, meeting the moonbeams as if in +friendly defiance, and casting them back to heaven with triumphant +reflections. And the stillness, profound as the tomb, was punctuated by +glancing fireflies. Pobloff hummed melodiously. + +"A night to make music," whispered a deep, sweet voice. Before he could +rise, his heart bounding as if stung to its centre, a woman, swathed in +white, sat beside him, touched him, put such a pressure upon his +shoulder that his blood began to stir. It was she. He stumbled in his +speech. She laughed, and he ground his teeth, for this alone saved him +from foolishness, from mad behaviour. + +"Maestro--you could make music this lovely night?" Pobloff started. + +"In God's name, who are you, and what are you doing here? Where did you +go this evening? I missed you. Ah! unhappy man that I am, you will drive +me crazy!" + +She did not smile now, but pressed close to him. + +"I am a prisoner--like yourself," she replied simply. + +"A prisoner! How a prisoner? I am not a prisoner, but an envoy from my +king to the sick princeling." + +She sighed. + +"The poor, mad prince," she said, "he is in need of your medicine, +sadly. He sent for me a year ago, and I am now his prisoner for life." + +"But I saw you on the train, a day's journey hence," interrupted the +musician. + +"Yes, I had escaped, and was being taken back by black Hamet when we +met." + +Pobloff whistled. So the mystery was disclosed. A little white slave +from the seraglio of this embryo tyrant had flown the cage! No wonder +she was watched, little surprise that she did not care to eat. He +straightened himself, the hair on his round head like porcupine quills. + +"My dear young lady," he exclaimed in accents paternal, "leave all to +me. If you do not wish to stay in this place, you may rely on me. When I +see this same young man,--he must be a nice sprig of royalty!--I propose +to tell him what I think of him." Pobloff threw out his chest and +snorted with pride. Again he fancied that he heard suppressed laughter. +He darted glances in every direction, but the fall of distant waters +smote upon his ears like the crepuscular music of Chopin. His companion +shook with ill-suppressed emotion. It was some time before she could +speak. + +"Pobloff," she begged, in her dangerous contralto, a contralto like the +medium register of a clarinet, "Pobloff, let me adjure you to be +careful. Your coming here has caused political disturbances. The aunt of +the prince hates music as much as he adores it. She is no party to your +invitation. So be on your guard. Even now there may be spies in the +shrubbery." She put her hand on his arm. It was too much. In an instant, +despite her feeble struggle, the ardent musician grasped the creature +that had tantalized him since morning, and kissed her a dozen times. His +head whirled. Pobloff! Pobloff! a voice cried in his brain--and only +yesterday you left your Luga, your pretty pigeon, your wife! + +The girl was dragged away from him. In the moonshine he saw the grinning +Hamet, suspiciously observing him. The runaway stood up and pressed +Pobloff's hand desperately, uttering the cry of her forlorn heart:-- + +"Don't play in the great hall; don't play in that accursed place. You +will be asked, but refuse. Make any excuse, but do not set foot on its +ebon floors." + +He was so confused by the strangeness of this adventure, so confused by +the admonition of the unknown when he saw her white draperies disappear, +that his jaw fell and his courage wavered. A moment later two oddly +caparisoned soldiers, bearing lights, approached, and in the name of her +Highness invited him make midnight music in the Palace of a Thousand +Sounds. + + +IV + +Seated before a Steinway grand pianoforte, an instrument that found its +way to this far-away province through the caprice of some artistic +potentate, Pobloff nervously preluded. Notwithstanding the warning of +the girl, he had allowed himself to be convoyed to the great Hall of +Ebony, and there, quite alone, he sat waiting for some cue to begin. +None came. He glanced curiously about him. For all the signs of humanity +he might as well have been on the heights of Kerb, out among its thorny +groves, or in its immemorial forests. He preluded as he gazed around. He +could see, by the dim light of two flambeaux set in gold sconces, column +after column of blackness receding into inky depths of darkness. A +fringe of light encircled his instrument, and beside him was a gallery, +so vast that it became a gulf of the infinite at a hundred paces. Now, +Pobloff was a brave man. He believed that once upon a time he had peered +into strange crevices of space; what novelty could existence hold for +him after that shuddering experience? Again he looked into the tenebrous +recesses of the hall. He saw nothing, heard nothing. + +His fingers went their own way over the keyboard. Finally, following +some latent impulse, they began to shape the opening measures of +Chopin's Second Ballade, the one of the enigmatic tonalities, sometimes +called _The Lake of the Mermaids_. It began with the chanting, childish +refrain, a Lithuanian fairy-tale of old, and as its nave, drowsy, +lulling measures--the voices of wicked, wooing sirens--sang and sank in +recurrent rhythms, Pobloff heard--this time he was sure--the regular +reverberation of distant footsteps. It was as if the monotonous beat of +the music were duplicated in some sounding mirror, some mirror that +magnified hideously, hideously mimicked the melody. Yet these footfalls +murmured as a sea-shell. Every phrase stood out before the pianist, +exquisitely clear; his brain had only once before harboured such an +exalted mood. There was the expectation of great things coming to pass; +dim rumours of an apocalyptic future, when the glory that never was on +sea or land should rend the veil of the visible and make clear all that +obscures and darkens. The transfiguration which informs the soul of one +taken down in epileptic seizure possessed him. Every cranny of his being +was flooded with overmastering light--and the faint sound of footsteps +marking sinister time to his music, drew closer, closer. + +Shaking off an insane desire to join his voice in the immortal choiring +of the Cherubim, Pobloff dashed into the passionate storm-scream of the +music, and like a pack of phantom bloodhounds the footsteps pressed him +in the race. He played as run men from starving wolves in Siberian +wastes. To stop would mean--God! what would it mean? These were no +mortal steps that crowded upon his sonorous trail. His fingers flew +over the keys as he finished the scurrying tempests of tone. Again the +first swaying refrain, and Pobloff heard the invisible multitude of feet +pause in the night, as if waiting the moment when the Ballade would +cease. He quivered; the surprises and terrors were telling upon his +well-seasoned nerves. + +Still he sped on, fearing the tremendous outburst at the close, where +Chopin throws overboard his soul, and with blood-red sails signals the +hellish _Willis_, the Lamias of the lake, to his side. Ah, if Pobloff +could but thus portion his soul as hostage to the infernal host that now +hemmed him in on all sides! Riding over the black and white rocks of his +keyboard, he felt as if in the clutches of an unknown force. He +discerned death in the distance--death and the unknown horror--and was +powerless to resist. Still the galloping of unseen feet, horrible, naked +flesh, that clattered and scraped the earth; the panting, hoarse and +subdued, of a mighty pack, whose thirst for destruction, for revenge, +was unslaked. And always the same trampling of human feet! Were they +human? Did not resilient bones tell the tale of brutes viler than men? +The glimmering lights seemed cowed, as they sobbed in vacuity and slowly +expired. + +Pobloff no longer asked himself what it meant; he was become a maniac, +pursued by deathless devils. He could have flown to the end of the +universe in this Ballade; but, at last, his heart cracking, head +bursting, face livid, overtaken by the Footsteps of the Missing, he +smashed both fists upon the keys and fell forward despairingly.... + + * * * * * + +... The gigantic, noseless negro, the grand vizier himself, sternly +regarded the prince, who stood, torch in hand, near the shattered +pianoforte. The dumb spoke:-- + +"Let us hope, Exalted Highness, that your masquerades and mystifications +are over forever. To-day's prankish sport may put us to trouble for a +satisfactory explanation." He waved his hand vaguely in the direction of +the prostrate composer. "And hasheesh sometimes maddens for a lifetime!" +He lightly touched the drugged Pobloff with his enormous foot. + +The youthful runaway ashamedly lowered his head--in reality he adored +music with all the fulness of his cruel, faunlike nature. + + + + +XV + +THE CURSORY LIGHT + + +To this day Pinton could never explain why he looked out of that pantry +window. He had reached his home in a hungry condition. He was tired and +dead broke, so he had resolved to forage. He had listened for two or +three, perhaps five, minutes in the hall of his boarding-house; then he +went, soft-footed, to Mrs. Hallam's pantry on the second floor. He was +sure that it was open, he was equally sure that it contained something +edible on its hospitable shelves. Ah! who has not his bread at midnight +stolen, ye heavenly powers, ye know him not! + +Pinton, however, knew one thing, and that was a ravenous desire to sink +his teeth into pie, custard, or even bread. He felt with large, eager +hands along the wall on the pantry side. With feverish joy he touched +the knob--a friendly knob, despite its cold, distant glaze--of the door +he sought. + +Pinton gave a tug, and then his heart stopped beating. The door was +locked. Something like a curse, something like a prayer, rose to his +lips, and his arms fell helplessly to his side. + +Mrs. Hallam, realizing that it was Saturday night--the predatory night +of the week--had secured her pastry, her confitures, her celebrated +desserts; and so poor Pinton, all his sweet teeth furiously aching, his +mouth watering, stood on the hither side of Paradise, a baffled peri in +pantaloons! + +After a pause, full of pain and troublous previsions of a restless, +discontented night, Pinton grew angry and pulled at the knob of the +door, thinking, perhaps, that it might abate a jot of its dignified +resistance. It remained immovable, grimly antagonistic, until his +fingers grew hot and cold as they touched a bit of cold metal. + +The key in the lock! In a second it was turned, and the hungry one was +within and restlessly searching and fumbling for food. He felt along the +lower shelves and met apples, oranges, and sealed bottles containing +ruined, otherwise miscalled preserved, fruit. He knelt on the dresser +and explored the upper shelf. Ah, here was richness indeed! Pies, pies, +cakes, pies, frosted cakes, cakes sweating golden, fruity promises, and +cakes as icy as the hand of charity. Pinton was happy, glutton that he +was, and he soon filled the pockets of his overcoat. What Mrs. Hallam +might say in the morning he cared not. Let the galled jade wince, his +breakfast appetite would be unwrung; and then he started violently, lost +his balance, and almost fell to the floor. + +Opposite him was the window of the pantry, which faced the wall of the +next house. Pinton had never been in the pantry by daylight, so he was +rudely shocked by the glance of a light--a cursory, moving light. It +showed him a window in the other house and a pair of stairs. It +flickered about an old baluster and a rusty carpet, it came from below, +it mounted upward and was lost to view. + +The burglar of pies, the ravisher of cakes, was almost shocked by this +unexpected light. He watched it dancing fantastically on the discoloured +wall of the house; he wondered--ill at ease--if it would flash in his +face. His surmise was realized, for a streak of illumination reached the +narrow chamber in which he cowered, and then he was certain some one was +looking at him. He never budged, for he was too frightened. Suddenly the +light vanished and a head was dimly silhouetted in the window opposite. +It nodded to Pinton. Pinton stared stupidly, and the head disappeared. +The hungry man, his appetite now gone, was numb and terrified. + +What did it mean, who was the man? A detective, or a friend of Mrs. +Hallam's in a coign from which the plunderers of her pantry could be +noted? Beady repentance stood out on Pinton's forehead. + +And the light came back. This time it was intelligible, for it was a +lantern in the hand of a young man of about thirty. His face was open +and smiling. He wore his hair rather long for an American, and it was +blond and curling. + +He surveyed Pinton for a moment, then he said, in a most agreeable +voice:-- + +"What luck, old pal?" + +Pinton dropped his pies, slammed the window, and got to his bedroom as +fast as his nervous legs could carry him. He undressed in a nightmare, +and did not sleep until the early summer sun shot hot shafts of heat +into his chamber. + +With a shamed Sabbath face he arose, dressed, and descended to his +morning meal. Mrs. Hallam was sitting in orotund silence, but seemed in +good humour. She asked him casually if he had enjoyed his Saturday +evening, and quite as casually damned the wandering cats that had played +havoc in her pantry. She remarked that leaving windows open was a poor +practice, even if hospitable in appearance, and nervous Mr. Pinton drank +his coffee in silent assent and then hurried off to the church where he +trod the organ pedals for a small salary's sake. + +The following Friday was rehearsal night, and the organist left his +choir in a bad humour. His contralto had not attended, and as she was +the only artiste and the only good-looking girl of the lot, Pinton took +it into his head to become jealous. She had not paid the slightest +attention to him, so he could not attribute her absence to a personal +slight; but he felt aggrieved and vaguely irritated. + +Pinton's musicianship was not profound. He had begun life as an organ +salesman. He manipulated the cabinet organ for impossible customers in +Wisconsin, and he came to New York because he was offered a better +chance. + +The inevitable church position occurred. Then came Zundel voluntaries +and hard pedal practice. At last Mendelssohn's organ sonatas were +reached and with them a call--organists, like pastors, have calls--to a +fashionable church. The salary was fair and Mr. Pinton grew +side-whiskers. + +He heard Paderewski play Chopin, and became a crazy lover of the piano. +He hired a small upright and studied finger exercises. He consulted a +thousand books on technic, and in the meantime could not play Czerny's +velocity studies. + +He grew thin, and sought the advice of many pianists. He soon found that +pressing your foot on the swell and pulling couplers for tone colour +were not the slightest use in piano playing. Subtle finger pressures, +the unloosening of the muscles, the delicate art of _nuance_, the art +unfelt by many organists, all were demanded of the pianist, and Pinton +almost despaired. + +He grew contemptuous of the king of instruments as he essayed the C +major invention of Bach. He sneered at stops and pedals, and believed, +in his foolish way, that all polyphony was bound within the boards of +the Well-Tempered Clavichord. Then the new alto came to the choir, and +Pinton--at being springtide, when the blood is in the joyful +mood--thought that he was in love. He was really athirst. + +This Friday evening he was genuinely disappointed and thirsty. He turned +with a sinking heart and parched throat into Pop Pusch's dearly beloved +resort. Earlier in his life he had often solaced himself with the free +lunch that John, the melancholy waiter, had dispensed. Pinton's mind was +a prey to many emotions as he entered the famous old place. He sat down +before a brown table and clamoured for amber beer. + +He was not alone at the table. As Pinton put the glass of Pilsner to his +lips he met the gaze of two sardonic eyes. He could not finish his +glass. He returned the look of the other man and then arose, with a +nervous jerk that almost upset the table. + +"Sit down, old pal; don't be crazy. I'll never say a word. Sit down, you +fool; don't you see people are looking at you?" + +The voice was low, kindly in intonation, but it went through Pinton like +a saw biting its way into wood. + +He sat down all in a heap. He knew the eyes; he knew the voice. It was +the owner of the dark lantern--the mysterious man in the other house of +that last Saturday night. Pinton felt as if he were about to become ill. + +"Lord, but you are a nervous one!" said the other, most reassuringly. +"Sit still and I'll order brandy. It will settle your stomach." + +That brought Pinton to his senses at once. + +"No, no, I'll be all right in a moment," he said rather huskily. "I +never drink spirits. Thank you, all the same." + +"Don't mention it," said the man, and he tossed off his Wrzburger. Each +man stealthily regarded the other. Pinton saw the stranger of the +lantern and staircase. Close by he was handsome and engaging. His hair +was worn like a violin virtuoso's, and his hands were white, delicate, +and well cared for. He spoke first. + +"How did you make out on that job?--I don't fancy there was much in it. +Boarding-houses, you know!" + +Pinton, every particle of colour leaving his flabby face, asked:-- + +"What job?" + +The stranger looked at him keenly and went on rather ironically:-- + +"You are the most nervous duck I ever ran across. When I saw you last +your pocket was full of the silver plate of that pantry, and I can thank +you for a fright myself, for when I saw you, I was just getting ready to +crack a neat little crib. Say! why didn't you flash your glim at me or +make some friendly signal at least? You popped out of sight like a +prairie rabbit when a coyote heaves in view." + +Pinton felt the ground heave beneath him. What possible job could the +man mean? What was a "glim," and what did the fellow suggest by silver +plate? Then it struck him all of a sudden. Heavens! he was taken for a +burglar by a burglar. His presence in the pie pantry had been +misinterpreted by a cracksman; and he, the harmless organist of Dr. +Bulgerly's church, was claimed as the associate of a dangerous, perhaps +notorious, thief. Pinton's cup of woe overflowed. + +He arose, put on his hat, and started to go. The young man grasped his +arm, and said in a most conciliatory fashion:-- + +"Perhaps I have hurt your sensitive nature. It was far from my intention +to do so. I saluted you at first in the coarse, conventional manner +which is expected by members of our ancient and honourable craft, and if +I have offended you, I humbly beg your pardon." + +His accent was that of a cultivated gentleman. Pinton, somewhat assured, +dropped back in his seat, and, John passing by just then, more beer was +ordered. + +"Hear me before you condemn me," said the odd young man. "My name is +Blastion and I am a burglar by profession. When I saw you the other +night, at work on the premises next door to me, I was struck by your +refined face. I said to myself: 'At last the profession is being +recruited by gentlemen, men of culture, men of refinement. At last a +profitable, withal risky, pursuit is being dignified, nay, graced, by +the proper sort of person.' And I saluted you in a happy, haphazard +fashion, and then you flew the coop. Pardon my relapse into the +vernacular." + +Pinton felt that it was time to speak. + +"Pardon me, if I interrupt you, Mr. Blastion; but I fear we are not +meeting on equal ground. You take me for a--for a man of your +profession. Indeed, sir, you are mistaken. When you discovered me last +Saturday night I was in the pantry of Mrs. Hallam, my boarding-house +keeper, searching for pie. I am not a burglar--pardon my harsh +expression; I am, instead, an organist by profession." + +The pallor of the burglar's countenance testified to the gravity of his +feeling. He stared and blushed, looked apprehensively at the various +groups of domino players in the back room, then, pulling himself +together, he beckoned to melancholy John, and said:-- + +"Johann, two more beers, please. Yes?" + +Pinton became interested. There was something appealing in the signal +the man flashed from his eyes when he realized that he had unbosomed +himself to a perfect stranger, and not to a member of his beloved guild. +The organist put his hand on the man's arm and said--faint memories of +flatulent discourses from the Reverend Bulgerly coming to his aid: "Be +not alarmed, my friend. I will not betray you. I am a musician, but I +respect art ever, even when it reveals itself in manifold guises." + +Pinton felt that he was a man of address, a fellow of some wit; his +confidential and rather patronizing pose moved his companion, who slyly +grimaced. + +"So you are an organist and not a member of the noble Knights of the +Centrebit and Jimmy?" he asked rather sarcastically. + +"Yes," admitted Pinton, "I am an organist, and an organist who would +fain become a pianist." The other started. + +"I am a pianist myself, and yet I cannot say that I would like to play +the organ." + +"You are a pianist?" said Pinton, in a puzzled voice. + +"Well, why not? I studied in Paris, and I suppose my piano technic stood +me in good stead in my newer profession. Just look at my hands if you +doubt my word." + +Aghast, the organist examined the shapely hands before him. Without +peradventure of a doubt they were those of a pianist, an expert pianist, +and one who had studied assiduously. He was stupefied. A burglar and a +pianist! What next? + +Mr. Blastion continued his edifying remarks: "Yes, I studied very hard. +I was born in the Southwest, and went to Paris quite young. I had good +fingers and was deft at sleight-of-hand tricks. I could steal a +handkerchief from a rabbi--which is saying volumes--and I played all the +Chopin tudes before I was fifteen. At twenty-one I knew twenty-five +concertos from memory, and my great piece was the _Don Juan Fantasy_. +Oh, I was a wonder! When Liszt paid his last visit to Paris I played +before him at the warerooms of the Pleyels. + +"Monsieur Thodore Ritter was anxious for his old master to hear such a +pupil. I assure you there must be some congenital twist of evil in me, +for I couldn't for the life of me forbear picking the old fellow's +pockets and lifting his watch. Now don't look scandalized, Mr. ---- eh? +Oh! thank you very much, Mr. Pinton. If you are born that way, all the +punishments and preachments--excuse the alliteration--will not stand in +your way as a warning. I have done time--I mean I have served several +terms of imprisonment, but luckily not for a long period. I suffered +most by my incarceration in not having a piano. Not even a dumb keyboard +was allowed, and I practised the Jackson finger exercises in the air and +thus kept my fingers limber. On Saturdays the warden allowed me, as a +special favour, to practise on the cabinet organ--an odious +instrument--so as to enable me to play on Sundays in chapel. Of course +no practice was needed for the wretched music we poor devils howled once +a week, but I gained one afternoon in seven for study by my ruse. + +"Oh, the joy of feeling the ivory--or bone--under my expectant fingers! +I played all the Chopin, Henselt, and Liszt tudes on the miserable +keyboard of the organ. Yes, of course, without wind. It was, I assure +you, a truly spiritual consolation. You can readily imagine if a man has +been in the habit of practising all day, even if he does 'burgle' at +night, that to be suddenly deprived of all instrumental resources is a +bitter blow." + +Pinton stuttered out an affirmative response. Then both arose after +paying their checks, and the organist shook the burglar's hand at the +corner, after first exacting a promise that Blastion should play for him +some morning. + +"With pleasure, my boy. You're a gentleman and an artist, and I trust +you absolutely." And he walked away, whistling with rare skill the D +flat valse of Chopin. + +"You can trust me, I swear!" Pinton called after him, and then went +unsteadily homeward, full of generous resolves and pianistic ambitions. +As he intermittently undressed he discovered, to his rage and amazement, +that both his purse and watch had disappeared. The one was well filled; +the other, gold. Blastion's technic had proved unimpeachable. + + + + +XVI + +AN IRON FAN + + +Effinghame waited for Dr. Arn in the study, a small chamber crowded with +the contents of the universe--so it seemed to the visitor. There was a +table unusual in size, indeed, big enough to dissect a body thereon. It +was littered with books and medical publications and was not very +attractive. The walls were covered with original drawings of famous +Japanese masters, and over the fireplace hung a huge fan, dull gray in +colouring, with long sandalwood spokes. Not a noteworthy example of +Japanese art, thought Effinghame, as he glanced without marked curiosity +at its neutral tinting, though he could not help wondering why the +cunning artificers of the East had failed to adorn the wedge-shaped +surfaces of this fan with their accustomed bold and exquisite +arabesques. + +He impatiently paced the floor. His friend had told him to come at nine +o'clock in the evening. It was nearly ten. Then he began to finger +things. He fumbled the papers in the desk. He examined the two Japanese +swords--light as ivory, keen as razors. He stared at each of the prints, +at Hokusai, Toyokimi, Kuniyoshi, Kiyonaga, Kiosai, Hiroshigh, Utamaro, +Oukoyo-Y,--the doctor's taste was Oriental. And again he fell to +scrutinizing the fan. It was large, ugly, clumsy. What possessed Arn to +place such a sprawling affair over his mantel? Tempted to touch it, he +discovered that it was as silky as a young bat's wing. At last, his +curiosity excited, he lifted it with some straining to the floor. What +puzzled him was its weight. He felt its thin ribs, its soft, paper-like +material, and his fingers chilled as they closed on the two outermost +spokes. They were of metal, whether steel or iron he could not +determine. A queer fan this, far too heavy to stir the air, and-- + +Effinghame held the fan up to the light. He had perceived a shadowy +figure in a corner. It resolved itself into a man's head--bearded, +scowling, crowned with thorns or sunbeams. It was probably a Krishna. +But how came such a face on a Japanese fan? The type was Oriental, +though not Mongolian, rather Semitic. It vaguely recalled to Effinghame +a head and face he had seen in a famous painting. But where and by whom? +It wore a vile expression, the eyes mean and revengeful; there was a +cruel mouth and a long, hooked, crafty nose. The forehead was lofty, +even intellectual, and bore its thorns--yes, he was sure they were +thorns--like a conqueror. Just then Dr. Arn entered and laughed when he +saw the other struggling with the fan. + +"My _Samurai_ fan!" he exclaimed, in his accustomed frank tones; "how +did you discover it so soon?" + +"You've kept me here an hour. I had to do something," answered the +other, sulkily. + +"There, there, I apologize. Sit down, old man. I had a very sick patient +to-night, and I feel worn out. I'll ring for champagne." They talked +about trifling personal matters, when suddenly Effinghame asked:-- + +"Why _Samurai_? I had supposed this once belonged to some prehistoric +giant who could waft it as do ladies their bamboo fans, when they brush +the dust from old hearts--as the Spanish poet sang." + +"That fan is interesting enough," was the doctor's reply. "When a +_Samurai_, one of the warrior caste Japanese, was invited to the house +of a doubtful friend, he carried this fan as a weapon of defence. +Compelled to leave his two swords behind a screen, he could close this +fighting machine and parry the attack of his hospitable enemy until he +reached his swords. Just try it and see what a formidable weapon it +would prove." He took up the fan, shut it, and swung it over his head. + +"Look out for the bottles!" cried Effinghame. + +"Never fear, old chap. And did you notice the head?" + +"That's what most puzzled me." + +"No wonder. I too was puzzled--until I found the solution. And it took +me some years--yes, all the time you were in Paris learning how to +paint and live." He paused, and his face became gloomy. + +"Well--well?" + +"There is no well. It's a damned bad fan, that iron one, and I don't +mind saying so to you." + +"Superstitious--you! Where is your Haeckel, your Wundt, your Weismann? +Do you still believe in the infallibility of the germ-plasm? Has the fan +brought you ill-luck? The fact is, Arn, ever since your return from +China you've been a strange bird!" It was Effinghame's turn to laugh. + +"Don't say another word." The doctor was vivacious in a moment and +poured out wine. They both lighted cigars. Slowly puffing, Arn took up +the fan and spread it open. + +"See here! That head, as you must have noticed, is not Japanese. It's +Jewish. Do you recall the head of Judas painted by Da Vinci in his Last +Supper? Now isn't this old scoundrel's the exact duplicate--well, if not +exact, there is a very strong resemblance." Effinghame looked and +nodded. + +"And what the devil is it doing on a fan of the _Samurai_? It's not +caprice. No Japanese artist ever painted in that style or ever expressed +that type. I thought the thing out and came to the conclusion--" + +"Yes--yes! What conclusion?" eagerly interrupted his listener. + +"To the conclusion that I could never unravel such a knotty question +alone." Effinghame was disappointed. + +"So I had recourse to an ally--to the fan itself," blandly added Arn, as +he poured out more wine. + +"The fan?" + +"Precisely--the fan. I studied it from tip to tip, as our bird-shooting +friends say, and I, at last, discovered more than a picture. You know I +am an Orientalist. When I was at Johns Hopkins University I attended the +classes of the erudite Blumenfeld, and what you can't learn from +him--need I say any more? One evening I held the fan in front of a vivid +electric light and at once noticed serried lines. These I deciphered +after a long time. Another surprise. They were Chinese characters of a +remotely early date--Heaven knows how many dynasties back! Now what, you +will ask, is Chinese doing on a _Samurai_ fighting fan! I don't know. I +never shall know. But I do know that this fan contains on one side of it +the most extraordinary revelation ever vouchsafed mankind, particularly +Christian mankind." Excited by his own words, Arn arose. + +"Effinghame, my dear fellow, I know you have read Renan. If Renan had +seen the communication on this iron fan, he would have never written his +life of the Messiah." His eyes blazed. + +"Why, what do you mean?" + +"I mean that it might have been a life of Judas Iscariot." + +"Good God, man, are you joking?" ejaculated Effinghame. + +"I mean," sternly pursued Arn, "that if De Quincey had studied this +identical fan, the opium-eater would have composed another gorgeous +rhetorical plea for the man prelected to betray his Saviour, the +apostle who spilt the salt." He sat down and breathed heavily. + +"Go on! Go on!" + +"Shall I relate the history upon the fan?" And without waiting for an +answer he began at the left of the fan and slowly read to the right:-- + + I who write this am called Mo the Bonze. What I write of I + witnessed in a walled city of Judea. I travelled there attracted by + the report of miraculous happenings brought about by the magic art + of a youthful barbarian called Ieshua. The day I arrived in the + city they had sentenced the wise man to death by crucifixion. I was + disappointed. I had come many moons and many leagues from the + Yellow Kingdom to see something rare. I was too late. The magician, + whom his disciples called a god, had been executed. I tarried a few + days in the city. After many questions put to beggars and outcasts, + I heard that a certain woman of rank had a portrait of Ieshua. I + called and without hesitation asked her to show me this picture. + She was an exalted soul. She wept bitter tears as she drew from a + secret cabinet a scarf upon which was imprinted a bloody image. She + continued to weep as I made a copy of the head. I confess I was not + impressed. The face was bearded and ugly. The new god was said to + have been as fair as the sun. And I told the woman this. She only + wept the more. + + "If he were a god," I asked, "where are outward evidences?" She + became frantic. + + "The real man!" she cried; "_this_ one died for the man he + betrayed," and again fell to lamenting. Seeing I could gain nothing + more from her, I left, wondering at the strange heretics I had + encountered. I went back to my country and after weaving this tale + and painting the head, there awaited the fifth Buddha, the + successor to Siddartha, whose coming has been predicted. + +Arn's voice ceased. There was silence in the chamber. Then Effinghame +started up and fiercely growled:-- + +"What do _you_ make of it, Arn?" + +"Isn't it clear enough? There's been a frightful error somewhere, one of +incalculable consequences. A tremendous act of heroism has been +committed by a man whose name has been universally execrated through the +ages. Perhaps he repented at the eleventh hour and by some means +impersonated his betrayed friend; perhaps--" + +"But that _other_ body found in the blasted field of Aceldama!" +demanded the agitated Effinghame. Dr. Arn did not answer. + +After a lugubrious pause, he whispered:-- + +"There's more to follow. You haven't heard the worst." + +"What--more! I thought your damnable old Bonze died in the odour of +sanctity over there in his Yellow Kingdom." + +"True. He died. But before he died he recorded a vision he had. It is +inscribed on the other side of the fan." + +Effinghame's features lengthened. + +"Still the same fan." + +"The same. Here is what it prophesies." Reversing the clumsy fan, Arn +again read:-- + + Before I pass over into Nirvana I must relate what I saw in the + country of the Christians. It was not a dream. It was too real. And + yet it is to be, for it has not yet happened. The Campagna was now + become a shallow lake from the sea almost to the Sabine Mountains. + What had been Rome was a black waste spot, full of stones and + weeds. And no two stones stood together. Ah! our war with the white + races had been successful. We had not used their fighting machines, + as did that nation of little brown men, the Japanese. The Chinese + were too sage. They allowed the Christians to exterminate the + Japanese; but when they attacked us and attempted to rob us of our + land, we merely resorted to our old-time weapon--the Odour-Death. + With it we smothered their armies, sunk their navies, swept through + their countries like the simoon. The awful secret of the + Odour-Death is one that has been ours from the beginning of time. + Known only to the College of Bonzes, it was never used except in + extreme peril. Its smell is more revolting in its consequences than + the Black Plague. It ravaged the earth. + + I sat in a flat-bottomed boat, enjoying the soft melancholy Italian + evening. Not a human did I see; nor had I encountered one on my + slow voyage from the Middle Seas. In meditation I pondered the + ultimate wisdom of Confucius and smiled at the folly of the white + barbarians who had tried to show us a new god, a new religion. At + last they, too, had succumbed like the nations before their era. + The temple of Jupiter on the Capitol had fallen, so had the holy + temple of Jerusalem. And now St. Peter's. Their central religion + had been destroyed, and yet prophecies of the second coming of + their divinity had not been accomplished. When the last Pope of + Rome dies, so it was said, then time would be accomplished. The + last Pope _had_ died. Their basilica with its mighty dome was a + desert where scorpions and snakes abounded. The fifth Buddha would + appear, not the second Christos. Suddenly I saw before me in a puny + boat a beautiful beardless youth. He was attired in some symbolical + garments and upon his head a triple tiara. I could not believe my + aged eyes. He sat upright. His attitude was hieratic. His eyes + were lifted heavenwards. He clasped his hands and prayed:-- + + "O Lord, remove thy servant. The time is at hand foretold by thy + slaughtered saints. I am the last Pope and the humblest of thy + servants. Though the heathen hath triumphed upon the earth, I go to + thy bosom, for all things are now accomplished." And he tumbled + forward, dead. The last Pope! I had seen him. Nothing could happen + after that. + + And as I turned my boat in the direction of the sea a moaning came + upon the waters. The sky became as brass. A roar, like the rending + asunder of the firmament, caused my soul to expand with horror and + joy. Yes, time _was_ accomplished. The last Pope had uttered the + truth. Eternity was nigh. But the Buddha would now prove to the + multitudes awakened from their long sleep that _He_, not other + gods, was the true, the only God. In a flare of light sounded the + trumpets of destiny; eternity unrolled before me, and on the vast + plain I saw the bones of the buried dead uniting, as men and women + from time's beginnings arose in an army, the number whereof is + unthinkable. And oh! abomination of desolation, the White Horse, + not _Kalki_ the tenth incarnation of Vishnu, but the animal + foretold in _their_ Apocalypse, came through the lightnings, and in + the whirlwinds of flame and thunder I saw the shining face of Him, + the Son of Man! Where our Buddha? Alas! the last Pope spake truth. + I, Mo the Bonze, tell you this ere it be too late to repent your + sins and forswear your false gods. The Galilean is our master.... + +"_Farceur!_ Do you know what I would do with that accursed fan? I'd +destroy it, sell it, get rid of it somehow. Or else--" Effinghame +scrutinized the doctor, whose eyes were closed--"or else I would return +to the pious practices of my old religion." No smile crossed the face of +his friend as he firmly held the fighting fan, the iron and mystical fan +of the _Samurai_. + + + + +XVII + +THE WOMAN WHO LOVED CHOPIN + + +I + +When Marco Davos left Ischl on the midday train, that picturesque, +huddled Austrian watering-place was stuffy. He was surprised then most +pleasantly by the coolness of Aussee, further down the line in the +direction of Vienna. Ischl is not a bad place, but it lies, as the +natives say, smothered in a kettle. He rode over from the station to the +stadt park, where the band was playing. There he dismounted, for he was +going further--Aussee is not very interesting, but it principally serves +as a good starting-point for trips to many of the charming lakes with +which Styria is dotted. After asking his way, Davos passed the swimming +baths, and keeping on the left bank of a tiny stream, he presently found +himself walking through an earthly paradise. Since his advent in Ischl, +where he drank the waters and endeavoured to quiet his overtaxed nerves, +he had made up his mind to visit Alt-Aussee; several Viennese friends +had assured him that this hamlet, beneath a terrific precipice and on +the borders of a fairy-like lake, would be well worth the while. + +It was a relief to breathe the thinner mountain air, and the young +artist inhaled it with satisfaction, his big hat in hand, his long curly +black hair flowing in the gentle breeze. He found himself in tunnels of +verdure, the sunlight shut off by the heavy leafage; then the path +debouched into the open and, skirting closely the rocky wall, it widened +into an island of green where a shady pagoda invited. He sat down for a +few minutes and congratulated himself that he had escaped the intimate +discomforts of the omnibus he discerned on the opposite bank, packed +with stout people. This was the third week of his vacation, one enforced +by a nerve specialist in the Austrian capital, and for the first time +Davos felt almost cheerful. Perhaps the absolute hush of the country and +the purity of the atmosphere, with its suggestion of recent rain,--the +skies weep at least once a day in the Salzkammergut region,--proved a +welcome foil to fashionable Ischl, with its crowds, its stiffness, its +court ceremonial--for the emperor enjoys his _villegiatura_ there. And +Davos was sick and irritable after a prolonged musical season. He had +studied the pianoforte with Rosenthal, and his success, from his dbut, +had been so unequivocal that he played too much in public. There was a +fiery particle in his interpretations of Chopin, Schumann, and Liszt +that proclaimed the temperament, if not the actual possession, of +genius. Still in his early manhood--he was only twenty--the maturity of +his musical intelligence and the poetry of his style created havoc in +impressionable hearts. With his mixed blood, Hungarian and Italian, +Marco Davos' performance of romantic composers was irresistible; in it +there was something of Pachmann's wayward grace and Paderewski's +plangency, but with an added infusion of gypsy wildness which evoked for +old concert-goers memories of Liszt the brilliant rhapsodist. + +But he soon overpaid the score presented by the goddess Fortune--his +nerves were sadly jangled. A horror of the human face obsessed his +waking and sleeping hours; he dreamed of colossal countenances with +threatening eyes, a vast composite of the audiences he nightly faced. As +his popularity increased the waning of his self-respect told him that he +must go into retreat, anywhere out of the musical world--else would his +art suffer. It did suffer. The nervous diffidence, called stage-fright, +which had never assailed his supreme self-balance, intruded its +unwelcome presence. Marco, several months after he had discovered all +these mischievous symptoms, the maladies of artistic adolescence, was +not assured when the critics hinted of them--the public would surely +follow suit in a few weeks. Then came the visit to the learned Viennese +doctor and the trip to Ischl. A few more months of this appalling +absorption in his own personality, this morbid marriage of man to his +own image, and he suspected that his brain would be irretrievably +injured. + +He was a curious student of matters psychologic as well as musical. A +friendly laboratory had inducted him into many biologic mysteries. +Particularly fascinating to him was the tactile sense, that sense of +touch wherewith man acquaints himself with this earth-clot swimming in +space. Davos contemplated the tips of his fingers as he sat in the +grateful cool, his ten voices as he named them. With them he sang, +thundered, and thought upon the keyboard of his grand piano-forte. A +miracle, indeed, these slender cushions of fat, ramified by a network of +nerves, sinews, and bones as exquisite in their mechanism as the motion +of the planets. If hearing is a miracle, so is touch; the ear is not a +resonator, as has been so long maintained, but an apparatus which +records variations of pressure. This makes it subservient to the laws of +sensation; touch and hearing are akin. It aroused the pride of Davos +after he had read the revolutionary theories of Pierre Bounier regarding +the touch. So subtle could the art of touch be cultivated, the pianist +believed, that the blind could _feel_ colour on the canvas of the +painter. He spent weeks experimenting with a sensitive manometer, +gauging all the scale of dynamics. No doubt these fumblings on the edge +of a new science temporarily hurt his play. With a dangerous joy he +pressed the keys of his instrument, endeavouring to achieve more +delicate shadings. He quarrelled with the piano manufacturers for their +obstinate adherence to the old-fashioned clumsy action; everything had +been improved but the keyboard--that alone was as coldly unresponsive +and inelastic as a half-century ago. He had fugitive dreams of wires +that would vibrate like a violin. The sounding-board of a pianoforte is +too far from the pianist, while the violinist presses his strings as one +kisses the beloved. Little wonder it is the musical monarch. A new +pianoforte, with passionately coloured overtones, that could sob like a +violoncello, sing like a violin, and resound with the brazen clangours +of the orchestra--Liszt had conceived this synthesis, had by the sheer +force of his audacious genius compelled from his instrument ravishing +tones that were never heard before or--alas!--since. + +Even the antique harpsichord had its compensations; not so powerful in +its tonal capacity, it nevertheless gave forth a pleading, human quality +like the still small angelic voice. Davos pondered these problems, +pondered Chopin's celestial touch and the weaving magic of his many-hued +poems; Chopin--Keats, Shelley, and Heine battling within the walls of a +frail tender soul. + +The sound of footsteps and voices aroused him. He shivered with disgust. +More people! Two men, well advanced in life, followed by two women, +barely attracted his notice, until he saw that the little creature who +waddled at the rear of the party was a Japanese in European clothes. +Notwithstanding her western garb, she resembled a print of Utamaro. +Beside her walked a tall, grave girl, with dark hair and gray eyes, +attired in the quaint garb of some early nineteenth-century epoch--1840 +or thereabouts. As old-fashioned as she looked, a delicate girlish +beauty was hers, and when she indifferently gazed at Davos, straightway +he heard humming in his head the "glance motive" from Tristan and +Isolde. They passed on, but not leaving him as he was before; a voice +whispered in the secret recesses of his being: "You love! Follow! Seek +her!" And under the sudden impulsion of this passion he arose and made a +few steps toward the curve of the path around which the girl and her +companions had disappeared. The absurdity of this hasty translation into +action of his desire halted him. Yes, his nerves must be in a bad way if +a casual encounter with a pretty woman--but was she pretty? He did not +return to his seat. He continued his stroll leisurely. Pretty! Not +exactly pretty--distinguished! Noble! Lovely! Beautiful! He smiled. Here +he was playing the praises of the unknown in double octaves. He did not +overtake her. She had vanished on the other side of the bridge, and in a +few minutes he found himself entering Alt-Aussee. It wore a bright +appearance, with its various-coloured villas on the lake shores, and its +church and inn for a core. The garden of this hotel he found to be +larger than he had imagined; it stretched along the bank and only +stopped as if stone and mortar had been too lazy to go farther. + +Again he hesitated. The garden, the _restauration_--full of people: +women knitting, children bawling, men reading; and all sipping coffee to +a background of gossip. He remembered that it was the sacred hour of +_Kaffeeklatsch_, and he would have escaped by a flight of steps that led +down to the beach, but he was hailed. A company of a half-dozen sat at a +large table under the trees, and the host was an orchestral conductor +well known to Davos. There was no alternative. He took a chair. He was +introduced as the celebrated pianoforte-virtuoso to men and women he had +never seen before, and hoped--so rancorous was his mood--never to see +again. A red-headed girl from Brooklyn, who confessed that she thought +Maeterlinck the name of some new Parisian wickedness, further bothered +him with questions about piano teachers. No, he didn't give lessons! He +never would! She dropped out of the conversation. Finally by an effort +he swore that his head was splitting, that he must return to Ischl. He +broke away. When he discovered that the crowd was also bound for the +same place, he abruptly disappeared. It took him just two hours to +traverse the irregular curves of the lake on the Franz Carl Promenade, +and he ate his dinner in peace at the inn upon a balcony that projected +over the icy waters. + +Davos decided, as he smoked a mild cigarette, that he would remain at +Alt-Aussee for the night. The peace of the landscape purified his soul +of its irritability, though he wished that the Dachstein would not +dominate so persistently the sky-line--it was difficult to avoid the +view of this solitary and egotistic peak, the highest in Styria. He was +assigned a comfortable chamber, but the night was too fine for bed. He +did not feel sleepy, and he went along the road he had come by; the +church was an opaque mass, the spire alone showing in the violet +twilight, like some supernatural spar on a ship far out at sea. He +attempted to conjure to his tired brain the features, the expression, of +the girl. They would not reappear; his memory was traitorous. + +The murmur of faint music, piano music, made his ears wince--how he +hated music! But afar as were these tonal silhouettes, traced against +the evening air, his practised hearing told him that they were made by +an artist. He languidly followed the clue, and soon he was at the gate +of a villa, almost buried in the bosk, and listening with all his +critical attention to a thrilling performance--yes, thrilling was the +word--of Chopin's music. What! The last movement of the B flat minor +sonata, the funeral march sonata, but no more like the interpretation he +had heard from others--from himself--than--than.... + +But, good heavens! _Who_ was playing! The unison passages that mount and +recede were iridescent columns of mist painted by the moonlight and +swaying rhythmically in the breeze. Here was something rare. No longer +conscious of the technical side of the playing, so spiritualized was it, +so crystalline the touch, Davos forgot his manners and slipped through +the gateway, through the dark garden, toward an open window in which +burned a solitary candle. The mystery of this window and the quicksilver +dartings of the music--gods, what a touch, what gossamer delicacy!--set +his heart throbbing. He forgot his sick nerves. When the trumpet blows, +the war-horse lusts for action--and this was not a trumpet, but a horn +of elf-land. He moved as closely as he dared to the window, and the +music ceased--naturally enough, the movement had concluded. His ears +burned with the silence. _She_ came to the window. Arrested by the +vision--the casement framed her in a delicious manner--he did not stir. +She could not help seeing this intruder, the light struck him full in +the face. She spoke:-- + +"Dear Mr. Davos, won't you come into the house? My father and my uncle +will be most happy to receive you." + + * * * * * + +She knew him! Stunned by his overstrung emotions, he could only bow his +head. + + +II + +He received the welcome of a king. The two men he had seen earlier in +the day advanced ceremoniously and informed him that the honour of his +presence was something they had never hoped for; that--as news flies +swiftly in villages--they had heard he was at Alt-Aussee; they had +recognized the _great_ Marco Davos on the road. These statements were +delivered with exaggerated courtesy, though possibly sincere. The elder +of the pair was white-whiskered, very tall and spare, his expression a +sadly vague one. It was her father. The other an antique person, a +roly-poly fellow who chuckled and quavered, was her uncle. Davos sat in +a drawing-room containing a grand pianoforte, a few chairs, and couches. +The floor was stained, and when a cluster of lights was brought by the +uncle, he noticed that only Chopin portraits hung on the walls. He +apologized for his intrusion--the music had lured him from the highroad. + +"We are very musical," said the father. + +"I should say so," reiterated his brother-in-law. + +"Musical!" echoed Davos. "Do you call it by such an everyday phrase? I +heard the playing of a marvellous poet a moment ago." The two men looked +shyly at each other. She entered. He was formally presented. + +"Monsieur Davos, this is Constantia Grabowska, my daughter. My name is +Joseph Grabowski; my late wife's brother, Monsieur Pelletier." Davos +was puzzled by the name, Constantia Grabowska! She sat before him, +dressed in black silk with crinoline; two dainty curls hung over her +ears; her profile, her colouring, were slightly Oriental, and in her +nebulous gray eyes with their greenish light there was eternal youth. +Constantia! Polish. And how she played Chopin--ah! it came to him before +he had finished his apologies. + +"You are named after Chopin's first love," he ejaculated. "Pardon the +liberty." She answered him in her grave, measured contralto. + +"Constantia Gladowska was my grandmother." The playing, the portraits, +were now explained. A lover of the Polish composer, Davos knew every +incident of his biography. + +"I am the son of that Joseph Grabowski, the Warsaw merchant who married +the soprano singer, Constantia Gladowska, in 1832," said the father, +smilingly. "My father became blind." + +"Chopin's _Ideal_!" exclaimed Marco. He was under the spell of the +girl's beauty and music. He almost stared at her, for the knowledge that +she was a great artiste, perhaps greater than himself, rather dampened +his passion. She was adorable as she returned without coquetry his +ardent gaze; but she was--he had to admit it--a rival. This composite +feeling he inwardly wrestled with as the conversation placidly +proceeded. They only spoke of Poland, of Chopin. Once the name of +Emilia Plater, the Polish Joan of Arc, was mentioned--she, too, was a +distant connection. The young pianist hinted that more music would be +agreeable, but there was no response. He was quite alone with +Constantia, and they talked of Poland's tone-poet. She knew much more of +Chopin than he did, and she recited Mickewicz's patriotic poems with +incomparable verve. + +"Do you believe in heredity?" he cried, as the father entered with the +tea. "Do you believe that your love of Chopin is inherited? Chopin +composed that wonderful slow movement of the F minor concerto because of +his love for your grandmother. How I wish I could have seen her, heard +her." + +The girl, without answering him, detached from her neck a large brooch +and chain. Davos took it and amazedly compared the portrait with the +living woman. + +"You _are_ Constantia Gladowska." She smiled. + +"Her love of Chopin--she must have loved her youthful adorer--has been +transmitted to you. Oh, please play me that movement again, the one +Rubinstein called 'the night wind sweeping over the churchyard graves.'" +Constantia blushed so deeply that he knew he had offended her. She had +for him something of the pathos of old dance music--its stately +sweetness, its measured rhythms. After drinking a cup of tea he drifted +to the instrument--flies do not hanker after honey as strongly as do +pianists in the presence of an open keyboard. A tactful silence ensued. +He began playing, and, as if exasperated at the challenge implied by her +refusal, he played in his old form. Then he took the theme of Chopin's E +flat minor Scherzo, and he juggled with it, spun it into fine fibres of +tone, dashed it down yawning and serried harmonic abysses. He was +magnificent as he put forth all the varied resources of his art. +Constantia, her cheeks ablaze, her lips parted, interposed a fan between +her eyes and the light. There was something dangerous and passionate in +her regard. In all the fury of his play he knew that he had touched her. +Once, during a pause, he heard her sigh. As he finished in a thunderous +crash he saw in the doorway the figure of the Japanese maid--an ugly, +gnarled idol with slitted eyes. She withdrew when he arose to receive +the unaffected homage of his hosts. He was curious. Monsieur Pelletier, +who looked like a Brazilian parrot in beak and hue, cackled:-- + +"That's Cilli, our Japanese. She was born in Germany, and is my niece's +governess. Quite musical, too, I should say so. Just look at my two +Maltese cats! I call them Tristan and Isolde because they make noises in +the night. Don't you _loathe_ Wagner?" + +It was time to go. Enamoured, Davos took his leave, promising to call +the next forenoon before he went back to Ischl. He held her fingers for +a brief moment and longed to examine their tips,--the artist still +struggled to subdue the man,--but the pressure he received was so +unmistakable that he hurried away, fearing to betray his emotion. He +hovered in the vicinity of the house, longing for more music. He was +disappointed. For a full hour he wandered through the dusty lanes in the +faded light of an old moon. When he reached his chamber, it was long +past one o'clock; undaunted, his romantic fervour forced him to the +window, and he watched the shining lake. He fell asleep thinking of +Constantia. But he dreamed of Cilli, the Japanese maid with the hideous +eyes. + + +III + +Not only that morning, but every morning for two weeks, did Marco Davos +visit Alt-Aussee. He came down from Ischl on the earliest train, and +some nights he stopped at the hotel near his new friends. After a few +visits he saw little of the father and uncle, and he was not sorry--they +were old bores with their archaic anecdotes of dead pianists. Two +maniacs on the subject of music, Davos wished them to the devil after he +had known them twenty-four hours. His passion had reached the acute key. +He could not eat or drink in normal fashion, and no sooner had he left +the girl than the sky became sombre, his pulse weakened, and he longed +to return to her side to tell her something he had forgotten. He did +this several times, and hesitated in his speech, reddened, and left her, +stumbling over the grass like a lame man. Never such a crazy wooer, +never a calmer maiden. She looked unutterable sentiment, but spoke it +not. + +When he teased her about her music, she became a statue. She was too +timid to play before artists; her only master had been her father. Once +more he had heard the piano as he returned unexpectedly, and almost +caught her; he saw her at the instrument, but some instinct must have +warned her that she was being spied upon. She stopped in the middle of a +phrase from a Mendelssohn song, and even to his prejudiced ears her +touch had seemed commonplace. Yet he loved her all the more despite her +flat refusal to play. The temptation to his excited artistic temperament +was removed. He played, often, gloriously. His nerves were steel. This +was a cure his doctor had not foreseen. What did it matter, anyhow?--he +was near Constantia daily, and the sunshine was royal. Only--why did her +relatives absent themselves so obstinately! She told him, with her +secret smile, that she had scolded them for talking so much; but when he +played they were never far away, she assured him. Nor was the Japanese +woman, Cilli--what a name! A nickname given by Constantia in her +babyhood. Cilli was a good soul. He hoped so--her goodness was not +apparent. She had a sneering expression as he played. He never looked up +from the keyboard that he did not encounter her ironical gaze. She was +undoubtedly interested. Her intensity of pose proved it; but there was +no sympathy in her eyes. And she had a habit of suddenly appearing in +door or window, and always behind her mistress. She ended by seriously +annoying him, though he did not complain. It was too trivial. + +One afternoon he unfolded his novel views on touch. If the action of the +modern pianoforte could be made as sensitive in its response as the +fingerboard of a fiddle.... Constantia listened with her habitual +gravity, but he knew that she was bored. Then he shifted to the subject +of fingers. He begged to be allowed the privilege of examining hers. At +first she held back, burying her hand in the old Mechlin lace flounce of +her sleeves. He coaxed. He did not attempt to conceal his chagrin when +he finally saw her fingers. They were pudgy, good-humoured, fit to lift +a knife and fork, or to mend linen. They did not match her cameo-like +face, and above all they did not reveal the musical soul he knew her to +possess. For the first time since he met her she gave evidence of ill +humour. She sharply withdrew her hand from his, and as she did so a +barbaric croon was heard, a sort of triumphant wailing, and Constantia, +without making an excuse, hurriedly left the room. The singing stopped. + +"It's that devil of a Japanese woman," he muttered testily. He waited +for nearly an hour, and in a vile temper took up his hat and stick and +went away. Decidedly this was his unlucky day, he grumbled, as he +reached the water. He saw Grabowski and Pelletier, arm in arm, trudging +toward the villa, but contrived to evade them. In ten minutes he found +himself spying on the house he had quitted. He skirted a little private +way back of the villa, and to his amazement father, uncle, and +Constantia came out and hailed the omnibus which travelled hourly to +Aussee. Davos was furious. He did not risk following them, for he +realized he had been treated shabbily. His wrath softened as he +reflected; perhaps Constantia, agitated by his rudeness,--had he been +rude?--persuaded her family to follow him to Ischl. The sky cleared. +That was the solution--Marco Davos straightened himself--his pride was +no longer up in arms. Poor child--she was so easily wounded! How he +loved her! + +His body trembled. He could not believe he was awake. Incredible music +was issuing from behind the closed blinds of the villa. Music! And the +music he had overheard that first night. But Constantia had just gone +away; he had seen her. There must be some mistake, some joke. No, no, by +another path she had managed to get back to the house. Ay! but what +playing. Again came that purling rush of notes, those unison passages, +as if one gigantic hand grasped them--so perfect was the tonal accord. +He did not hesitate. At a bound he was in the corridor and pushed open +the door of the drawing-room.... + +At first the twilighted room blinded him. Then to his disgust and terror +he saw the apelike features of the squat Japanese governess. She sat at +the piano, her bilious skin flushed by the exertion of playing. + +"You--you!" he barely managed to stammer. She did not reply, but +preserved the immobility of a carved idol. + +"You are a wonderful artiste," he blurted, going to her. She stolidly +answered:-- + +"The Japanese have the finest sense of touch in the world. I was once a +pupil of Karl Tausig." Involuntarily he bowed his head to the revered +name of the one man he had longed to hear. Then his feelings almost +strangled him; his master passion asserted itself. + +"Your fingers, your fingers--let me see them," he hoarsely demanded. +With a malicious grin she extended her hands--he groaned enviously. Yes, +they were miracles of sculpture, miracles of colour and delicacy, the +slender tips well-nigh prehensile in their cunning power. And the +fingers of Constantia, of his love, of the woman who loved Chopin--that +Chopin whose first passion was for her grandmother, the opera singer +Constantia Gladowska! + +The knowledge of her cruel deception crept into his consciousness. He +was chilled for several seconds. Grief at his lost love, implacable +anger at her trickery, crowded into his unhappy brain. But he only bowed +to Cilli, and summoning all his will he politely said:-- + +"It is quite true that when the Japanese choose to play the piano, we +Europeans must shut up shop." He hurried out to the road and walked +desperately.... + +The next morning, as he nervously paced the platform of the Ischl +railway station, he encountered his old friend Alfred Brnfeld, the +jovial Viennese pianist. + +"Hullo!" + +"Hullo!" + +"Not going back to Vienna?" + +"Yes--I'm tired of the country." + +"But, man, you are pale and tired. Have you been studying up here after +your doctor bade you rest?" The concern in Brnfeld's voice touched +Davos. He shook his head, then bethought himself of something. + +"Alfred, you are acquainted with everybody in Europe. How is it you +never told me about that strange Grabowski crowd--you know, the +granddaughter of Chopin's first love?" Brnfeld looked at him with +instant curiosity. + +"You also?" he said. The young man blushed. After _that_ he could never +forgive! The other continued:-- + +"Granddaughter, fiddlesticks! They are not Poles, those Grabowskis, but +impostors. Their real name is--is--" Davos started. + +"What, you have met them?" + +"Yes, the stupid father, the odious uncle, the fair Constantia--what a +meek saint!--and that diabolical Japanese, who plays the piano like a +house on fire." Tears came to the eyes of Marco Davos. + +"Did they--I mean, did _she_ take you in, too?" + +"Here, at Ischl, last summer," was the grim reply. + + + + +XVIII + +THE TUNE OF TIME + + +Ferval returned to Rouen after a fatiguing trip down the Seine as far as +Croisset, the old home of Gustave Flaubert. Here he viewed, not without +a dismal sense of fame and its futility, the little garden-house in +which the masterpieces of the great Frenchman had been conceived in joy +and executed in sorrow. He met the faithful Colange, one-time attendant +of Flaubert, and from him learned exacerbating details of the novelist's +lonesome years; so he was in a mood of irritation as he went ashore near +the Boeldieu Bridge and slowly paced toward his hotel. He loved this +Norman Rouen, loved the battered splendour of Ntre-Dame Cathedral, +loved the church of Saint-Ouen--that miracle of the Gothic, with its +upspringing turrets, its portal as perfect as a Bach fugue. And in the +Solferino Garden he paid his tribute of flowers at the monuments of +Maupassant and Flaubert. Ferval was modern in his tastes; he believed +nothing in art was worth the while which did not date from the +nineteenth century. + +Deplorably bored, he passed his hotel on the Quai and turned into the +Rue Jeanne d'Arc, which led by the faade of the Palais de Justice. He +had studied it carefully, and it did not, this dull afternoon in +September, hold his interest long; he sauntered on, not feeling strong +enough to light a cigarette. Decidedly, Rouen was become tiresome. He +would go back to Paris by the evening train--or to Dieppe, thence to +London, on the morning boat. Presently he found himself nearing the +Porte de la Grosse Horloge. Through its opening poured vivacious working +girls and men in blouse and cap, smoking, chattering, gesticulating. It +was all very animated, and the wanderer tried to enjoy the picture. Then +over against the crenellated wall, under the tablet bearing the quaint +inscription picked out in choice Latin, Ferval saw a tall girl. Her bare +head would not have marked her in a crowd where motley prevailed; it was +her pose that attracted him,--above all, her medival face, with its +long, drooping nose which recalled some graven image of Jean Goujon. Her +skin was tanned; her hair, flame-coloured, was confined by a classic +fillet; her eyes, Oriental in fulness, were light blue--Ferval had +crossed to the apparition and noted these things. She did not return his +stare, but continued to gaze at the archway as if expecting some one. +Young, robust, her very attitude suggested absolute health; yet her +expression was so despairing, her eyes so charged with misery, that +involuntarily he felt in his pocket for money. And then he saw that in +her hand she held a tambourine. She wore a faded uniform of the +Salvation Army. + +Suddenly an extraordinary noise was heard; music, but of such a peculiar +and excruciating quality that the young man forgot his neighbour and +wondered what new pain was in store for his already taut nerves. The +shops emptied, children stopped their games, and the Quarter suspended +its affairs to welcome the music. Ferval heard rapturous and mocking +remarks. "Baki, Baki, the human orchestra!" cried one gossip to another. +And the reverberating music swelled, multifarious and amazing as if a +military band from piccolo to drum were about to descend the highway. A +clatter and bang, a sweet droning and shrill scraping, and then an old +man proudly limped through the gateway of the Great Clock. This was the +conjurer, this white-haired fellow, who, with fife, cymbals, bells, +concertinas,--he wore two strapped under either arm,--at times fiddler, +made epileptic music as he quivered and danced, wriggled, and shook his +venerable skull. The big drum was fastened to his back, upon its top +were placed cymbals. On his head he wore a pavilion hung with bells that +pealed when he twisted or nodded his long, yellow neck. He carried a +weather-worn fiddle with a string or two missing, while a pipe that +might have been a clarinet years before, now emitted but cackling tones +from his thin lips, through which shone a few fanglike teeth. By some +incomprehensible cordination of muscular movements he contrived to make +sound simultaneously his curious armoury of instruments, and the +whistling, screeching, scratching, drumming, wheezing, and tinkling of +metal were appalling. But it was rhythmic, and at intervals the edge of +a tune could be discerned, cutting sharply through the dense cloud of +vibrations, like the prow of a boat cleaving the fog. Baki, his face red +and swollen by his exertions, moved to the spot where waited the girl. + +"_Ai_, Debora!" cried a boy, "here's the old man. Pass the plate, pass +the plate!" To his amazement, though he could give no reason for the +feeling, Ferval saw the girl go from group to group, her tambourine +outstretched, begging for coppers. Once she struck an insulting youth +across the face, but when she reached Ferval and met his inquiring look, +she dropped her eyes and did not ask for alms. A red-headed Sibyl, he +thought discontentedly, a street beggar, the daughter of an old ruffian. +And as he walked away rapidly he remembered her glance, in which there +lurked some touch of antique pride and wrath. + + +II + +Rouen lay below him, a violet haze obscuring all but the pinnacles of +its churches. The sinking sun had no longer power to pierce this misty +gulf, at the bottom of which hummed the busy city; but Ferval saw +through rents in the twirling, heat-laden atmosphere the dim shapes of +bridges mirrored by the water beneath him; and once the two islands +apparently swept toward him, a blur of green; while at the end of the +valley, framed by hills, he seemed to discern the odd-looking +Transbordeur spanning the Seine. + +For twenty-four hours he had not ceased thinking of the girl with the +tambourine, of her savage, sullen grace, her magnificent poise and +strange glance. He had learned at his hotel that she was called "_Debora +la folle_," and that she was the daughter of the still crazier Baki. Was +she some sort of a gypsy, or a Continental version of Salvation Army +lass? No one knew. Each year, at the beginning of autumn, the pair +wandered into Rouen, remained a few weeks, and disappeared. Where? +Paris, perhaps, or Italy or--_l bas!_ The shoulder-shrugging proved +that Baki and his daughter were not highly regarded by reputable +citizens of Rouen, though the street people followed their music and +singing as long as it lasted. Singing? queried Ferval; does the woman +sing? + +He became more interested. His visits to the country where Pissarro +painted and Flaubert wrote revealed other possibilities besides those +purely artistic ones in which this amateur of fine shades and sensations +delighted. He did not deny, on the esplanade where behind him stood +Bonsecours and the monument of Jeanne d'Arc, that souvenirs of the girl +had kept his eyelids from closing during the major portion of the night. +To cool his brain after the midday breakfast he had climbed the white, +dusty, and winding road leading to the Monumental Cemetery wherein, true +Flaubertian, he had remained some moments uncovered at the tomb of the +master. Now he rested, and the shade of the trees mellowed the slow dusk +of a Rouen evening. + +A deep contralto voice boomed in his ears. As he had seen but a scant +half-dozen persons during the afternoon on the heights, Ferval was +startled from his dreams. He turned. Sitting on a bank of green was the +girl. Her hands were clasped and she spoke carelessly to her father, +who, unharnessed from his orchestra, appeared another man. Rapidly +Ferval observed his striking front, his massive head with the long, +white curls, the head of an Elijah disillusioned of his mission. He, +too, was sitting, but upright, and his arm was raised with a threatening +gesture as if in his desolating anger he were about to pronounce a +malediction upon the vanishing twilighted town. Ferval moved +immediately, as he did not care to be caught spying upon his queer +neighbours. He was halted by their speech. It was English. His surprise +was so unaffected that he turned back and went up to the two and bade +them good-day. At once he saw that the girl recognized him; the father +dropped his air of grandeur and put on the beggar's mask. What an actor! +thought Ferval, at the transformation. "Would the good gentleman +please--?" + +The girl plucked at her father's arm imploringly. With her grave, cold +expression she answered the other's salutation and fixed him with her +wonderful eyes so inquiringly that Ferval began a hasty explanation. +"English was rarely spoken here ... and then the pleasure of the music!" +The old man burst into scornful laughter. + +"The music!" he exclaimed. "The music!" echoed his daughter. Ferval +wished himself down in Rouen. But he held his position. + +"Yes," he continued, "your music. It interested me. And now I find you +speaking my own tongue. I must confess that I am curious, that my +curiosity has warrant." Thus was he talking to beggars as if they were +his social equals. Unconsciously the tone he adopted had been forced +upon him by the bearing of his companions, above all by their accent, +that of cultivated folk. Who and what were they? The musician no longer +smiled. + +"You are a music-lover, monsieur?" he asked in a marked French _patois_. + +"I love music, and I am extremely engaged by your remarkable combination +of instruments," answered Ferval. Baki regarded his wretched orchestra +on the grass, then spoke to his daughter. + +"Debora," he said in English, and his listener wondered if it were +Celtic or Scotch in its unusual intonations, "Debora, you must sing +something for the gentleman. He loves our art,"--there was indescribable +pathos in this phrase,--"so sing something from Purcell, Brahms, or +Richard Strauss." + +These words were like the sting of hail; they seemed to drop from the +sky, so out of key were they with the speaker's ragged clothes and the +outlandish garb of his daughter. Purcell! Brahms! Strauss! What could +these three composers mean to such outcasts? Believing that he was the +victim of a mystification, Ferval waited, his pulses beating as if he +had been running too hard. The girl slowly moved her glorious eyes in +his direction; light as they were in hue, their heavy, dark lashes gave +them a fantastic expression--bright flame seen through the shadow of +smoke. He felt his own dilating as she opened her throat and poured out +a broad, sonorous stream of sound that resolved into Von ewiger Liebe by +Brahms. He had always loved deep-voiced women. Had he not read in the +Talmud that Lilith, Adam's first wife, was low of voice? And this +beggar-maid? Maybe a masquerading singer with a crazy father! What else +could mean such art wasted on the roads, thrown in the faces of a +rabble! Ferval kindled with emotion. Here was romance. Brahms and his +dark song under the bowl of the troubled blue sky strongly affected him. +He took the lean, brown hand of the singer and kissed it fervently. She +drew back nervously, but her father struck her on the shoulder +chidingly. + +"A trifle too dreary," he rumbled in his heavy bass. "Now, Purcell for +the gentleman, and may he open his heart and his purse for the poor." + +"Father," she cried warningly, "we are not beggars, _now_!" She turned +supplicatingly to the young man and made a gesture of dismissal. He +gently shook his head and pretended that he was about to leave, though +he felt that his feet were rooted in the earth, his power of willing +gone. + +"Ay, ay, my girl!" continued the musician, "you can sing as well as the +best of them, only you love your sinful old father so much that you have +laid aside your ambitions, to follow him in his pilgrimage of expiation +about this wicked globe. Ah, sir, if you but knew--I _will_ speak, +Debora, for he is a gentleman and a lover of music! If you but knew our +history, you would not be surprised at us. Have ye ever been in Wales?" + +Ferval stumbled in his answer. It was overlooked; the old man continued: +"If ye have, ye must have heard of the sin-eaters. I am one of them, I +am an eater of sin--" + +Again the girl exclaimed, this time piteously, "Oh, father, remember +your vow!" + +"Poor lass! Yes, I was a doer of evil, and I became an eater of sin. +Some day my sins will be forgiven--this is my penance." He pointed to +his instruments. Ferval kept silence. He feared a word would blow away +the cobweb foundations of the narrative. The girl had turned and was +watching a young tilted moon which with a single star made silvery dents +low in the western horizon. + +"I am an eater of sin. We still have a few such in Wales. They put a +piece of bread and cheese on the breast of a dead man and when the +sin-eater eats it, the sins of the dead are passed into the bread and +cheese and the soul of the dead is shrived of them. Ay, ay, but it's a +grave duty, my friend, to take upon your own soul the crime of another. +If you are free from sin yourself, you may walk through life a brave +creature; but ... I took his sins, sins, the sins of the wickedest +composer of our century, God rest his soul. And for the wicked things he +put into his symphonies I must march through life playing on this +terrible collection of instruments the Tune of Time--" His daughter +faced him. + +"Father, we must go; you are only keeping the gentleman." Again she +signalled Ferval, but he disregarded her warning. He would not stir. The +story and the man who told it, a prophet shorn of his heaven-storming +powers, fascinated him. + +"I took his sins to myself and they were awful. Once every night I play +the Tune of Time in which the wickedness of the dead man is spread out +like dry rot in a green field. This man kept his genius so long stagnant +that it decayed on his hands, and then into his pestilential music he +poured his poison, and would have made the world sick. Oh, for delivery +from the crushing transgressions of another! His name? Ah, but that is +my secret! I ate his sin, and truth, my son, is stranger than theology! +Listen!" + +Before his daughter could check him he had hastily donned his armament +of instruments and, tramping slowly the broad, smooth path, began +playing. Ferval, much disappointed, was about to disappear, for he +remembered the racking noises of the previous day. But this music, this +Tune of Time!... + + +III + +It was like the flare of lightning which illuminates strange regions +beyond the borders of the soul. Ferval no longer heard, he felt; he felt +no more, he saw. The white veil was torn asunder, and it showed him a +melodious thunder-pool wherein tapering tiny bodies swam, whose eyes +were the eyes of Debora. They split and coalesced into other creatures, +and to the drummings of spheric harmonies resolved themselves scaly and +monstrous. Never did they cease changing. As the music buzzed he saw the +great ladder of life, the lowermost rungs resting in lakes of melted +amber, the top threatening the remotest rims of the universe. And still +the Tune of Time whirred on, as facet after facet of the Infinite +wheeled toward creation. Numberless legions of crumpled nightmare shapes +modulated into new, familiar forms. Ferval saw plasmic dew become +anthropoidal apes, fiercely roaming primeval forests in search of prey. +The music mounted ever upward, for the Tune of Time is the Tune of +Love--love and its inseparable shadow, hate, fashion the firmament. The +solid, circular earth shivered like a mighty harp under this lyric +burden of love. The very stars sported in their orbits; and from the +fulgurating ovens of the Milky Way there shot forth streams of audible +light that touched the heart-strings of the hairy, erect primates and +set them chanting; thus were the souls born which crowned them men. This +space-bridging music ranged from sun to sun, and its supernatural +symphony had no beginning and never shall end. + +But the magician or devil who revealed this phantasmagoria of the +Cosmos--how had he wrested from the Inane the Tune of Time that in a +sequence of chromatic chords pictured the processes of the eternal +energy? Was this his sin, the true sin against the Holy Ghost? How had +he blundered upon the secret of the rhythmic engine which spun souls +through the ages? No man could live after this terrific peep at the +Ancient of Days. Debora's eyes peered into Ferval's, filled with the +music that enmeshes. And now sounded the apocalyptic trumpets even unto +the glittering edges of eternity.... + +Amid this vertiginous tempest of tones Debora danced the Dance of Space. +She revolved in lenten movement to the lilt of the music, her eyes +staring and full of broken lights. As her gaze collided with her +companion's he saw a disk of many-coloured fire; and then her languorous +gestures were transformed into shivering intensities. She danced like +the wine-steeped Noah; she danced as danced David before the Ark of the +Covenant. And she was Herodias pirouetting for the price of John's head, +and her brow was wreathed with serpents. Followed the convulsive +curvings of the Nautch and the opaque splendours of stately Moorish +slaves. Debora threw her watcher into a frenzy of fear. He crouched +under a sky that roofed him in with its menacing blackness; the orbs of +the girl were shot with crescent lightnings. Alien in his desolation, he +wondered if her solemn leaps, as the music dashed with frantic speed +upon his ear-drums, signified the incarnation of Devi, dread slayer of +men! The primal charmers affrighted his vision: Lilith, Ourania, +Astart, Ashtaroth, Belkis, Ishtar, Mylitta, Cotytto, and many +immemorial figures from before the Flood streamed by and melted into the +woven paces of Debora--this new Jephtha's daughter dancing to her doom +as her father fingered the Tune of Time. In the whirling patterns of her +dance, Ferval discerned, though dimly, the Veil of Maya, the veil of +illusion called Space, on the thither side of which are embroidered the +fugacious symbols of Time.... + +... As the delirious music faltered and fainted, he watched the tragic +eyes of Debora yellowing cat-like. His senses and imagination had been +hypnotized by all this fracas and by the beauty of the girl. With such a +mate and such formidable music, he could conquer the earth! His brain +was afire with the sweetness of the odour that enveloped them, an odour +as penetrating as the music of the nocturnal Chopin. + +"Debora," he whispered, "you must never go away from me." She hung her +head. The old man was not to be seen; the darkness had swallowed him. +Ferval quietly passed his arm about the waist of the silent woman and +slowly they walked in the tender night. She was the first to speak:-- + +"You did not hear a madman's story," she asserted in her clear, candid +voice, which had for him the hue of a cleft pomegranate. "It is the +history of my father's soul. It is his own sin he expiates." + +"But you, you!" Ferval cried unsteadily. "Why must your life be +sacrificed to gratify the bizarre egotism of such a--" He cut short the +phrase, fearful of wounding her. He felt her body tremble and her arm +contract. They reached the marble staircase of the Jeanne d'Arc +memorial. She stopped him and burst forth:-- + +"Would you be willing to share his burden? Would you take upon your +shoulders his sin? He may have committed the one unpardonable sin, for +he discovered the true philosopher's stone, that can transmute metals, +make mountains nod, the stars to stop, and command the throne of +Jehovah--oh, what blasphemy has been his in his daring music! If he +could persuade one other soul besides mine to help him, he might be +released from his woe. Will you be that other?" + +She put this question as if she were proposing a commonplace human +undertaking. Ferval in his confusion fancied that she was provoking him +to a declaration. To grasp his receding reason he fatuously exclaimed:-- + +"Is this a Salvation Army fantasy?" + +With that she called out, in harsh resentment: + +"Not salvation for you!" + +She then thrust him from her so violently that he tumbled backward down +the steps to the very bottom, where, unnerved by the ferocity of the +attack and his head bruised by the fall, he felt his consciousness +escape like gas from a punctured balloon. When found the next morning, +he was barely covered by the old sin-eater's rags, while near by was +scattered the entire orchestra of that eloquent wizard. Shudderingly he +realized that it had been no dream; shudderingly he wondered if upon his +soul had been shifted the unknown crime of the fanatic! The witching, +enigmatic Debora haunted his memory; and with dismay he recalled the +blistering vision evoked by the music, through which she had glided like +some tremulous Lamia. Decidedly his imagination had carried him far. He +cursed his easy credulity, he reviled his love of the exotic.... + +Ferval made inquiry of the authorities, but received little comfort. +Salvation Army people they were not, this father and daughter; the +tambourine, assumed garb, and prophet's beard had deceived him. +Impostors! But of what incredible caliber, of what illusion-creating +power! For years he could not see a Salvation Army girl without a sense +of cerebral exaltation. If he could have met Debora again, he would have +forgiven her sibylline deceptions, her father's chicanery. And how did +they spin their web? Ferval, student of the occult, greedy of +metaphysical problems, at first set it down to Indian Yogi magic. But +the machinery--the hideously discordant human orchestra, the corybantic +dancing! No, he rejected the theory. Music is sometimes hypnotic, but +not such music; dancing is the most alluring of the spatial arts, and +Debora's miming was a delight to the eye; but could it have so obscured +his judgments as to paint upon the canvas of his fancy those prodigious +frescoes of time and space? + +In the iron solitude of his soul he tortured himself with these +questions. His stupor lasted for days--was it the abrupt fall or was it +the result of his absinthe-like dreams? He was haunted by an odour that +assailed his brain like one tune persistently played. The odour! Whence +did it come with its sickly sweetness? Perhaps therein lay the secret of +his hallucinating visions. Perhaps a drug had perverted his brain. But +within the week the dangerous perfume had become dissipated, and with it +vanished all hope of solving the riddle. Oh, to sense once more the +enchantments of its fragrance, once more revel in the sublimated +intoxication of mighty forces weaving at the loom of life! By the +cadences of what infernal art had he been vouchsafed a glimpse of the +profiles of the gods? Henceforth Ferval became a lover of shadows. + + + + +XIX + +NADA + + +The tenderness of the growing night disquieted the dying woman. + +"Aline!" she called. But it was only the name that reverberated within +the walls of her brain, harrowed by fever. A soft air rustled the drawn +curtains of lawn; and on the dressing table the two little lamps +fluttered in syncopated sympathy. One picture the room held. It was +after a painting by Goya, and depicted a sneering skeleton scrawling on +his dusty tomb, with a bony fore-finger, the sinister word, +_Nada_--nothing! The perturbation of the woman increased, though +physical power seemed denied her. "Aline, my child!" This time a +clucking sound issued from her throat. + +The girl went to the bedside and gently fanned. Her aunt wagged her head +negatively. "No, no!" she stuttered. Aline stopped, and kneeling, took +the sick hands in her own. Their eyes met and Aline, guided by the +glance, looked over at the picture with its sardonic motto. + +"Shall I take it away, Aunt Mary?" The elder woman closed her eyes as if +to shut out the ghoulish mockery. Then Aline saw the tabouret that stood +between the windows--it was burdened with magnolias in a deep white +bowl. + +"Do you wish them nearer?" + +"No, no," murmured her aunt. Her eyes brightened. She pushed her chin +forward, and the young girl removed the flowers, knowing that their +odour had become oppressive. She was not absent more than a few seconds. +As she returned the maid touched her arm. + +"The gentlemen are waiting below, miss. They won't leave until they see +you." + +"How can I go now? Send them away, send them away!" + +"Yes, miss; but I told them what you said this afternoon about the +danger of Holiest Mother--" + +"Hush! she is calling." Aline slipped into the room on hurried feet, her +eyes dilated, her hair in anxious disorder. But the invalid made no +signal. She lay with closed eyelids, the contraction of her nostrils a +faint proclamation of life. Again the niece took her place at the +headboard, and with folded fingers watched the whispering indications of +speedy flight. The maid soon beckoned her from a narrowed door. Aline +joined her. + +"They say that if you don't go down, they will come up." + +"Who says?" was the stern query. + +"The Second Reader and the Secretary. I think you had better see them; +they both look worried. Really I do, Miss Allie." + +"Very well, Ellen; but you must stay here, and if Holiest Mother makes +the slightest move, touch the bell. I'll not be gone five minutes." + +Without arranging her hair or dress, Aline opened the folding doors of +the drawing-room. Only the centre lamp was lighted, but she recognized +the two men. They were sitting together, and arose as she entered. The +burly Second Reader wore a dismayed countenance. His cheeks were flabby, +his eyes red. The other was a timid little man who never had anything to +say. + +"How is Holiest Mother?" asked the Reader. + +"Dying." + +"Oh, Sister Aline! Why such a blunt way of putting it? _She_ may be +exchanging her earthly garb for a celestial one--but die! We do not +acknowledge death in the Church of the New Faith." He paused and blandly +stroked his huge left hand, covered with red down. + +"Holiest Mother, my aunt, has not an hour to live," was the cool +response of the girl. "If you have no further question, I must ask you +to excuse me; I am needed above." She stepped to the door. + +"Wait a moment, sister! Not so fast. The situation is serious. Hundreds +of thousands of the faithful depend on our report of this--of this sad +event. We may tell them that the female pope of our great religion"--he +bent his big neck reverently--"was wafted to her heavenly abode by the +angels. But there are the officers of the law, the undertaker, the +cemetery people, to be considered. Shall we acknowledge that our founder +has died like any other human--in bed, of a fever? And who is to be her +successor? Has she left a will?" + +"Poor Aunt Mary!" muttered the girl. + +"It must be a woman, will or no will," continued the Second Reader, in +the tone of a conqueror making terms with a stricken foe. "Now Aline, +sister, you are the nearest of kin. You are a fervent healer. _You_ are +the Woman." + +"How can you stand there heartlessly plotting such things and a dying +woman in the house?" Aline's voice was metallic with passion. "You care +only for the money and power in our church. I refuse to join with you in +any such scheme. Aunt Mary will die. She will name her successor. Then +it will be time to act. Have you forgotten her last words to the +faithful?" She pointed to a marble tablet above the fireplace, which +bore this astounding phrase: "My first and forever message is one and +eternal." Nothing more,--but the men cowered before the sublime wisdom +uttered by a frail woman, wisdom that had started the emotional +machinery of two continents. + +"But, great God! Miss Aline, you mustn't go off and leave us in this +fix." Drops of water stood on the forehead of the Second Reader. His +hands dropped to his side with a gesture of despair. His companion kept +to the corner, a scared being. + +"You know as well as I do that _somebody_ has to take the throne seat +after--after your Aunt Mary dies--I mean, after Holiest Mother is +translated to eternity. Ask her, beg her, for some advice. We can't let +the great undertaking go to pieces--" + +"You have little faith, brother," replied Aline. "If that message means +anything, then the New Faith will take care of itself--" + +"Yes, yes, I know," was the testy interruption; "but the world is not so +easily led in matters of religion. The message, as you say, is divine; +but it may sound like meaningless twaddle to the world at large. If we +are to heal mankind and dispel the heresy of disease and death, why +can't Holiest Mother save herself? Mind you, I am looking at this thing +with the eyes of the sceptics--" + +"You are an unbeliever, a materialist, yourself," was the bold retort. +"Do as you please, but you can't drag me into your money calculations." +The swift slam of the door left them to their fears. + +Her aunt, sitting as upright as a candle, was conducting an invisible +orchestra when Aline returned. The frightened maid tried to hold the +lean, spasmodic arms as they traced in the air the pompous rhythm of a +march that moved on silent funereal pinions through the chamber. The +woman stared threateningly at the picture on the wall, the picture of +the skeleton which had come from nothingness to reveal nothingness to +the living. The now distraught girl, her nerves crisped by her doubts, +threw herself upon the bed, her fears sorely knocking at her heart. + +"Aunt, Aunt Mary--Holiest Mother, in Christ's name, in the name of the +New Faith, tell me before you go--tell me what is to become of our holy +church after you die--after you pass over to the great white light. Is +it all real? Or is it only a dream, _your_ beautiful dream?--What is the +secret truth? Or--or--is there no secret--no--" her voice was cracked by +sobs. The stately, soundless music was waved on by her aunt. Then +Holiest Mother fell back on her pillow, and with a last long glance at +the picture, she pointed, with smiling irony at the picture. + +_Nada, Nada ..._ + +The night died away in tender complicity with the two little lamps on +the dressing table, and the sweet, thick perfume of magnolias modulated +into acrid decay as day dawned. Below, the two men anxiously awaited the +message from the dead. And they saw again upon the marble tablet above +the fireplace her cryptic wisdom:-- + +"My first and forever message is one and eternal." + + + + +XX + +PAN + + For the Great God Pan is alive again. + + --DEAN MANSEL. + + +I + +The handsome Hungarian kept his brilliant glance fixed upon Lora Crowne; +she sat with her Aunt Lucas and Mr. Steyle at a table facing the +orchestra. His eyes were not so large as black; the intensity of their +gaze further bewildered the young woman, whose appearance that evening +at the famous caf on the East Side was her initial one. The heat, the +bristling lights, the terrific appealing clamour of the gypsy band, set +murmuring the nerves of this impressionable girl. And the agility of the +_cymbalom_ player, his great height, clear skin, and piercing eyes, +quite enthralled her. + +"It is the gypsy dulcimer, Lora; I read all about it in Liszt's book on +gypsy music," said Aunt Lucas, in an airy soprano. + +Mr. Steyle was impressed. Lora paid no attention, but continued to gaze +curiously at the antics of the player, who hammered from his instrument +of wire shivering, percussive music. With flexible wrists he swung the +felt-covered mallets that brought up such resounding tones; at times +his long, apelike arms would reach far asunder and, rolling his eyes, he +touched the extremes of his _cymbalom_; then he described furious +arpeggios, punctuated with a shrill tattoo. And the crazy music defiled +by in a struggling squad of chords; but Arpad Vihary never lifted his +eyes from Lora Crowne.... + +The vibration ceased. Its withdrawal left the ear-drums buzzing with a +minute, painful sensation, like that of moisture rapidly evaporating +upon the naked skin. A battalion of tongues began to chatter as the +red-faced waiters rushed between the tables, taking orders. It was after +eleven o'clock, and through the swinging doors passed a throng of motley +people, fanning, gossiping, bickering--all eager and thirsty. Clarence +Steyle pointed out the celebrities with conscious delight. Over +yonder--that man with the mixed gray hair--was a composer who came every +night for inspiration,--musical and otherwise, Clarence added, with a +laugh. And there was the young and well-known decadent playwright who +wore strangling high collars and transposed all his plays from French +sources; he lisped and was proud of his ability to dramatize the latest +mental disease. And a burglar who had written a famous book on the +management of children during hot weather sat meekly resting before a +solitary table. + +The leader of the Hungarian band was a gypsy who called himself Alfassy +Janos, though he lived on First Avenue, in a flat the door of which +bore this legend: _Jacob Aron_. The rest of the band seemed gypsy. Who +is the _cymbalom_ player? That is not difficult to answer; the programme +gives it. + +"There you are, Miss Lora." + +She looked. "Oh, what a romantic name! He must be a count at least." + +"Lora, dear, gypsies never bear titles," remarked Aunt Lucas, +patronizingly. + +"How about the Abb Liszt?" triumphantly asked her charge. + +Aunt Lucas laughed coldly. "Liszt was Hungarian, not Romany. But your +artist with the drumsticks certainly is distinguished-looking. If he +only would not wear that odious scarlet uniform. I wonder why he does +not sit down, like the rest of his colleagues." + +Arpad Vihary leaned against the panelled wall, his brow puckered in +boredom, his long black mustaches drooping from sheer discouragement. +His was a figure for sculpture--a frame powerfully modelled, a bisque +complexion. Thin as a cedar sapling, he preserved such an immovable +attitude that in the haze of the creamy atmosphere he seemed a carved, +marmoreal image rather than a young man with devouring eyes. + +The three visitors ate sandwiches and pretended to relish Munich beer +served in tall stone mugs. Aunt Lucas, who was shaped like a 'cello, +made more than a pretence of sipping; she drank one entirely, +regretting the exigencies of chaperonage: to ask for more might shock +the proper young man. + +"It's horrid here, after all," she remarked discontentedly. "So many +people--_such_ people--and very few nice ones. The Batsons are over +there, Lora; but then you don't care for them. O dear, I wish the band +would strike up again." + +It did. A vicious swirl of colour and dizzy, dislocated rhythms prefaced +the incantations of the Czardas. Instantly the eating, gabbling crowd +became silent. Alfassy Janos magnetized his hearers with cradling, +caressing movements of his fiddle. He waved like tall grass in the wind; +he twisted snakewise his lithe body as he lashed his bow upon the +screaming strings; the resilient tones darted fulgurantly from +instrument to instrument. After chasing in circles of quicksilver, they +all met with a crash; and the whole tonal battery, renforced by the +throbbing of Arpad Vihary's dulcimer, swept through the suite of rooms +from ceiling to sanded floor. It was no longer enchanting music, but +sheer madness of the blood; sensual and warlike, it gripped the +imagination as these tunes of old Egypt, filtered through savage +centuries, reached the ears. Lora trembled in the gale that blew across +the Puzta. She imagined a determined Hungarian prairie, over which +dashed disordered centaurs brandishing clubs, driving before them a band +of satyrs and leaping fauns. The hoofed men struggled. At their front +was a monster with a black goat-face and huge horns; he fought fiercely +the half-human horses. The sun, a thin scarf of light, was eclipsed by +earnest clouds; the curving thunder closed over the battle; the air was +flame-sprinkled and enlaced by music; and most melancholy were the eyes +of the defeated Pan--the melancholy eyes of Arpad Vihary.... + +Aunt Lucas was scandalized. "Do you know, Lora, that the impudent +dulcimer virtuoso"--she prided herself on her musical terms--"actually +stared you out of countenance during the entire Czardas?" And she could +have added that her niece had returned the glance unflinchingly. + +Mr. Steyle noticed Lora's vacant regard when he addressed her and +insisted on getting her away from the dangerous undertow of this "table +d'hte music," as he contemptuously called it. He summoned the waiter. + +Lora shed her disappointment. "Oh, let's wait for the _cymbalom_ solo," +she frankly begged. + +Her aunt was unmoved. "Yes, Mr. Steyle, we had better go; the air is +positively depressing. These slumming parties are delightful if you +don't overdo them--but the people!" Up went her lorgnon. + +They soon departed. Lora did not dare to look back until she reached the +door that opened on the avenue; as she did so her vibrant gaze collided +with the Hungarian's. She determined to see him again. + + +II + +Nice Brooklyn girls always attend church and symphony concerts. This +dual custom is considered respectable and cultured. Lora's parents +during their lifetime never missed the Theodore Thomas concerts and the +sermons of a certain famous local preacher; but there were times when +the young woman longed for Carmen and the delights of fashionable +Bohemia. Carefully reared by her Aunt Lucas, she had nevertheless a +taste for gypsy bands and "Gyp's" novels. She read the latter +translated, much to the disedification of her guardian, who was a +linguist and a patron of the fine arts. This latter clause included +subscriptions to the Institute Course and several scientific journals. +If Lora were less romantic, all would be well. Once the careful chaperon +had feared music and its disturbing influences; but after she had read +an article about its healing effect upon the insane she felt that it +could work no evil in Lora; indeed, it was an elevating art. She was +fond of music herself, and, as dancing was strictly tabooed, there +seemed little likelihood of the noble art of "sweet concordance"--Aunt +Lucas had picked this quotation up somewhere--doing mischief to her +impressionable niece. + +Nearly all dwelling-houses look alike in Brooklyn, even at midday. The +street in which the Crownes lived was composed of conventional +brown-stone buildings and English basements. Nielje, the Dutch maid, +stood at the half-opened door, regarding with suspicion the big, dark +man who had pulled the bell so violently. Aunt Lucas was in New York at +the meeting of a society devoted to Ethical Enjoyment. Though Nielje had +been warned secretly of an expected visitor, this wild-looking young man +with long black hair, wearing a flaring coat of many colours and baggy +Turkish trousers, gave her a shock. Why did he come to the basement as +if he were one of the cook's callers? She paused. Then the door was +shoved in by a muscular arm, and she was pushed against the wall. + +"Don't try that again, man," she protested. + +He answered her in gibberish. "Mees, Mees Lora," he repeated. + +"Ach!" she exclaimed. + +Arpad Vihary gloomily followed her into the dining-room, where Lora +stood trembling. This was the third time she had met the Hungarian, and +fearing Prospect Park,--after two timid walks there, under the +fiery-fingered leaves of early autumn,--she had been prevailed upon to +invite Arpad to her home. She regretted her imprudence the moment he +entered. All his footlight picturesqueness vanished in the cold, hard +light of an unromantic Brooklyn breakfast-room. He seemed like a clumsy +circus hero as he scraped his feet over the parquetry and attempted to +kiss her hand. She drew away instantly and pointed to a chair. He +refused to sit down; his pride seemed hurt. + +Then he gave the girl an intense look, and she drew nearer. + +"Oh, Arpad Vihary," she began. + +He interrupted. "You do not love me now. Why? You told me you loved me, +in the park, yesterday. I am a poor artist, that is the reason." + +This speech he uttered glibly, and, despite the extraordinary +pronunciation, she understood it. She took his long hand, the fingers +amazed her. He bent them back until they touched his wrist, and was +proud of their flexibility. He walked to the dining-table and tossed its +cover-cloth on a chair. Upon his two thumbs he went around it like an +acrobat. "Shall I hold you out with one arm?" he softly asked. Lora was +vastly amused; this was indeed a courtship out of the ordinary--it +pleased her exotic taste. + +"Hungarian gypsies are very strong, are they not?" she innocently asked. + +"I am not gypsy nor am I Hungarian; I am an East Indian. My family is +royal. We are of the Rajpoot tribes called Ranas. My father once ruled +Roorbunder." + +Lora was amazed. A king's son, a Rana of Roorbunder! She became very +sympathetic. Again she urged him to sit down. + +"My nation never sits before a woman," he proudly answered. + +"But I will sit beside you," she coaxed, pushing him to a corner. He +resisted her and went to the window. Lora again joined him. The man +piqued her. He was mysterious and very unlike Mr. Steyle--poor, +sentimental Clarence, who melted with sighs if she but glanced at him; +and then, Clarence was too stout. She adored slender men, believing that +when fat came in at the door love fled out of the window. + +"They put me in a circus at Buda-Pesth," remarked Arpad Vihary, as if he +were making a commonplace statement about the weather. + +She gave a little scream; he regarded her with Oriental composure. "In a +circus! You! Did you ride?" + +"I cannot ride," he said. "I played in a cage all day." + +"Because you were wild?" She then went into a fit of laughter. He was +such a funny fellow, though his ardent gaze made her blush. So blond and +pink was Lora that her friends called her Strawberry--a delicate +compliment in which she delighted. It was this golden head and radiant +face, with implacably blue eyes, that set the blood pumping into Arpad's +brain. When he looked at her, he saw sunlight. + +"Do you know, you absurd prince, that when you played the Czardas the +other night I seemed to see a vision of a Hungarian prairie, covered +with fighting centaurs and satyrs! I longed to be a _vivandire_ among +all those fauns. You were there--in the music, I mean--and you were big +Pan--oh, so ugly and terrible!" + +"Pan! That is a Polish title," he answered quite simply. + +"Stupid! The great god Pan--don't you know your mythology? Haven't you +read Mrs. Browning? He was the god of nature, of the woods. Even now, I +believe you have ears with furry tips and hoofs like a faun." + +He turned a sickly yellow. + +"Anyhow, why did they put you in a cage? Were you a wild boy?" + +"They thought so in Hungary." + +"But why?" + +He stared at her sorrowfully, and was about to empty his soul; but she +turned away with a shudder. + +"I know, I know," she whispered; "your hands--they are like the hands +of--" + +Arpad threw out his chest, and Lora heard with a curiosity that became +nervous a rhythmic wagging sound, like velvet bruised by some dull +implement. It frightened her. + +"Do not be afraid of me," he begged. "You cannot say anything I do not +know already." He walked to the door, and the girl followed him. + +"Don't go, Arpad," she said with pretty remorse. + +The fire blazed in his eyes and with a single swift grasp he seized her, +holding her aloft like a torch. Lora almost lost consciousness. She had +not counted upon such barbarous wooing, and, frightened, cried out, +"Nielje, Nielje!" + +Nielje burst into the room as if she had been very near the keyhole. +She was a powerful woman from Holland, who did not fear an army. + +"Put her down!" she insisted, in her deepest gutturals. "Put her down, +you brute, or I'll hurt you." + +Lora jumped to the floor as Nielje struck with her broomstick at Arpad's +retreating back. To the surprise of the women he gave a shriek of agony +and ran to the door, Nielje following close behind. Lora, her eyes +strained with excitement, did not stir; she heard a struggle in the +little hall as the man fumbled at the basement entrance. Again he +yelled, and then Lora rushed to the window. Nielje, on her knees, was +being dragged across the grassy space in front of the house. She held +on, seemingly, to the coat-tail of the frantic musician; only by a +vigorous shove did he evade her persistent grasp and disappear. + +A policeman with official aptness went leisurely by. Nielje flew into +the house, locking and bolting the door. Her face was red as she rolled +on the floor, her hands at her sides. Lora, alarmed, thought she was +seriously hurt or hysterical from fright; but the laughter was too +hearty and appealing. + +"Oh, Meeslora! Oh, Meeslora!" she gasped. "He must be monkey-man--he has +monkey tail!" + +Lora could have fainted from chagrin and horror. + +Had the great god Pan passed her way? + + + + +BOOKS BY JAMES HUNEKER + + +What Maeterlinck wrote: + +Maurice Maeterlinck wrote thus of James Huneker: "Do you know that +'Iconoclasts' is the only book of high and universal critical worth that +we have had for years--to be precise, since Georg Brandes. It is at once +strong and fine, supple and firm, indulgent and sure." + +The _Evening Post_ of June 10, 1915, wrote of Mr. Huneker's "The New +Cosmopolis": + +"The region of Bohemia, Mr. James Huneker found long ago, is within us. +At twenty, he says, he discovered that there is no such enchanted spot +as the Latin Quarter, but that every generation sets back the mythical +land into the golden age of the Commune, or of 1848, or the days of +'Hernani.' It is the same with New York's East Side, 'the fabulous East +Side,' as Mr. Huneker calls it in his collection of international urban +studies, 'The New Cosmopolis.' If one judged externals by grime, by +poverty, by sanded back-rooms, with long-haired visionaries assailing +the social order, then the East Side of the early eighties has gone down +before the mad rush of settlement workers, impertinent reformers, +sociological cranks, self-advertising politicians, billionaire +socialists, and the reporters. To-day the sentimental traveller 'feels a +heart-pang to see the order, the cleanliness, the wide streets, the +playgrounds, the big boulevards, the absence of indigence that have +spoiled the most interesting part of New York City.' But apparently this +is only a first impression; for Mr. Huneker had no trouble in +discovering in one caf a patriarchal figure quite of the type beloved +of the local-color hunters of twenty years ago, a prophet, though +speaking a modern language and concerned with things of the day. So that +we owe to Mr. Huneker the discovery of a notable truth, namely, that +Bohemia is not only a creation of the sentimental memory, but, being +psychological, may be located in clean and prosperous quarters. The +tendency has always been to place it in a golden age, but a tattered and +unswept age. Bohemia is now shown to exist amidst model tenements and +sanitary drinking-cups." + + +IVORY APES AND PEACOCKS + +_WITH FRONTISPIECE PORTRAIT OF DOSTOEVSKY_ + +12mo. $1.50 net + + * * * * * + +NEW COSMOPOLIS + +12mo. $1.50 net + + * * * * * + +THE PATHOS _of_ DISTANCE + +A Book of a Thousand and One Moments + +12mo. $2.00 net + + * * * * * + +PROMENADES _of an_ IMPRESSIONIST + +12mo. $1.50 net + +"We like best such sober essays as those which analyze for us the +technical contributions of Czanne and Rodin. Here Mr. Huneker is a real +interpreter, and here his long experience of men and ways in art counts +for much. Charming, in the lighter vein, are such appreciations as the +Monticelli, and Chardin."--FRANK JEWETT MATHER, JR., in _New +York Nation_ and _Evening Post_. + + * * * * * + +EGOISTS + +A Book of Supermen + +STENDHAL, BAUDELAIRE, FLAUBERT, ANATOLE FRANCE, HUYSMANS, BARRS, HELLO, +BLAKE, NIETZSCHE, IBSEN, AND MAX STIRNER + +_With Portrait and Facsimile Reproductions_ + +12mo. $1.50 net + + * * * * * + +ICONOCLASTS: + +A Book of Dramatists + +12mo. $1.50 net + +CONTENTS: Henrik Ibsen--August Strindberg--Henry +Becque--Gerhart Hauptmann--Paul Hervieu--The Quintessence of Shaw--Maxim +Gorky's Nachtasyl--Hermann Sudermann--Princess Mathilde's Play--Duse and +D'Annunzio--Villiers de l'Isle Adam--Maurice Maeterlinck. + +"His style is a little jerky, but it is one of those rare styles in +which we are led to expect some significance, if not wit, in every +sentence."--G.K. CHESTERTON, in _London Daily News_. + + * * * * * + +OVERTONES: + +A Book of Temperaments + +_WITH FRONTISPIECE PORTRAIT OF RICHARD STRAUSS_ + +12mo. $1.50 net + +"In some respects Mr. Huneker must be reckoned the most brilliant of all +living writers on matters musical."--_Academy, London_. + + * * * * * + +MEZZOTINTS IN MODERN MUSIC + +BRAHMS, TSCHAKOWSKY, CHOPIN, RICHARD STRAUSS, LISZT, AND WAGNER + +12mo. $1.50 net + +"Mr. Huneker is, in the best sense, a critic; he listens to the music +and gives you his impressions as rapidly and in as few words as +possible; or he sketches the composers in fine, broad, sweeping strokes +with a magnificent disregard for unimportant details.... A distinctly +original and very valuable contribution to the world's tiny musical +literature."--J.F. RUNCIMAN, in _London Saturday Review_. + + * * * * * + +FRANZ LISZT + +_WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS_ + +12mo. $2.00 net + + * * * * * + +CHOPIN: + +The Man and His Music + +_WITH ETCHED PORTRAIT_ + +12mo. $2.00 net + + * * * * * + +VISIONARIES + +12mo. $1.50 net + +CONTENTS: A Master of Cobwebs--The Eighth Deadly Sin--The Purse +of Aholibah--Rebels of the Moon--The Spiral Road--A Mock +Sun--Antichrist--The Eternal Duel--The Enchanted Yodler--The Third +Kingdom--The Haunted Harpsichord--The Tragic Wall--A Sentimental +Rebellion--Hall of the Missing Footsteps--The Cursory Light--An Iron +Fan--The Woman Who Loved Chopin--The Tune of Time--Nada--Pan. + +"In 'The Spiral Road' and in some of the other stories both fantasy and +narrative may be compared with Hawthorne in his most unearthly moods. +The younger man has read his Nietzsche and has cast off his heritage of +simple morals. Hawthorne's Puritanism finds no echo in these modern +souls, all sceptical, wavering and unblessed. But Hawthorne's splendor +of vision and his power of sympathy with a tormented mind do live again +in the best of Mr. Huneker's stories."--_London Academy_ (Feb. 3, 1906). + + * * * * * + +MELOMANIACS + +12mo. $1.50 net + +"It would be difficult to sum up 'Melomaniacs' in a phrase. Never did a +book, in my opinion at any rate, exhibit greater contrasts, not, +perhaps, of strength and weakness, but of clearness and +obscurity."--HAROLD E. GORST, in _London Saturday Review_. + + * * * * * + +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS, NEW YORK + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Visionaries, by James Huneker + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VISIONARIES *** + +***** This file should be named 17922-8.txt or 17922-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/7/9/2/17922/ + +Produced by Ted Garvin, Taavi Kalju, and the Online +Distributed Proofreaders Europe at http://dp.rastko.net + + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +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 + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + +*** END: FULL LICENSE *** + diff --git a/17922-8.zip b/17922-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..f581b85 --- /dev/null +++ b/17922-8.zip diff --git a/17922-h.zip b/17922-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..53eed58 --- /dev/null +++ b/17922-h.zip diff --git a/17922-h/17922-h.htm b/17922-h/17922-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6430f17 --- /dev/null +++ b/17922-h/17922-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,9253 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of Visionaries, by James Huneker. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; + } + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + } + + table {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} + + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + + .pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; + left: 1%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: left; + color: gray; + } /* page numbers */ + + .linenum {position: absolute; top: auto; left: 4%;} /* poetry number */ + .blockquot{margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 10%;} + .sidenote {width: 20%; padding-bottom: .5em; padding-top: .5em; + padding-left: .5em; padding-right: .5em; margin-left: 1em; + float: right; clear: right; margin-top: 1em; + font-size: smaller; color: black; background: #eeeeee; border: dashed 1px;} + + .bb {border-bottom: solid 2px;} + .bl {border-left: solid 2px;} + .bt {border-top: solid 2px;} + .br {border-right: solid 2px;} + .bbox {border: solid 2px;} + + .center {text-align: center;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + .u {text-decoration: underline;} + + .caption {font-weight: bold;} + + .figcenter {margin: auto; text-align: center;} + + .figleft {float: left; clear: left; margin-left: 0; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: + 1em; margin-right: 1em; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .figright {float: right; clear: right; margin-left: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em; + margin-top: 1em; margin-right: 0; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .footnotes {border: dashed 1px;} + .footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + .footnote .label {position: absolute; right: 84%; text-align: right;} + .fnanchor {vertical-align: super; font-size: .8em; text-decoration: none;} + + .poem1 {margin-left:50%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem1 br {display: none;} + .poem1 .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem1 span.i0 {display: block; margin-left: 0em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem span.i0 {display: block; margin-left: 0em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i2 {display: block; margin-left: 2em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i4 {display: block; margin-left: 4em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i8 {display: block; margin-left: 8em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Visionaries, by James Huneker + +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: Visionaries + +Author: James Huneker + +Release Date: March 4, 2006 [EBook #17922] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VISIONARIES *** + + + + +Produced by Ted Garvin, Taavi Kalju, and the Online +Distributed Proofreaders Europe at http://dp.rastko.net + + + + + + +</pre> + + + +<h1>VISIONARIES</h1> + +<h3>BY</h3> + +<h2>JAMES HUNEKER</h2> + + +<div class="poem1"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">J'aime les nuages ... là bas...!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza1"> +<span class="i0"><span class="smcap">Baudelaire</span><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<h4> +NEW YORK <br /> +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS <br /> +1916 +</h4> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h5> +COPYRIGHT, 1905, <br /> +BY CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS<br /> +<br /> +Published October, 1905. +</h5> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h3> +A<br /> +MON CHER MAÎTRE<br /> +<br /> +REMY DE GOURMONT<br /> +PARIS +</h3> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[Pg vii]</a></span></p> +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + + + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary=""> +<tr> + <td align='left'></td> + <td align='left'></td> + <td align='right'>PAGE</td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>I. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Master of Cobwebs</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_1'>1</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>II. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Eighth Deadly Sin</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_23'>23</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>III. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Purse of Aholibah</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_44'>44</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>IV. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">Rebels of the Moon</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_64'>64</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>V. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Spiral Road</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_80'>80</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>VI. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Mock Sun</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_110'>110</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>VII. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">Antichrist</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_135'>135</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>VIII. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Eternal Duel</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_145'>145</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>IX. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Enchanted Yodler</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_149'>149</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>X. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Third Kingdom</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_168'>168</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>XI. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Haunted Harpsichord</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_188'>188</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>XII. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Tragic Wall</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_203'>203</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>XIII. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Sentimental Rebellion</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_227'>227</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>XIV. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">Hall of the Missing Footsteps</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_249'>249</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>XV. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Cursory Light</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_266'>266</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>XVI. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">An Iron Fan</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_278'>278</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>XVII. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Woman who loved Chopin</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_289'>289</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>XVIII. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Tune of Time</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_309'>309</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>XIX. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">Nada</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_326'>326</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> + <td align='right'>XX. </td> + <td align='left'><span class="smcap">Pan</span></td> + <td align='right'><a href='#Page_332'>332</a></td> +</tr> +</table></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p> +<h2>VISIONARIES</h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>I</h2> + +<h3>A MASTER OF COBWEBS</h3> + + +<h4>I</h4> + +<p>Alixe Van Kuyp sat in the first-tier box presented to her husband with +the accustomed heavy courtesy of the Société Harmonique. She went early +to the hall that she might hear the entire music-making of the +evening—Van Kuyp's tone-poem, Sordello, was on the programme between a +Weber overture and a Beethoven symphony, an unusual honour for a young +American composer. If she had gone late, it would have seemed an +affectation, she reasoned. Her husband kept within doors; she could tell +him all. And then, was there not Elvard Rentgen?</p> + +<p>She regretted that she had invited the Parisian critic to her box. It +happened at a <i>soirée</i>, where he showed his savage profile among +admiring musical lambs. But he was never punctual at musical affairs. +This consoled Alixe.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span></p> + +<p>Perhaps he would forget her impulsive, foolish speech,—"without him the +music would fall upon unheeding ears,—he, who interpreted art for the +multitude, the holder of the critical key that unlocked masterpieces." +She had felt the banality of her compliment as she uttered it, and she +knew the man who listened, his glance incredulous, his mouth smiling, +could not be deceived. Rentgen had been too many years in the candy shop +to care for sweets. She recalled her mean little blush as he twisted his +pointed, piebald beard with long, fat fingers and leisurely +traversed—his were the measuring eyes of an architect—her face, her +hair, her neck, and finally, stared at her ears until they burned like a +child's cheek in frost time.</p> + +<p>Alixe Van Kuyp was a large woman, with a conscientious head and gray +eyes. As she waited, she realized that it was one of her timid nights, +when colour came easily and temper ran at its lowest ebb. She had begged +Van Kuyp to cancel the habit of not listening to his own music except at +rehearsal, and, annoyed by his stubbornness, neglected to tell him of +the other invitation. The house was quite full when the music began. +Uneasiness overtook her as the Oberon slowly stole upon her +consciousness. She forgot Rentgen; a more disquieting problem presented +itself. Richard's music—how would it sound in the company of the old +masters, those masters who were newer than Wagner, newer than Strauss +and the "moderns"!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span> She envisaged her husband—small, slim, with his +bushy red hair, big student's head—familiarly locking arms with Weber +and Beethoven in the hall of fame. No, the picture did not convince her. +She was his severest censor. Not one of the professional critics could +put their fingers on Van Kuyp's weak spots—"his sore music," as he +jestingly called it—so surely as his wife. She had studied; she had +even played the violin in public; but she gave up her virtuosa ambitions +for the man she had married during their student years in Germany. Now +the old doubts came to life as the chivalric tones of Weber rose to her +sharpened senses. Why couldn't Richard—</p> + +<p>The door in the anteroom opened, her guest entered. Alixe was not +dismayed. She left her seat and, closing the curtains, greeted him.</p> + +<p>The overture was ending as Rentgen sat down beside her in the intimate +little chamber, lighted by a solitary electric bulb.</p> + +<p>"You are always thoughtful," she murmured.</p> + +<p>"My dear lady, mine is the honour. And if you do not care, can't we hear +the music of your young man—" he smiled, she thought, acidly—"here? If +I sit outside, the world will say—we have to be careful of our +unsmirched reputations—we poor critics and slave-drivers of the deaf."</p> + +<p>She drew her hand gently away. He had held it, playfully tapping it as +he slowly delivered himself in short sentences. He was a Dane, but his +French and English were with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span>out trace of accent; certain intonations +alone betrayed his Scandinavian origin.</p> + +<p>Alixe could not refuse, for the moment he finished speaking she heard a +too familiar motive, the ponderous phrase in the brass choir which Van +Kuyp intended as the thematic label for his hero, "Sordello."</p> + +<p>"Ah, there's your Browning in tone for you," whispered the critic. She +wished him miles away. The draperies were now slightly parted and into +the room filtered the grave, languorous accents of the new tone-poem. +Her eyes were fixed by Rentgen's. His expression changed; with nostrils +dilated like a hunter scenting prey, his rather inert, cold features +became transfigured; he was the man who listened, the cruel judge who +sentenced. And she hoped, also the kind friend who would consider the +youth and inexperience of the culprit. To the morbidly acute hearing of +the woman, the music had a ring of hollow sonority after the denser +packed phrases of Weber.</p> + +<p>She had read Sordello with her husband until she thought its meaning was +as clear as high noon. By the critic's advice the subject had been +selected for musical treatment. Sordello's overweening spiritual +pride—"gate-vein of this heart's blood of Lombardy"—appealed to Van +Kuyp. The stress of souls, the welter of cross-purposes which begirt the +youthful dreamer, his love for Palma, and his swift death when all the +world thrust upon him its joys—here were mo<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span>tives, indeed, for any +musician of lofty aim and sympathetic imagination.</p> + +<p>Alixe recalled the interminable arguments, the snatches of poetry, the +hasty rushes to the keyboard; a composer was in travail. At the end of a +year, Rentgen professed his satisfaction; Van Kuyp stood on the highroad +to fame. Of that there could be no doubt; Elvard Rentgen would say so in +print. Alixe had been reassured—</p> + +<p>Yet sitting now within the loop of her husband's music it suddenly +became insipid, futile, and lacking in those enchantments for which she +yearned. Her eyes dropped to the shapely hands meekly folded in her lap, +dropped because the bold, interrogative expression on Rentgen's face +disturbed her. She knew, as any woman would have known, that he admired +her—but was he not Richard's friend? His glance enveloped her with +piteous mockery.</p> + +<p>The din was tremendous. After passages of dark music, in which the +formless ugly reigned, occurred the poetic duel between Sordello and +Eglamor at Palma's Court of Love. But why all this stress and fury? On +the pianoforte the delicate episode sounded gratefully; with the thick +riotous orchestration came a disillusioning transformation. There was +noise without power, there was sensuality that strove to imitate the +tenderness of passion; and she had fancied it a cloudy garden of love. +Alixe raised an involuntary hand to her ear.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Yes," whispered the critic, "I warned him not to use his colours with a +trowel. His theme is not big enough to stand it." He lifted thin +eyebrows and to her overheated brain was an unexpected Mephisto. Then +the music whirled her away to Italy; the love scene of Palma and +Sordello. It should have been the apex of the work.</p> + +<p>"Sounds too much like Tschaïkowsky's Francesca da Rimini," interrupted +Rentgen. She was annoyed.</p> + +<p>"Why didn't you tell Van Kuyp before he scored the work?" she demanded, +her long gray eyes beginning to blacken.</p> + +<p>"I did, my dear lady, I did. But you know what musicians are—" He +shrugged a conclusion with his narrow shoulders. Alixe coldly regarded +him. There was something new and dangerous in his attitude to her +husband's music this evening.</p> + +<p>Her heart began to beat heavily. What if her suspicions were but the +advance guard of a painful truth! What if this keen analyst of other +men's ideas—she dared not finish the thought. With a sluggish movement +the music uncoiled itself like a huge boa about to engulf a tiny rabbit. +The simile forced itself against her volition; all this monstrous +preparation for a—rabbit! In a concert-hall the poetic idea of the +tone-poem was petty. And the churning of the orchestra, foaming hysteria +of the strings, bellowing of the brass—would they never cease!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> Such an +insane chase after a rabbit! Yes, she said the word to herself and found +her lips carved into a hard smile, which she saw reflected as in a trick +mirror upon the face of Elvard Rentgen. <i>He</i> understood.</p> + +<p>Of little avail Sordello's frantic impotencies. She saw through the +rhetorical trickeries of the music, weighed its cheap splendours, +realized the mediocrity of this second-rate poet turned symphonist. +Image after image pressed upon her brain, each more pessimistic, more +depressing than its predecessor. Alixe could have wept. Her companion +placed his hand on her arm. His fingers burned; she moved, but she felt +his will controlling her mood. With high relief she heard the music end. +There was conventional applause. Alixe restlessly peered into the +auditorium. Again she saw opera-glasses turned toward the box. "Our good +friends," she rather bitterly thought. Rentgen recognized her mental +turmoil.</p> + +<p>"Don't worry," he said soothingly. "It will be all right to-morrow +morning. What I write will make the fortune of the composition." He did +not utter this vaingloriously, but as a man who stated simple truth. She +gazed at him, her timidity and nervousness returning in full tide.</p> + +<p>"I know I am overwrought. I should be thankful. But—but, isn't it +deception—I mean, will it be fair to conceal from Richard the real +condition of affairs?" He took her hand.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Spoken like a true wife," he gayly exclaimed. "My dear friend, there +will be no deception. Only encouragement, a little encouragement. As for +deceiving a composer, telling him that he may not be so wonderful as he +thinks—that's impossible. I know these star-shouldering souls, these +farmers of phantasms who exist in a world by themselves. It would be a +pity to let in the cold air of reality—anyhow Van Kuyp has some +talent."</p> + +<p>Like lifting mists revealing the treacherous borders of a masked pool, +she felt this speech with its ironic innuendo. She flushed, her vanity +irritated. Rentgen saw her eyes contract.</p> + +<p>"Let us go when the symphony begins," she begged, "I can't talk to any +one in my present bad humour; and to hear Beethoven would drive me +mad—now."</p> + +<p>"I don't wonder," remarked her companion, consolingly. Alixe winced.</p> + +<p>The silver-cold fire of an undecided moon was abroad in the sky and +rumours of spring filled the air. They parted at a fiacre. He told her +he would call the next afternoon, and she nodded an unforgiving head. It +was her turn to be disagreeable.</p> + +<p>In his music room, Van Kuyp read a volume of verse. He did not hear his +wife enter. It pained her when she saw his serious face with its +undistinguished features and dogged expression. No genius this, was her +hasty ver<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span>dict, as she quickly went to him and put a hand on his head. +It was her hand now that was hot. He raised eyes, dolent with dreams.</p> + +<p>"Well?" he queried.</p> + +<p>"You are a curious man!" she said wonderingly. "Aren't you interested in +the news about your symphonic poem?" He smiled the smile of the fatuous +elect. "I imagine it went all right," he languidly replied. "I heard it +at rehearsal yesterday—I suppose Thelème took the <i>tempi</i> too slow!"</p> + +<p>She sighed and asked:—</p> + +<p>"What are you reading a night like this?" His expression became +animated.</p> + +<p>"A volume of Celtic poetry—I've found a stunning idea for music. What a +tone-poem it will make! Here it is. What colour, what rhythms. It is +called The Shadowy Horses. 'I hear the shadowy horses, their long manes +a-shake'—"</p> + +<p>"Who gave you the poem?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, Rentgen, of course. Did you see him to-night?"</p> + +<p>"You dear boy! You must be tired to death. Better rest. The critics will +get you up early enough."</p> + +<p>Through interminable hours the mind of Alixe revolved about a phrase she +had picked up from Elvard Rentgen: "Music is a trap for weak souls; for +the strong as the spinning of cobwebs...."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span></p> +<h4>II</h4> + +<p>It was pompous July and the Van Kuyps were still in Paris. They lived +near Passy—from her windows high in the air Alixe caught the green at +dawn as the sun lifted level rays. Richard was writing his new +tone-poem, which the Société Harmonique accepted provisionally for the +season following. Sordello had set the town agog because of the +exhaustive articles by Rentgen it brought in its wake. He was a critic +who wrote brilliantly of music in the terms of painting, of plastic arts +in the technical phraseology of music, and by him the drama was +discussed purely as literature. This deliberate and delicate confusion +of æsthetics clouded the public mind. He described Sordello as a vast +mural fresco, a Puvis de Chavannes in tone, a symphonic drama wherein +agonized the shadowy Æschylean protagonist. Even sculpture was rifled +for analogies, and Van Kuyp to his bewilderment found himself called +"The Rodin of Music"; at other times, "Richard Strauss II," or a "Tonal +Browning"; finally, he was adjured to swerve not from the path he had so +wonderfully hewn for himself in the virgin jungle of modern art, and +begged to resist the temptations of the music-drama.</p> + +<p>Rentgen loathed the music of Wagner. Wagner had abused Meyerbeer for +doing what he did himself—writing operas stuffed with spectacular +effects. This man of the foot-<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span>lights destroyed all musical imagination +with his puppet shows, magic lanterns, Turkish bazaars, where, to the +booming of mystic bells, the listener was drugged into opium-fed +visions.</p> + +<p>Under a tent, as at a fair, he assembled the mangled masterpieces of +Bach, Gluck, Beethoven, Weber, Schubert, Schumann, Chopin, and to a +gullible public sold the songs of these music-lords—songs that should +swim on high like great swan-clouds cleaving skies blue and +inaccessible. And his music was operatic, after all, grand opera +saccharine with commonplace melodies gorgeously attired—nothing more. +Wagner, declared the indignant critic, was not original. He popularized +the noble ideas of the masters, vulgarized and debased their dreams. He +never conceived a single new melody, but substituted instead, sadly +mauled and pinched thematic fragments of Liszt, Berlioz, and Beethoven, +combined with exaggerated fairy-tales, clothed in showy tinsel and +theatrical gauds, the illusion being aided by panoramic scenery; scenery +that acted in company with toads, dragons, horses, snakes, crazy +valkyrs, mermaids, half-mad humans, gods, demons, dwarfs, and giants. +What else is all this but old-fashioned Italian opera with a new name? +What else but an inartistic mixture of Scribe libretto and Northern +mythology? Music-drama—fudge! Making music that one can <i>see</i> is a +death-blow to a lofty idealization of the art.</p> + +<p>Puzzled by the richness of Rentgen's vocabu<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span>lary, by his want of logic, +Alixe asked herself many times whether she was wrong and her husband +right. She wished to be loyal. His devotion to his work, his inspiration +springing as it did from poetic sources, counted for something. Why not? +All composers should read the poets. It is a starting-point. Modern +music leans heavily on drama and fiction. Richard Strauss embroiders +philosophical ideas, so why should not Richard Van Kuyp go to Ireland, +to the one land where there is hope of a spiritual, a poetic renascence? +Ireland! The very name evoked dreams!</p> + +<p>When Rentgen called at the Van Kuyps' it was near the close of a warm +afternoon. The composer would not stir, despite the invitation of the +critic or the pleading of his wife. He knew that the angel wings of +inspiration had been brushing his brow all the morning, and such visits +were too rare to be flouted. He sat at his piano and in a composer's +raucous varied voice, imitated the imaginary <i>timbres</i> of orchestral +instruments. Sent forth, Mrs. Van Kuyp and Rentgen slowly walked into +the little Parc of Auteuil, once the joy of the Goncourts.</p> + +<p>"Musicians are as selfish as the sea," he asserted, as they sat upon a +bench of tepid iron. She did not demur. The weather had exhausted her +patience; she was young and fond of the open air—the woods made an +irresistible picture this day. The critic watched her changing, +dissatisfied face.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Shall we ride?" he suddenly asked. Before she could shake a negative +head, he quickly uttered the words that had been hovering in her mind +for hours.</p> + +<p>"Or, shall we go to the Bois?" She started. "What an idea! Go to the +Bois without Richard, without my husband?"</p> + +<p>"Why not?" he inquired, "it's not far away. Send him a wire asking him +to join us; it will do him good after his labours. Come, Madame Van +Kuyp, come Alixe, my child." He paused. Her eyes expanded. "I'll go," +she quietly announced—"that is, if you grant me a favour."</p> + +<p>"A hundred!" he triumphantly cried.</p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<p>To soothe her conscience, which began to ring faint alarm-bells at +sundown, Alixe sent several despatches to her husband, and then tried a +telephone; but she was not successful. Her mood shifted chilly, and they +bored each other immeasurably on the long promenade vibrating with gypsy +music and frivolous folk.</p> + +<p>It was after seven o'clock as the sun slowly swam down the sky-line. +Decidedly their little flight from the prison of stone was not offering +rich recompense to Alixe Van Kuyp and her elderly companion.</p> + +<p>"And now for the favour!" he demanded, his eyes contentedly resting upon +the graceful expanse of his guest's figure.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span></p> + +<p>She moved restlessly: "My dear Rentgen, I am about to ask you a +question, only a plain question. <i>That</i> is the favour." He bowed +incredulously.</p> + +<p>"I must know the truth about Richard. It is a serious matter, this +composing of his. He neglects his pupils—most of them Americans who +come to Paris to study with him. Yet with the reputation he has +attained, due to you entirely"—she waved away an interruption—"he +refuses to write songs or piano music that will sell. He is an +incorrigible idealist and I confess I am discouraged. What can be our +future?" She drew the deep breath of one in peril; this plain talk +devoid of all sham mortified her exceedingly.</p> + +<p>She was thankful that he did not attempt to play the rôle of fatherly +adviser. His eyes were quite sincere when he answered her:—</p> + +<p>"What you say, Alixe—" the familiarity brought with it no condescending +reverberations—"has bothered me more than once. I shall be just as +frank on my side. No, your husband has but little talent; original +talent, none. He is mediocre—wait!" She started, her cheeks red with +the blood that fled her heart when she heard this doleful news. "Wait! +There are qualifications. In the first place, what do you expect from an +American?"</p> + +<p>"But you always write so glowingly of our composers," she interjected.</p> + +<p>"And," he went on as if she had not spoken, "Van Kuyp is your typical +countryman. He<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> has studied in Germany. He has muddled his brain with +the music of a dozen different nations; if he had had any individuality +it would have been submerged. His memory has killed his imagination. He +borrows his inspiration from the poets, from Liszt, Wagner, Berlioz, +Richard Strauss. Anyhow, like all musicians of his country, he is too +painfully self-conscious of his nationality."</p> + +<p>"You, alone, are responsible for his present ambitions," retorted the +unhappy woman.</p> + +<p>"Quite true, my dear friend. I acknowledge it."</p> + +<p>"And you say this to my face?"</p> + +<p>"Do you wish me to lie?" She did not reply. After a grim pause she burst +forth:—</p> + +<p>"Oh, why doesn't he compose an opera, and make a popular name?"</p> + +<p>"Richard Wagner Number II!" There were implications of sarcasm in this +which greatly displeased Mrs. Van Kuyp. They strolled on slowly. It was +a melodious summer night; mauve haze screened all but the exquisite +large stars. Soothed despite rebellion, Alixe told herself sharply that +in every duel with this man she was worsted. He said things that +scratched her nerves; yet she forgave. He had not the slightest +attraction for her; nevertheless, when he spoke, she listened, when he +wrote, she read. He ruled the husband through his music; he ruled her +through her husband. And what did he expect?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span></p> + +<p>They retraced their way. A fantastic bridge spanning the brief +marshland, frozen by the moonlight, appealed to them. They crossed. A +coachman driving an open carriage hailed confidentially. Alixe entered +and with a dexterous play of draperies usurped the back seat. Rentgen +made no sign. He had her in full view, the moon streaking her disturbed +features with its unflattering pencil.</p> + +<p>They started bravely, the horses running for home; but the rapid gait +soon subsided into a rhythmic trot. Rentgen spoke. She hardly recognized +his voice, so gently monotonous were his phrases.</p> + +<p>"Dear Alixe. It is a night for confessions. You care for your husband, +you are wrapped up in his art work, you are solicitous of his future, of +his fame. It is admirable. You are a model wife for an artist. But tell +me frankly, doesn't it bore you to death? Doesn't all this talk of +music, themes, orchestration, of the public, critics, musicians, +conductors, get on your nerves? Is it any consolation for you to know +that Van Kuyp will be famous? What is his fame or his failure to you? +Where do you, Alixe Van Kuyp, come in? Why must your charming woman's +soul be sacrificed, warped to this stunted tree of another's talent? You +are silent. You say he is trying to make me deny Richard! You were never +more mistaken. I am interested in you both; interested in you as a noble +woman—stop! I mean it. And in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span>terested in Richard—well—because he is +my own creation...."</p> + +<p>She watched him now with her heart in her eyes; he frightened her more +with these low, purring words, than if he declared open love.</p> + +<p>"He is my own handiwork. I have created him. I have fashioned his +outlines, have wound up the mechanism that moves him to compose. Did you +ever read that terrifying thought of Yeats, the Irish poet? I've +forgotten the story, but remember the idea: 'The beautiful arts were +sent into the world to overthrow nations, and, finally, life itself, +sowing everywhere unlimited desires, like torches thrown into a burning +city.' There—'like torches thrown into a burning city!' Richard Van +Kuyp is one of my burning torches. In the spectacle of his impuissance I +find relief from my own suffering."</p> + +<p>The booming of the Tzigane band was no longer heard—only the horses' +muffled footfalls and the intermittent chromatic drone of hidden distant +tram-cars. She shivered and shaded her face with her fan. There was +something remote from humanity in his speech. He continued with +increasing vivacity:—</p> + +<p>"Music is a burning torch. And music, like ideas, can slay the brain. +Wagner borrowed his harmonic fire from the torch of Chopin—" She broke +in:—</p> + +<p>"Don't talk of Chopin! Tell me more of Van Kuyp. Why do you call him +<i>yours</i>?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> Her curiosity was become pain. It mastered her prudence.</p> + +<p>"In far-away Celtic legends there may be found a lovely belief that our +thoughts are independent realities, that they go about in the void +seeking creatures to control. They are as bodiless souls. When they +descend into a human being they possess his moods, in very existence—"</p> + +<p>"And Richard!" she muttered. His words swayed her like strange music; +the country through which they were passing was a blank; she could see +but two luminous points—the nocturnal eyes of Elvard Rentgen, as he +spun his cobwebs in the moonshine. She did not fear him; nothing could +frighten her now. One desire held her. If it were unslaked, she felt she +would collapse. It was to know the truth, to be told everything! He put +restraining fingers on her ungloved hand; they seemed like cold, fat +spiders. Yet she was only curious, with a curiosity that murdered the +spirit within her.</p> + +<p>"To transfuse these shadows, my dear Alixe, has been one of my delights, +for I can project my futile desires into another's soul. I am denied the +gift of music-making, so this is my revenge on nature for bungling its +job. If Richard had genius, my intervention would be superfluous. He has +none. He is dull. You must realize it. But since he has known me, has +felt my influence, has been subject to my<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span> volition, my sorcery, you may +call it,—" his laugh was disagreeably conscious,—"he has developed the +shadow of a great man. He will seem a great composer. I shall make him +think he is one. I shall make the world believe it, also. It is my +fashion of squaring a life I hate. But if I chose to withdraw—"</p> + +<p>The road they entered was black and full of the buzzing shadows of hot +night, but she was oblivious to everything but his hallucinating +voice:—</p> + +<p>"And if you withdraw?" Her mouth echoed phrases without the complicity +of her brain.</p> + +<p>"If I do—ah, these cobweb spinners! Good-by to Richard Van Kuyp and +dreams of glory." This note of harsh triumph snapped his weaving words.</p> + +<p>"I don't believe you or your boasts," remarked Alixe, in her most +conventionally amused manner. "You are trying to scare me, and with this +hypnotic joke about Richard you have only hypnotized yourself. I mean to +tell Mr. Van Kuyp every bit of our conversation. I'm not frightened by +your vampire tales. You critics are only shadows of composers."</p> + +<p>"Yes, but we make ordinary composers believe they are great," he replied +acridly.</p> + +<p>"I'll tell this to Richard."</p> + +<p>"He won't believe you."</p> + +<p>"He shall—he won't believe <i>you</i>! Oh, Rentgen, how can you invent such +cruel things? Are you always so malicious? What do you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span> mean? Come—what +do you expect?" She closed her eyes, anticipating an avowal. Why should +a man seek to destroy her faith in her husband, in love itself, if not +for some selfish purpose of his own? But she was wrong, and became +vaguely alarmed—at least if he had offered his service and sympathy in +exchange for her friendship, she might have understood his fantastic +talk. Rentgen sourly reflected—despite epigrams, women never vary. For +him her sentiment was suburban. It strangled poetry. But he said +nothing, though she imagined he looked depressed; nor did he open his +mouth as the carriage traversed avenues of processional poplars before +arriving at her door. She turned to him imploringly:—</p> + +<p>"You must come with me. I shall never be able to go in alone, without an +excuse. Don't—don't repeat to Richard what you said to me, in joke, I +am sure, about his music. Heavens! What will my husband think?" There +was despair in her voice, but hopefulness in her gait and gesture, when +they reached the ill-lighted hall.</p> + +<p>A night-lamp stood on the composer's study table. The piano was open. He +sat at the keyboard, though not playing, as they hurriedly entered the +room.</p> + +<p>"You poor fellow! You look worn out. Did you think we had run away from +you? Did you get the wires, the telephone messages? Oh, why did you keep +us expecting you, Richard! We<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> have had a wonderful time and missed you +so much! Such a talk with Rentgen! And all about <i>you</i>. <i>Nicht wahr</i>, +Rentgen? He says you are the only man in the world with a musical +future. Isn't that so, Rentgen? Didn't you say that Richard was the only +man in whom you took any interest? Say what you said to me! I <i>dare</i> +you!"</p> + +<p>The musician, aroused by this wordy assault, looked from one to the +other with his heavy eyes, the eyes of an owl rudely disturbed. Alixe +almost danced her excitement. She hummed shrilly and grasped Van Kuyp's +arm in the gayest rebounding humour.</p> + +<p>"Why don't you speak, Maestro?"</p> + +<p>"I didn't join you because I was too busy at my score. Listen, children! +I have sketched the beginning of The Shadowy Horses. You remember the +Yeats poem, Rentgen? Listen!"</p> + +<p>Furiously he attacked the instrument, from which escaped accents of +veritable torture; a delirium of tone followed, meagre melodies fighting +for existence in the boiling madness of it all; it was the parody of a +parody, the music of yesterday masquerading as the music of to-morrow. +Alixe nervously watched the critic. He stood at the end of the piano and +morosely fumbled his beard. Again a wave of anxious hatred, followed by +forebodings, crowded her alert brain. She desperately clutched her +husband's shoulder; he finished in a burst of sheer pounding and brutal +roaring. Then she threw her arms about<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> him in an ecstasy of pride—her +confidence was her only anchorage.</p> + +<p>"There, Elvard Rentgen! What did you tell me? I dare you to say that +this music is not marvellous, not original!" Her victorious gaze, in +which floated indomitable faith, challenged him, as she drew the head of +her husband to her protecting bosom. The warring of exasperated eyes +endured a moment; to Alixe it seemed eternity. Rentgen bowed and went +away from this castle of cobwebs, deeply stirred by the wife's tender +untruths.... She was the last dawn illuminating his empty, sordid +life,—now a burnt city of defaced dreams and blackened torches.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span></p> +<h2>II</h2> + +<h3>THE EIGHTH DEADLY SIN</h3> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which +the Lord God had made.—<i>Genesis.</i></p></div> + + +<h4>I</h4> + +<h4>THE SERMON</h4> + +<p>"And the Seven Deadly Sins, beloved brethren, are: Pride, Covetousness, +Lust, Anger, Gluttony, Envy, Sloth. To these our wise Mother, the +Church, opposes the contrary virtues: Humility, Chastity, Meekness, +Temperance, Brotherly Love, Diligence." The voice of the preacher was +clear and well modulated. It penetrated to the remotest corner of the +church. Baldur, sitting near the pulpit, with its elaborate traceries of +marble, idly wondered why the sins were, with few exceptions, words of +one syllable, while those of the virtues were all longer. Perhaps +because it was easier to sin than to repent! The voice of the speaker +deepened as he continued:—</p> + +<p>"Now the Seven Deadly Arts are: Music, Literature, Painting, Sculpture, +Architecture, Dancing, Acting. The mercy of God has luckily purified +these once pagan inventions, and trans<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span>formed them into saving +instruments of grace. Yet it behooves us to examine with the utmost +diligence the possible sources of evil latent in each and every one of +those arts. Then we shall consider some of the special forms of sin that +may develop from them. St. Chrysostom warned the faithful against the +danger of the Eighth Deadly Art—Perfume...."</p> + +<p>His phrases, which began to fall into the rhythmic drone of a Sunday +sermon, lulled Baldur to dreaming. Perfume—that delicious vocable! And +the contrast with what his own nostrils reported to his consciousness +made him slightly shiver. It was on a Friday night in Lent that, weary +in flesh and spirit, his conscience out of tune, he had entered the +church and taken the first vacant seat. Without, the air was sluggish; +after leaving his club the idea of theatres or calls had set his teeth +on edge. He longed to be alone, to weigh in the silence of his heart the +utter futility of life. Religion had never been a part of his training +as the only son of a millionnaire, and if he preferred the Roman +Catholic ritual above all others, it was because the appeal was to his +æsthetic sense; a Turkish mosque, he assured his friends, produced the +same soothing impression—gauze veils gently waving and slowly obscuring +the dulling realities of everyday existence. This <i>morbidezza</i> of the +spirit the Mahometans call <i>Kef</i>; the Christians, pious ecstasy.</p> + +<p>But now he could not plunge himself, despite<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> the faint odour of incense +lingering in the atmosphere, into the deepest pit of his personality. At +first he ascribed his restlessness to the sultry weather, then to his +abuse of tea and cigarettes,—perhaps it was the sharp odour of the +average congregation, that collective odour of humanity encountered in +church, theatre, or court-rooms. The smell of poverty was mingled with +the heavy scents of fashionable women, who, in the minority, made their +presence felt by their showy gowns, rustling movements, and attitudes of +superior boredom. In a vast building like this extremes touch with +eagerness on the part of the poor, to whom these furtive views of the +rich and indolent brought with them a bitter consolation.</p> + +<p>Baldur remarked these things as he leaned back in his hard seat and +barely listened to the sermon, which poured forth as though the tap +would never be turned off again. And then a delicate note of iris, most +episcopal of perfumes, emerged from the mass of odours—musk, garlic, +damp shoes, alcohol, shabby clothing, rubber, pomade, cologne, +rice-powder, tobacco, patchouli, sachet, and a hundred other tintings of +the earthly symphony. The finely specialized olfactory sense of the +young man told him that it was either a bishop or a beautiful woman who +imparted to the air the subtle, penetrating aroma of iris. But it was +neither ecclesiastic nor maid. At his side was a short, rather thick-set +woman of vague age; she might have been twenty-five<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> or forty. Her hair +was cut in masculine fashion, her attire unattractive. As clearly as he +could distinguish her features he saw that she was not good-looking. A +stern mask it was, though not hardened. He would not have looked at such +an ordinary physiognomy twice if the iris had not signalled his peculiar +sense. There was no doubt that to her it was due. Susceptible as he was +to odours, Baldur was not a ladies' man. He went into society because it +was his world; and he attended in a perfunctory manner to the enormous +estate left him by his father, bound up in a single trust company. But +his thoughts were always three thousand miles away, in that delectable +city of cities, Paris. For Paris he suffered a painful nostalgia. There +he met his true brethren, while in New York he felt an alien. He was +one. The city, with its high, narrow streets—granite tunnels; its rude +reverberations; its colourless, toiling barbarians, with their +undistinguished physiognomies, their uncouth indifference to art,—he +did not deny that he loathed this nation, vibrating only in the presence +of money, sports, grimy ward politics, while exhibiting a depressing +snobbery to things British. There was no <i>nuance</i> in its life or its +literature, he asserted. France was his <i>patrie psychique</i>; he would +return there some day and forever....</p> + +<p>The iris crept under his nostrils, and again he regarded the woman. This +time she faced him, and he no longer wondered, for he saw her eyes.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> +With such eyes only a great soul could be imprisoned in her brain. They +were smoke-gray, with long, dark lashes, and they did not seem to focus +perfectly—at least there was enough deflection to make their expression +odd, withal interesting, like the slow droop of Eleonora Duse's magic +eye. Though her features were rigid, the woman's glance spoke to Baldur, +spoke eloquently. Her eyes were—or was it the iris?—symbols of a +soul-state, of a rare emotion, not of sex, nor yet sexless. The pupils +seemed powdered with a strange iridescence. He became more troubled than +before. What did the curious creature want of him! She was neither +coquette nor cocotte, flirtation was not hinted by her intense +expression. He resumed his former position, but her eyes made his +shoulders burn, as if they had sufficient power to bore through them. He +no longer paid any attention to his surroundings. The sermon was like +the sound of far-away falling waters, the worshippers were so many black +marks. Of two things was he aware—the odour of iris and her eyes.</p> + +<p>He knew that he was in an overwrought mood. For some weeks this mood had +been descending upon his spirit, like a pall. He had avoided music, +pictures, the opera—which he never regarded as an art; even his +favourite poets he could not read. Nor did he degustate, as was his +daily wont, the supreme prose of the French masters. The pleasures of +robust stomachs, gourmandizing and drinking, were de<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span>nied him by nature. +He could not sip a glass of wine, and for meat he entertained distaste. +His physique proved him to be of the neurotic temperament—he was very +tall, very slim, of an exceeding elegance, in dress a finical dandy; +while his trim pointed blue-black beard and dark, foreign eyes were the +cause of his being mistaken often for a Frenchman or a Spaniard—which +illusion was not dissipated when he chose to speak their several +tongues.</p> + +<p>Involuntarily, and to the ire of his neighbours, he arose and indolently +made his way down the side aisle. When he reached the baize swinging +doors, he saw the woman approaching him. As if she had been an +acquaintance of years, she saluted him carelessly, and, accompanied by +the scandalized looks of many in the congregation, the pair left the +church, though not before the preacher had sonorously quoted from the +Psalm, <i>Domine ne in Furore</i>, "For my loins are filled with illusions; +and there is no health in my flesh."</p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<h4>THE SÉANCE</h4> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>Je cherche des parfums nouveaux, des fleurs plus larges, des +plaisirs inéprouvés.—<span class="smcap">Flaubert.</span></p></div> + +<p>"It may be all a magnificent illusion, but—" he began.</p> + +<p>"Everything is an illusion in this life, though seldom magnificent," she +answered. They slowly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> walked up the avenue. The night was tepid; motor +cars, looking like magnified beetles, with bulging eyes of fire, went +swiftly by. The pavements were almost deserted when they reached the +park. He felt as if hypnotized, and once, rather meanly, was glad that +no one saw him in company of his dowdy companion.</p> + +<p>"I wonder if you realize that we do not know each other's name," he +said.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes. You are Mr. Baldur. My name is Mrs. Lilith Whistler."</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Whistler. Not the medium?"</p> + +<p>"The medium—as you call it. In reality I am only a woman, happy, or +unhappy, in the possession of super-normal powers."</p> + +<p>"Not supernatural, then?" he interposed. He was a sceptic who called +himself agnostic. The mystery of earth and heaven might be interpreted, +but always in terms of science; yet he did not fancy the superior manner +in which this charlatan flouted the supernatural. He had heard of her +miracles—and doubted them. She gave a little laugh at his correction.</p> + +<p>"What phrase-jugglers you men are! You want all the splendours of the +Infinite thrown in with the price of admission! I said super-normal, +because we know of nothing greater than nature. Things that are off the +beaten track of the normal, across the frontiers, some call +supernatural; but it is their ignorance of the vast, unexplored +territory of the spirit—which is only the material masquerading in a +different guise."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span></p> + +<p>"But you go to church, to a Lenten service—?" It was as if he had known +her for years, and their unconventional behaviour never crossed his +mind. He did not even ask himself where they were moving.</p> + +<p>"I go to church to rest my nerves—as do many other people," she +replied; "I was interested in the parallel of the Seven Deadly Sins and +the Seven Deadly Arts."</p> + +<p>"You believe the arts are sinful?" He was curious.</p> + +<p>"I don't believe in sin at all. A bad conscience is the result of poor +digestion. Sins are created so that we pay the poll-tax to eternity—pay +it on this side of the ferry. Yet the arts may become dangerous engines +of destruction if wrongfully employed. The Fathers of the early Church, +Ambrose and the rest, were right in viewing them suspiciously."—He +spoke:—</p> + +<p>"The arts diabolic! Then what of the particular form of wizardry +practised so successfully by the celebrated Mrs. Whistler, one of whose +names is, according to the Talmud, that of Adam's first wife?"</p> + +<p>"What do you know, my dear young man, of diabolic arts?"</p> + +<p>"Only that I am walking with you near the park on a dark night of April +and I never saw you before a half-hour ago. Isn't that magic—white, not +black?"</p> + +<p>"Pray do not mock magic, either white or black. Remember the fate of the +serpents<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> manufactured by Pharaoh's magicians. They were, need I tell +you, speedily devoured by the serpents of Moses and Aaron. Both parties +did not play fair in the game. If it was black magic to transform a rod +into a snake on the part of Pharaoh's conjurers, was it any less +reprehensible for the Hebrew magicians to play the same trick? It was +prestidigitation for all concerned—only the side of the children of +Israel was espoused in the recital. Therefore, do not talk of black or +white magic. There is only one true magic. And it is not slate-writing, +toe-joint snapping, fortune-telling, or the vending of charms. Magic, +too, is an art—like other arts. This is forgotten by the majority of +its practitioners. Hence the sordid vulgarity of the average mind-reader +and humbugging spiritualist of the dark-chamber séance. Besides, the +study of the super-normal mind tells us of the mind in health—nature is +shy in revealing her secrets."</p> + +<p>They passed the lake and were turning toward the east driveway. Suddenly +she stopped and under the faint starlight regarded her companion +earnestly. He had not been without adventures in his career—Paris +always provided them in plenty; but this encounter with a homely woman +piqued him. Her eye he felt was upon him and her voice soothing.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Baldur—listen! Since Milton wrote his great poem the +English-speaking people are all devil-worshippers, for Satan is the hero +of Paradise Lost. But I am no table-tipping me<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span>dium eager for your +applause or your money. I don't care for money. I think you know enough +of me through the newspapers to vouchsafe that. You are rich, and it is +your chief misery. Listen! Whether you believe it or not, you are very +unhappy. Let me read your horoscope. Your club life bores you; you are +tired of our silly theatres; no longer do you care for Wagner's music. +You are deracinated; you are unpatriotic. For that there is no excuse. +The arts are for you deadly. I am sure you are a lover of literature. +Yet what a curse it has been for you! When you see one of your friends +drinking wine, you call him a fool because he is poisoning himself. But +you—you—poison your spirit with the honey of France, of Scandinavia, +of Russia. As for the society of women—"</p> + +<p>"The Eternal Womanly!" he sneered.</p> + +<p>"The Eternal Simpleton, you mean. In <i>that</i> swamp of pettiness, idiocy, +and materialism, a man of your nature could not long abide. Religion—it +has not yet responded to your need. And without faith your sins lose +their savour. The arts—you don't know them all, the Seven Deadly Arts +and the One Beautiful Art!" She paused. Her voice had been as the sound +of delicate flutes. He was aflame.</p> + +<p>"Is there, then, an eighth art?" he quickly asked.</p> + +<p>"Would you know it if you saw it?"</p> + +<p>"Of course. Where is it, what is it?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span></p> + +<p>She laughed and took his arm.</p> + +<p>"Why did you look at me in church?"</p> + +<p>"Because—it was mere chance—no, it may have been the odour of iris. I +am mad over perfume. I think it a neglected art, degraded to the +function of anointment. I have often dreamed of an art by which a +dazzling and novel synthesis of fragrant perfumes would be invented by +some genius, some latter-day Rimmel or Lubin whom we could hail as a +peer of Chopin or Richard Strauss—two composers who have expressed +perfume in tone. Roinard in his Cantiques des Cantiques attempted a +concordance of tone, light, and odours. Yes—it was the iris that +attracted me."</p> + +<p>"But I have no iris about me. I have none now," she simply replied. He +faced her.</p> + +<p>"No iris? What—?"</p> + +<p>"I <i>thought</i> iris," she added triumphantly, as she guided him into one +of the side streets off Madison Avenue. He was astounded. She must be a +hypnotist, he said to himself. No suggestion of iris clung to her now. +And he remembered that the odour disappeared after they left the church. +He held his peace until they arrived before a brown-stone house of the +ordinary kind with an English basement. She took a key from her pocket +and, going down several steps, beckoned to him. Baldur followed. His +interest in this modern Cassandra and her bizarre words was too great +for him to hesitate or to realize that he would get himself into some +dangerous<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> scrape. And was this truly the Mrs. Whistler whose tricks of +telepathy and other extraordinary antics had puzzled and angered the +wise men of two continents? He did not have much time for reflection. A +grilled door opened, and presently he was in a room furnished very much +like a physician's office. Electric bulbs, an open grate, and two +bookcases gave the apartment a familiar, cheerful appearance. Baldur sat +down on a low chair, and Mrs. Whistler removed her commonplace headgear. +In the bright light she was younger than he had imagined, and her head a +beautifully modelled one—broad brows, very full at the back, and the +mask that of an emotional actress. Her smoke-coloured eyes were most +remarkable and her helmet of hair blue black.</p> + +<p>"And now that you are my guest at last, Mr. Baldur, let me apologize for +the exercise of my art upon your responsive nerves;" she made this +witch-burning admission as if she were accounting for the absence of +tea. To his relief she offered him nothing. He had a cigarette between +his fingers, but he did not care to smoke. She continued:—</p> + +<p>"For some time I have known you—never mind how! For some time I have +wished to meet you. I am not an impostor, nor do I desire to pose as the +goddess of a new creed. But you, Irving Baldur, are a man among men who +will appreciate what I may show you. You love, you understand, perfumes. +You have even<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> wished for a new art—don't forget that there are others +in the world to whom the seven arts have become a thrice-told tale, to +whom the arts have become too useful. All great art should be useless. +Yet architecture houses us; sculpture flatters us; painting imitates us; +dancing is pure vanity; literature and the drama, mere vehicles for +bread-earning; while music—music, the most useless art as it should +have been—is in the hands of the speculators. Moreover music is too +sexual—it reports in a more intense style the stories of our loves. +Music is the memory of love. What Prophet will enter the temple of the +modern arts and drive away with his divine scourge the vile +money-changers who fatten therein?" Her voice was shrill as she paced +the room. A very sibyl this, her crest of hair agitated, her eyes +sparkling with wrath. He missed the Cumæan tripod.</p> + +<p>"There is an art, Baldur, an art that was one of the lost arts of +Babylon until now, one based, as are all the arts, on the senses. +Perfume—the poor, neglected nose must have its revenge. It has outlived +the other senses in the æsthetic field."</p> + +<p>"What of the palate—you have forgotten that. Cookery, too, is a fine +art," he ventured. His smile irritated her.</p> + +<p>"Yes, Frenchmen have invented symphonic sauces, they say. But again, +eating is a useful art; primarily it serves to nourish the body. When +man was wholly wild—he is a mere bar<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span>barian to-day—his sense of smell +guarded him from his foes, from the beasts, from a thousand dangers. +Civilization, with its charming odours of decay,—have you ever ventured +to savour New York?—cast into abeyance the keenest of all the senses. +Little wonder, then, that there was no art of perfume like the arts of +vision and sound. I firmly believe the Hindoos, Egyptians, and the +Chinese knew of such an art. How account for the power of theocracies? +How else credit the tales of the saints who scattered perfumes—St. +Francis de Paul, St. Joseph of Cupertino, Venturini of Bergamo?"</p> + +<p>"But," he interrupted, "all this is interesting, fascinating. What I +wish to know is what form your art may take. How marshal odours as +melodies in a symphony, as colours on a canvas?" She made an impatient +gesture.</p> + +<p>"And how like an amateur you talk. Melody! When harmony is infinitely +greater in music! Form! When colour is infinitely greater than line! The +most profound music gives only the timbre—melodies are for infantile +people without imagination, who believe in patterns. Tone is the quality +<i>I</i> wish on a canvas, not anxious drawing. So it is with perfumes. I can +blend them into groups of lovely harmony; I can give you single notes of +delicious timbre—in a word, I can evoke an odour symphony which will +transport you. Memory is a supreme factor in this art. Do not forget how +the vaguest scent will carry you back to your youthful dreamland.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> It is +also the secret of spiritual correspondences—it plays the great rôle of +bridging space between human beings."</p> + +<p>"I sniff the air promise-crammed," he gayly misquoted. "But when will +you rewrite this Apocalypse? and how am I to know whether I shall really +enjoy this feast of perfume, if you can simulate the odour of iris as +you did an hour ago?"</p> + +<p>"I propose to show you an artificial paradise," she firmly asserted. In +the middle of the room there was a round table, the top inlaid with +agate. On it a large blue bowl stood, and it was empty. Mrs. Whistler +went to a swinging cabinet and took from it a dozen small phials. "Now +for the incantation," he jokingly said. In her matter-of-fact manner she +placed the bottles on the table, and uncorking them, she poured them +slowly into the bowl. He broke the silence:—</p> + +<p>"Isn't there any special form of hair-raising invocation that goes with +this dangerous operation?"</p> + +<p>"Listen to this." Her eyes swimming with fire, she intoned:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As I came through the desert thus it was,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As I came through the desert: Lo you there,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That hillock burning with a brazen glare;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Those myriad dusky flames with points aglow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which writhed and hissed and darted to and fro;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A Sabbath of the serpents, heaped pell-mell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Devil's roll-call and some fête in Hell:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet I strode on austere;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No hope could have no fear.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span>He did not seem to hear. From out the bowl there was stealing a perfume +which overmastered his will and led him captive to the lugubrious glade +of the Druids....</p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<h4>THE CIRCUS OF CANDLES</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Comme d'autres esprits voguent sur la musique,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Le míen, ô mon amour! nage sur ton parfum.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">—<span class="smcap">Baudelaire.</span><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>He was not dreaming, for he saw the woman at the bowl, saw her +apartment. But the interior of his brain was as melancholy as a lighted +cathedral. A mortal sadness encompassed him, and his nerves were like +taut violin strings. It was within the walls of his skull, that he +saw—his mundane surroundings did not disturb his visions. And the waves +of dolour swept over his consciousness. A mingling of tuberoses, +narcissus, attar of roses, and ambergris he detected in the air—as +<i>triste</i> as a morbid nocturne of Chopin. This was followed by a blending +of heliotrope, moss-rose, and hyacinth, together with dainty touches of +geranium. He dreamed of Beethoven's manly music when whiffs of +apple-blossom, white rose, cedar, and balsam reached him. Mozart passed +roguishly by in strains of scarlet pimpernel, mignonette, syringa, and +violets. Then the sky was darkened with Schumann's perverse harmonies as +jasmine, laven<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span>der, and lime were sprayed over him. Music, surely, was +the art nearest akin to odour. A superb and subtle chord floated about +him; it was composed of vervain, opoponax, and frangipane. He could not +conceive of a more unearthly triad. It was music from Parsifal. Through +the mists that were gathering he savoured a fulminating bouquet of +patchouli, musk, bergamot, and he recalled the music of Mascagni. Brahms +strode stolidly on in company with new-mown hay, cologne, and sweet +peas. Liszt was interpreted as ylang-ylang, myrrh, and maréchale; +Richard Strauss, by wistaria, oil of cloves, chypre, poppy, and +crab-apple.</p> + +<p>Suddenly there developed a terrific orchestration of chromatic odours: +ambrosia, cassia, orange, peach-blossoms, and musk of Tonkin, magnolia, +eglantine, hortensia, lilac, saffron, begonia, peau d'Espagne, acacia, +carnation, liban, fleur de Takeoka, cypress, oil of almonds, benzoin, +jacinth, rue, shrub, olea, clematis, the hediosma of Jamaica, olive, +vanilla, cinnamon, petunia, lotus, frankincense, sorrel, neroli from +Japan, jonquil, verbena, spikenard, thyme, hyssop, and decaying orchids. +This quintessential medley was as the sonorous blasts of Berlioz, +repugnant and exquisite; it swayed the soul of Baldur as the wind sways +the flame. There were odours like wingèd dreams; odours as the plucked +sounds of celestial harps; odours mystic and evil, corrupt and opulent; +odours recalling the sweet, dense smell of chloro<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span>form; odours evil, +angelic, and anonymous. They painted—painted by Satan!—upon his +cerebellum more than music—music that merged into picture; and he was +again in the glade of the Druids. The huge scent-symphony dissolved in a +shower of black roses which covered the ground ankle-deep. An antique +temple of exotic architecture had thrown open its bronze doors, and out +there surged and rustled a throng of Bacchanalian beings who sported and +shouted around a terminal god, which, with smiling, ironic lips, +accepted their delirious homage. White nymphs and brown displayed in +choric rhythms the dance of the Seven Deadly Sins, and their goat-hoofed +mates gave vertiginous pursuit. At first the pagan gayety of the scene +fired the fancy of the solitary spectator; but soon his nerves, +disordered by the rout and fatigued by the spoor of so many odours, +warned him that something disquieting was at hand. He felt a nameless +horror as the sinister bitter odour of honeysuckle, sandalwood, and +aloes echoed from the sacred grove. A score of seductive young witches +pranced in upon their broomsticks, and without dismounting surrounded +the garden god. A battalion of centaurs charged upon them. The +vespertine hour was nigh, and over this iron landscape there floated the +moon, an opal button in the sky. Then to his shame and fear he saw that +the Satyr had vanished and in its place there reared the Black Venus, +the vile shape of ancient<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> Africa, and her face was the face of Lilith. +The screaming lovely witches capered in fantastic spirals, each sporting +a lighted candle. It was the diabolic Circus of the Candles, the +infernal circus of the Witches' Sabbath. Rooted to the ground, Baldur +realized with fresh amazement and vivid pain the fair beauty of Adam's +prehistoric wife, her luxurious blond hair, her shapely shoulders, her +stature of a goddess—he trembled, for she had turned her mordant gaze +in his direction. And he strove in vain to bring back the comforting +vision of the chamber. She smiled, and the odours of sandal, coreopsis, +and aloes encircled his soul like the plaited strands of her glorious +hair. She was that other Lilith, the only offspring of the old Serpent. +On what storied fresco, limned by what worshipper of Satan, had these +accursed lineaments, this lithe, seductive figure, been shown! Names of +Satanic painters, from Hell-fire Breughel to Arnold Böcklin, from +Felicien Rops to Franz Stuck, passed through the halls of Irving +Baldur's memory.</p> + +<p>The clangour of the feast was become maddening. He heard the Venus +ballet music from Tannhäuser entwined with the acridities of aloes, +sandal, and honeysuckle. Then the aroma of pitch, sulphur, and +assafœtida cruelly strangled the other melodic emanations. Lilith, +disdaining the shelter of her nymphs and their clowneries, stood forth +in all the hideous majesty of Ænothea, the undulating priestess of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> +Abominable Shape. His nerves macerated by this sinful apparition, Baldur +struggled to resist her mute command. What was it? He saw her wish +streaming from her eyes. Despair! Despair! Despair! There is no hope for +thee, wretched earthworm! No abode but the abysmal House of Satan! +Despair, and you will be welcomed! By a violent act of volition, set in +motion by his fingers fumbling a small gold cross he wore as a +watch-guard, the heady fumes of the orgy dissipated....</p> + +<p>He was sitting facing the bowl, and over it with her calm, confidential +gaze was the figure of Lilith Whistler.</p> + +<p>"Have I proved to you that perfume is the art of arts?" she demanded. He +rushed from the room and was shaking the grilled gate in the hallway +like a caged maniac, when with a pitying smile she released him. He +reached the street at a bound....</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>... "the evil of perfume, I repeat, was one against which the venerable +Fathers of the Church warned the faithful." The preacher's voice had +sagged to a monotone. Baldur lifted his eyes in dismay. Near him sat the +same woman, and she still stared at him as if to rebuke him for his +abstraction. About her hovered the odour of iris. Had it been only a +disturbing dream? Intoxicated by his escape from damnation, from the +last of the Deadly Arts, he bowed his head in grateful prayer. What +ec<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span>stasy to be once more in the arms of Mother Church! There, dipped in +her lustral waters, and there alone would he find solace for his barren +heart, pardon for his insane pride of intellect, and protection from the +demons that waylaid his sluggish soul. The sermon ended as it began:—</p> + +<p>"And the Seven Deadly Sins, beloved brethren, are: Pride, Covetousness, +Lust, Anger, Gluttony, Envy, Sloth. <i>Oremus!</i>"</p> + +<p>"Amen," fervently responded Baldur the Immoralist.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span></p> +<h2>III</h2> + +<h3>THE PURSE OF AHOLIBAH</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i8">Lo, this is that Aholibah<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose name was blown among strange seas....<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">—<span class="smcap">Swinburne.</span><br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<h4>I</h4> + +<h4>THE AVIARY</h4> + +<p>When the last breakfast guests had gone the waiters of the café began +their most disagreeable daily task. All the silver was assembled on one +of the long tables in an inner room, where, as at a solemn conclave, the +servants took their seats, and, presided over by the major-domo of the +establishment, they polished the knives and forks, spoons, and +sugar-tongs, filled the salt-cellars, replenished the pepper-boxes and +other paraphernalia of the dining art. The gabble in this close +apartment was terrific. Joseph, the maître d'hôtel, rapped in vain a +dozen times for silence. The chef poked his head of a truculent Gascon +through the door and indulged in a war of wit with a long fellow from +Marseilles,—called the "mast" because he was very tall and thin, and +had cooked in the galley of a Mediterranean trading brig. From time to +time one of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> the piccolos, a fat little boy from the South, carried in +pitchers of flat beer, brewed in the suburbs. As it was a hot day, he +was kept busy. The waiters had gone through a trying morning; there were +many strangers in Paris. Outside, the Boulevard des Italiens, despite +its shade trees, broiled under a torrid July sun that swam in a +mercilessly blue sky.</p> + +<p>The majority of the men were listening to gossip about their colleagues +in the Café Cardinal across the way. Ambroise alone sat apart and patted +and smoothed the salt in its receptacles. He was a young man from some +little town in Alsace, a furious patriot, and the butt of his +companions—for he was the latest comer in the Café Riche. Though he +told his family name, Nettier, and declared that his father and mother +were of French blood, he was called "the German." He was good-looking, +very blond, with big, innocent blue eyes; and while he was never +molested personally,—a short, sharp tussle with a cook had proved him +to be a man of muscle,—behind his back his walk was mimicked, his +precise attitudes were openly bantered. But Ambroise stood this torture +gantlet equably. He had lived long enough among Germans to copy their +impassive manner and, coupled with a natural contempt for his +fellow-monkeys in the cage, he knew that perhaps in a day a new man +would receive all these unwelcome attentions. Moreover, his work, +clear-cut, unobtrusive, and capable, pleased<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> M. Joseph. And when the +patron himself dined at the café, Ambroise was the garçon selected to +wait upon him. Hence the jealousy of his colleagues. Couple to this the +fact that he was reported miserly, and had saved a large sum—which were +all sufficient reasons for his unpopularity.</p> + +<p>As the afternoon wore on little airs began to play in the tree-tops; the +street watering carts had been assiduous, and before the terrace water +had been sprinkled by the piccolos so effectively that at five o'clock, +when the jaded stock-brokers, journalists, and business men began to +flock in, each for his apéritif, the café was comparatively cool.</p> + +<p>A few women's frocks relieved the picture with discreet or joyous shades +of white and pink. Ambroise was diligent and served his regular +customers, the men who grumbled if any one occupied their favourite +corners. Absinthe nicely iced, dominoes, the evening papers—these he +brought as he welcomed familiar faces. But his thoughts were not his +own, and his pose when not in service was listless, even bored. Would +<i>she</i> return that evening with the same crowd—was the idea that had +taken possession of his brain. He was very timid in the presence of +women, and it diverted the waiters to see him blush when he waited upon +the gorgeous birds that thronged the aviary at night, making its walls +echo with their chattering, quarrels, laughter. This provincial, modest, +sensitive, the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> only child of old-fashioned parents, was stupefied and +shocked in the presence of the over-decorated and under-dressed +creatures, daubed like idols, who began to flock in the café, with or +without escorts, after eleven o'clock every night in the year. He knew +them all by name. He knew their histories. He could detect at a glance +whether they were unhappy or merely depressed by the rain, whether they +drank champagne from happiness or desperation. Notwithstanding his +dreamy disposition his temperament was ardent; his was an unspoiled +soul; he felt himself a sort of moral barometer for the magnificent and +feline women who treated him as if he were a wooden post when they were +gossiping, harried him like an animal when they were thirsty. He noted +that they were always thirsty. They smoked more than they ate, and +whispered more, if no men were present, than they smoked. But then, men +were seldom absent.</p> + +<p>The night previous, Ambroise recalled the fact, she had not come in with +a different set. This was not her custom, and he worried over it. +Protected by princes and financiers, she nevertheless loved her liberty +so much that one seldom caught her in the same company twice in +succession. For this singular caprice Aholibah, oftener called the Woman +from Morocco,—because she had lived in Algiers,—was the despair of her +circle. Why, argued the other birds, why fly in the face of luck? To be +sure, she was still young, still beautiful, with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> that sort of metallic +beauty which reminded Ambroise of some priceless bronze blackened in the +sun. She was meagre, diabolically graceful, dark, with huge saucer-like +eyes that greedily drank in her surroundings. But her lashes were long, +and she could veil her glance so that her brilliant face looked as if +the shutters had been closed on her soul. Across her brows a bar of +blue-black marked the passage of her eyebrows—which sable line was +matched by her abundant hair, worn in overshadowing clusters. She +dressed winter and summer in scarlet, and her stage name was +Aholibah—bestowed upon her by some fantastic poet who had not read +Ezekiel, but Swinburne. It was rumoured by her intimates that her real +name was Clotilde Durval, that her mother had been a seamstress....</p> + +<p>With a sinking at the heart Ambroise saw her enter in the company of the +same gentleman she had brought the previous evening. The garçon did not +analyze this strange, jealous feeling, for he was too busily employed in +seating his guests and relieving the man of his hat and walking-stick. +An insolent chap it was, with his air of an assured conqueror and the +easy bearing of wealth. There was little discussion as to the order—a +certain brand of wine, iced beyond recognition for any normal palate, +was always served to Aholibah. She loved "needles on her tongue," she +asseverated if any one offered her weaker stuff. That July<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> night she +looked like a piratical craft that had captured a sleek merchantman for +prize. She was all smoothness; Ambroise alone detected the retracted +claws of the leopardess. She blazed in the electric illumination, and +her large hat, with its swelling plumes, threw her dusky features into +shadow—her eyes seemed far away under its brim and glowed with unholy +phosphorescence.</p> + +<p>While he arranged the details of the silver wine-pail in the other room, +the chef asked him if the Princess Comet had arrived. Ambroise almost +snarled—much to the astonishment of the Gascon. And when the sommelier +attempted to help him with the wine, he was elbowed vigorously. Ambroise +must have been drinking too much, said the boys. Joseph rather curiously +inspected his waiter as he made his accustomed round in the café. But, +pale as usual, Ambroise stood near his table, his whole bearing an +intent and thoroughly professional one. Joseph was satisfied and drove +the chef back to the kitchen.</p> + +<p>The young Alsatian had never seen Aholibah look so radiant. She was in +high spirits, and her pungent talk aroused her companion from incipient +moroseness. After midnight the party grew—some actresses from a near-by +theatre came in with their male friends, and another waiter was detailed +to the aid of Ambroise. But he stuck to the first-comers and served so +much wine to them that he had the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> satisfaction of seeing Aholibah's +disagreeable protector collapse. She hardly noticed it, for she was +talking vivaciously to Madeleine about the première of Donnay's comedy. +Thrice Ambroise sought to fill her glass; but she repulsed him. He was +sad. Something told him that Aholibah was farther away from him than +ever; was she on the eve of forming one of those alliances that would +rob him finally of her presence? He eyed the sleeping man—surely a +monster, a millionnaire, with the tastes of a brute. It was all very +trying to a man with fine nerves. Several times he caught Aholibah's eye +upon him, and he vaguely wondered if he had omitted anything—or, had he +betrayed his feelings? In Paris the waiter who shows that he has ears, +or eyes, or a heart, except in the exercise of his functions, is lost. +He is bound to be caught and his telltale humanity scourged by instant +dismissal. So when those fathomless eyes glittered in his direction, his +knees trembled, and a ball of copper invaded his throat. He could barely +drag himself to her side and ask if he could help her. A burst of +impertinent laughter greeted him, and Madeleine cried:—</p> + +<p>"Your blond garçon seems smitten, Aholibah!" When Ambroise heard this +awful phrase, his courage quite forsook him, and he withdrew into the +obscurity of the hall. So white was he that the kindly Joseph asked +solicitously if he were ill. Ambroise shook his head. The heat, he +feebly explained, had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> made his head giddy. Better drink some iced +mineral water, was suggested—the other man could look after the party! +But Ambroise would not hear of this, and feeling once more the beckoning +gaze of Aholibah he marched bravely to her and was rewarded by a tap on +the wrist.</p> + +<p>"There, loiterer! Go call a carriage. The Prince is sleepy—dear sheep!" +This last was a tender apostrophe to her snoring friend. Ambroise helped +them into a fiacre. When it drove away it was past two o'clock; the +house had to be closed. He walked slowly home to his little chamber on +the Rue Puteaux, just off the Batignolles. But he could not sleep until +the street-cleaners began the work of another day.... The Woman from +Morocco was the scarlet colour of his troubled dreams....</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>August had almost spent itself, and Aholibah remained in the arid and +flavourless town. Her intimate friends had weeks earlier gone to +Trouville, to Dinard, to Ostende, to Hombourg, even as far as Brighton; +but she lingered, seemingly from perversity. She came regularly to the +café about eleven, always in company with her Prince, and was untiringly +served by Ambroise. He was rewarded for his fidelity with many valuable +tips and latterly with gifts—for on being questioned he was forced to +admit that gratuities had to be shared with the other waiters. He was so +amiable, his smile so win<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span>ning, his admiration so virginal, that +Aholibah kept him near her. Her Prince drank, sulked, or grumbled as +much as ever. He was bored by the general heat and the dulness, yet made +no effort to escape either. One night they entered after twelve o'clock. +Aholibah was in vicious humour and snapped at her garçon. Dog-like he +waited upon her, an humble, devoted helot. He overheard her say to her +companion that she must have lost the purse at the Folies-Bergères.</p> + +<p>"Well, go to the Rue de la Paix to-morrow and buy another," was the +reply.</p> + +<p>"I can't replace that purse. Besides, it was a prized gift—"</p> + +<p>"From your sainted mother in heaven!" he sneered.</p> + +<p>Ambroise saw the windows of her eyes close with a snap, and he moved +away, fearing to be present in the surely impending quarrel. He +remembered the purse. It was a long gold affair, its tiny links crusted +with precious pearls—emeralds, rubies, diamonds. And the top he saw +before him with ease, for its pattern was odd—a snake's head with jaws +distended by a large amethyst. Yes, it was unique, that purse. And its +value must have been bewildering for any but the idle rich. Ah! how he +hated all this money, coming from nowhere, pouring in golden streams +nowhere. He was not a revolutionist,—not even a socialist,—but there +were times when he could have taken the neck of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> Prince between his +strong fingers and choked out his worthless life. These attacks of envy +were short-lived—he could not ascribe them to the reading of the little +hornet-like anarchist sheet, <i>Père Peinard</i>, which the other waiters +lent him; rather was it an excess of bile provoked by the coveted beauty +of Aholibah.</p> + +<p>She usurped his day dreams, his night reveries. He never took a step +without keeping her memory in the foreground. When he closed his eyes, +he saw scarlet. When he opened them, he felt her magnetic glance upon +him, though she was far from the café. His one idea was to speak with +her. His maddest wish assumed the shape of a couple walking slowly arm +in arm through the Bois—<i>she</i> was the woman! But this particular vision +bordered on delirium, and he rarely indulged in it.... He stooped to +look under the chairs, under the table, for the missing treasure. It was +not to be seen. Indolently the Prince watched him as he peered all over +the café, out on the terrace. Aholibah was deeply preoccupied. She +sipped her wine without pleasure. Her brows were thunderous. The +cart-wheel hat was tipped low over them. Several times Ambroise sought +her glance. He could have sworn that she was regarding him steadily. So +painful became the intensity of her eyes that he withdrew in confusion. +His mind was made up at last.</p> + +<p>The next day was for him a free one. He<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> wandered up and down the Rue de +la Paix staring moodily into the jewellers' windows. That night, though +he could have stayed away from the café, he returned at ten o'clock, and +luckily enough was needed. Joseph greeted him effusively. The "mast," +the thin fellow from Marseilles, had gone home with a splitting +headache. Would Ambroise stay and serve his usual table? To his immense +astonishment and joy he saw her enter alone. He took her wraps and +seated her on her favourite divan near an electric fan. Then he stared +expectantly at the door. But her carriage had driven away. Was a part of +his dream coming true? He closed his eyes, and straightway saw scarlet. +Then he went for wine, without taking her order.</p> + +<p>Aholibah was preoccupied. She played with the bracelet on her tawny left +wrist. Occasionally she lifted her glass, or else tossed her hair from +her eyes. If any stranger ventured near her, she began to hum +insolently, or spoke earnestly with Ambroise. He was in the eleventh +heaven of the Persians. Two Ambroises appeared to be in him: one served +his lady, spoke with her; the other from afar contemplated with the +ecstasy of a hasheesh eater his counterfeit brother. It was an exquisite +sensation.</p> + +<p>"The purse—has Mademoiselle—" He stammered.</p> + +<p>"No," she crisply answered.</p> + +<p>"Can it never be duplicated? Perhaps—"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Never. It is impossible. It was made in Africa."</p> + +<p>"But—but—" he persisted. His bearing was so peculiar that she bent +upon him her dynamic gaze.</p> + +<p>"What's the matter with you this evening, Ambroise? Have you come into a +successful lottery ticket? Or—" She was suspiciously looking at him. +"Or—you haven't found <i>it</i>?"</p> + +<p>He nodded his head, his face beatific with joy. He resembled the +youthful Saint George after slaying the dragon. She was startled. Her +eyes positively lightened; he listened for the attendant peal of +thunder.</p> + +<p>"Speak out, you booby. Cornichon! Where did you find it? Let me see +it—at once." All fire and imperiousness, she held out grasping fingers. +He shook. And then carefully he drew from the inside pocket of his coat, +the purse. She snatched it. Yes—it was her purse. And yet there was +something strange about it. Had the stones been tampered with? She +examined it searchingly. She boasted a jeweller's knowledge of diamonds +and rubies. One of the stones had been transposed, that she could have +sworn. And how different the expression of the serpent's eyes—small +carbuncles. No—it was not her purse! She looked at Ambroise. He was +paling and reddening in rapid succession.</p> + +<p>"It is <i>not</i> my purse! How did this come into your possession? It is +very valuable,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> quite as valuable as mine. But the eyes of my serpent +were not so large—I mean the carbuncles. Ambroise—look at me! I +command you! Where did you find this treasure—cher ami!" Her seductive +voice lingered on the last words as if they were a morsel of delicious +fruit. He leaned heavily on the table and closed his eyes to shut out +her face—but he only saw scarlet. He heard scarlet.</p> + +<p>"I—I—bought the thing because—you missed the other—" He could get no +further. She smiled, showing her celebrated teeth.</p> + +<p>"You bought the thing—<i>hein</i>? You must be a prince in +disguise—Ambroise! And I have just lost <i>my</i> Prince! Perhaps—you +thought—you audacious boy—"</p> + +<p>He kept his eyes closed. She was in a corner of the room—quite +empty—the other waiters were on the terrace. She weighed his appearance +and smiled mysteriously; her smile, her glance, and her scarlet gowns +were her dramatic assets. Then she spoke in a low voice—a contralto +like the darker tones of an English horn:—</p> + +<p>"I fancy I'll keep your thoughtful <i>gift</i>—Ambroise. And now, like a +good boy, get a fiacre for me!" She went away, leaving him standing in +the middle of the room, a pillar of burning ice. When Joseph spoke to +him he did not answer. Then they took him by the arm, and he fell over +in a seizure which, asserted the practical head waiter, was caused by +indigestion.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span></p> +<h4>II</h4> + +<h4>ACROSS THE STYX</h4> + +<p>It was raining on the Left Bank. The chill of a November afternoon cut +its way through the doors of the Café La Source in the Boul' Mich' and +made shiver the groups of young medical students who were reading or +playing dominos. Ambroise Nettier, older, thinner, paler, waited +carefully on his patrons. He had been in the hospital with brain fever, +and after he was cured, one of the students secured him a position at +this café in the Quartier. He had been afraid to go back to the Café +Riche; Joseph had harshly discharged him on that terrible night; alone, +without a home, without a penny, his savings gone, his life insurance +hypothecated,—it had been intended for the benefit of his parents,—his +clothes, his very trunk gone, and plunged in debt to his fellow-waiters, +his brain had succumbed to the shock. But Ambroise was young and strong; +when he left the hospital he was relieved to find that he no longer saw +scarlet. He was a healed man. He had intended to seek for a place at the +Café Cardinal, but it was too near the Café Riche—he might meet old +acquaintances, might be asked embarrassing questions. So he gladly +accepted his present opportunity.</p> + +<p>The dulness of the day waxed with its waning. It was nearly six o'clock +when the door<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> slowly opened and Aholibah entered. She was alone. Her +scarlet plumage was wet, and she was painted like a Peruvian war-god. +She did not appear so brilliant a bird of paradise—or elsewhere—as at +the aviary across the water. Yet her gaze was as forthright as ever. She +sat on a divan between two domino parties, and was hardly noticed by the +fanatics of that bony diversion. Recognizing Ambroise, she made a sign +to him. It was some minutes before he could reach her table; he had +other orders. When he did, she said she wanted some absinthe. He stared +at her. Yes, absinthe—she had discarded iced wines. The doctor told her +that cold wine was dangerous. He still stared. Then she held up the +purse. It was a mere shell; all the stones save the amethyst in the +mouth of the serpent were gone. She laughed shrilly. He went for the +drink. She lighted a cigarette....</p> + +<p>Every night for six months she haunted the café. She was always +unattended, always in excellent humour. She made few friends among the +students. Her scarlet dress grew shabbier. Her gloves and boots were +pitiful to Ambroise, who recalled her former splendours, her outrageous +extravagances. Why had fortune flouted her! Why had she let it, like +water, escape through her jewelled, indifferent fingers! He made no +inquiries. She vouchsafed none. They were now on a different footing. +Tantalizingly she dangled the purse under his nose as he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> brought her +absinthe—always this opalescent absinthe. She drank it in the morning, +in the afternoon, at night. She seldom spoke save to Ambroise. And +he—he no longer saw scarlet, for the glorious tone of her hat and gown +had vanished. They were rusty red, a carroty tint. Her face was like the +mask of La Buveuse d'Absinthe, by Felicien Rops; her eyes, black wells +of regard; her hair without lustre, and coarse as the mane of a horse. +Aholibah no longer manifested interest in the life of Paris. She did not +read or gossip. But she still had money to spend.</p> + +<p>The night he quarrelled with his new patron, Ambroise was not well. All +the day his head had pained him. When he reached La Source, the dame at +the cashier's desk told him that he was in for a scolding. He shrugged +his thin shoulders. He didn't care very much. Later the prophesied event +occurred. He had been much too attentive to the solitary woman who drank +absinthe day and night. The patron did not propose to see his +establishment, patronized as it was by the shining lights of medicine—!</p> + +<p>Ambroise changed his clothes and went away without a word. He was weary +of his existence, and a friend who shared his wretched room in the Rue +Mouffetard had apprised him of a vacant job at a livelier resort, the +Café Vachette, commonly known as the Café Rasta. There he would earn +more tips, though the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> work would be more fatiguing. And—the Morocco +Woman might not follow him. He hurried away.</p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<h4>AVERNUS</h4> + +<p>She sat on a divan in the corner when he entered the Vachette for the +first time. He said nothing, nor did he experience either a thrill of +pleasure or disgust. The other waiters assured him that she was an old +customer, sometimes better dressed, yet never without money. And she was +liberal. He took her usual order, but did not speak to her, though she +played with the purse as if to tempt him—it had become for him a symbol +of their lives. A quick glance assured him that the amethyst had +disappeared. She was literally drinking <i>his</i> gift away in absinthe. The +spring passed, and Ambroise did not regain his former health. His limbs +were leaden, his head always heavy. The alert waiter was transformed. He +took his orders soberly, executed them soberly,—he was still a good +routinier; but his early enthusiasm was absent. Something had gone from +him that night; as she went to her carriage with her scornful, snapping, +petulant <i>Ça</i>!—he felt that his life was over. Aholibah watched like a +cat every night; he was not on for day duty. She never came to the Rasta +before dark. The story of her infatuation for the well-bred, melancholy<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> +garçon was noised about; but it did not endanger his position, as at La +Source. He paid little attention to the jesting, and was scrupulously +exact in his work. But the sense of his double personality began to +worry him again. He did not see scarlet as of old; he noticed when his +eyes were closed that the apparition of a second Ambroise swam into the +field of his vision. And he was positively certain that this spectre of +himself saw scarlet—the attitude of his double assured him of the fact. +Simple-minded, ignorant of cerebral disorders, loyal, and laborious, +Ambroise could not speak of these disquieting things—indeed, he only +worked the more....</p> + +<p>At last, one night in late summer, she did not appear. It was after a +day when she had sung more insolently than ever, drunk more than her +accustomed allowance, and had shown Ambroise the purse—the sockets of +the serpent's eyes untenanted by the beautiful carbuncles. Apathetic as +he had become, he was surprised at her absence. It was either caprice or +serious illness. She had dwindled to a skeleton, with a maleficent +smile. Her teeth were yellow, her hands become claws, the scarlet of her +clothes a drab hue, the plumes on her hat gone. Ambroise wondered. About +midnight a mean-looking fellow entered and asked for him. A lady, a very +ill lady, was in a coupé at the door. He hurried out. It was Aholibah. +Her eyes were glazed and her lips black and cracked. She tried to croon, +in a hoarse voice:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span>—</p> + +<p>"I am the Woman of Morocco!" But her head fell on the window-sill of the +carriage. Ambroise lifted the weary head on his shoulder. His eyes were +so dry that they seemed thirsty. The old glamour gripped him. The cabman +held the reins and waited; it was an every-night occurrence for him. The +starlight could not penetrate to the Boulevard through the harsh +electric glare; and the whirring of wheels and laughter of the café's +guests entered the soul of Ambroise like steel nails. She opened her +eyes.</p> + +<p>"I am that Aholibah ... a witness through waste Asia ... that the strong +men and the Captains knew ..." This line of Swinburne's was pronounced +in the purest English. Ambroise did not understand. Then followed some +rapidly uttered jargon that might have been Moorish. He soothed her, and +softly passed his hand over her rough and dishevelled hair. His heart +was bursting. She was after all his Aholibah, his first love. A crowd +gathered. He asked for a doctor. A dozen students ran in a dozen +different directions. The tired horse stamped its feet impatiently, and +once it whinnied. The coachman lighted his pipe and watched his dying +fare. Some wag sang a drunken lyric, and Ambroise repeated at +intervals:—</p> + +<p>"Please not so close, Messieurs. She needs air." Then she moved her head +and murmured:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Where's—my Prince? My—Prince Ambroise—I have something—" Her head +fell back on his shoulder with a rigid jerk. In her clenched fingers he +recognized his purse—smudged, torn, the serpent mouth gaping, the eyes +empty.... And for the last time Ambroise saw scarlet—saw scarlet +double. His two personalities had separated, never to merge again.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span></p> +<h2>IV</h2> + +<h3>REBELS OF THE MOON</h3> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"On my honour, friend," Zarathustra answered, "what thou speakest +of doth not exist: there is no devil nor hell. Thy soul will be +dead even sooner than thy body: henceforth fear naught."</p></div> + + +<p>The moon, a spiritual gray wafer, fainted in the red wind of a summer +morning as the two men leaped a ditch soft with mud. The wall was not +high, the escape an easy one. Crouching, their clothes the colour of +clay, they trod cautiously the trench, until opposite a wood whose trees +blackened the slow dawn. Then, without a word, they ran across the road, +and, in a few minutes, were lost in the thick underbrush of the little +forest. It was past four o'clock and the dawn began to trill over the +rim of night; the east burst into stinging sun rays, while the moving +air awoke the birds and sent scurrying around the smooth green park a +cloud of golden powdery dust....</p> + +<p>Arved and Quell stood in a secret glade and looked at each other +solemnly—but only for a moment. Laughter, unrestrained laughter, +frightened the squirrels and warned them that they were still in +danger.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Well, we've escaped this time," said the poet.</p> + +<p>"Yes; but how long?" was the sardonic rejoinder of the painter.</p> + +<p>"See here, Quell, you're a pessimist. You are never satisfied; which, I +take it, is a neat definition of pessimism."</p> + +<p>"I don't propose to chop logic so early in the morning," was the surly +reply. "I'm cold and nervous. Say, did you lift anything before we got +away?" Arved smiled the significant smile of a drinking man.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I did. I waited until Doc McKracken left his office, and then I +sneaked <i>this</i>." The severe lines in Quell's face began to swim +together. He reached out his hand, took the flask, and then threw back +his head. Arved watched him with patient resignation.</p> + +<p>"Hold on there! Leave a dozen drops for a poor maker of rhymes," he +chuckled, and soon was himself gurgling the liquor.</p> + +<p>They arose, and after despairing glances at their bespattered garments, +trudged on. In an hour, the pair had reached the edge of the forest, +and, as the sun sat high and warm, a rest was agreed upon. But this time +they did not easily find a hiding-place. Fearing to venture nearer the +turnpike, hearing human sounds, they finally retired from the clearing, +and behind a moss-etched rock discovered a cool resting-place on the +leafy floor.</p> + +<p>At full length, hands under heads, brains mellowed by brandy, the men +summed up the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> situation. Arved was the first to speak. He was tall, +blond, heavy of figure, and his beard hung upon his chest. His +dissatisfied eyes were cynical when he rallied his companion. A man of +brains this, but careless as the grass.</p> + +<p>"Quell, let us think this thing out carefully. It is nearly six o'clock. +At six o'clock the cells will be unlocked, and then,—well, McKracken +will damn our bones, for he gets a fat board fee from my people, and the +table is not so cursed good at the Hermitage that he misses a margin of +profit! What will he do? Set the dogs after us? No, he daren't; we're +not convicts—we're only mad folk." He smiled good-humouredly, though +his white brow was dented as if by harsh thoughts.</p> + +<p>Quell's little bloodshot eyes stared up into a narrow channel of +foliage, at the end of which was a splash of blue sky. He was +mean-appearing, with a horselike head, his mustache twisted into a +savage curl. His forehead was abnormal in breadth and the irritable +flashes of fire in his eyes told the story of a restless soul. The +nostrils expanded as he spoke:—</p> + +<p>"We're only mad folk, as you say; nevertheless, the Lord High Keeper +will send his police patrol wagon after us in a jiffy. He went to bed +dead full last night, so his humour won't be any too sweet when he hears +that several of his boarders have vanished. He'll miss you more than me; +I'm not at the first table with you swells."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span></p> + +<p>Quell ended his speech with so disagreeable an inflection that Arved was +astonished. He looked around and spat at a beetle.</p> + +<p>"What's wrong with you, my hearty? I believe you miss your soft iron +couch. Or did you leave it this morning left foot foremost? Anyhow, +Quell, don't get on your ear. We'll push to town as soon as it's +twilight, and I know a little crib near the river where we can have all +we want to eat and drink. Do you hear—drink!" Quell made no answer. The +other continued:—</p> + +<p>"Besides, I don't see why you've turned sulky simply because your family +sent you up to the Hermitage. It's no disgrace. In fact, it steadies the +nerves, and you can get plenty of booze."</p> + +<p>"If you have the price," snapped his friend.</p> + +<p>"Money or no money, McKracken's asylum—no, it's bad taste to call it +that; his retreat, ah, there's the word!—is not so awful. I've a theory +that our keepers are crazy as loons; though you can't blame them, +watching us, as they must, from six o'clock in the morning until +midnight. Say, why were you put away?"</p> + +<p>"Crazy, like yourself, I suppose." Quell grinned.</p> + +<p>"And now we're cured. We cured ourselves by flight. How can they call us +crazy when we planned the job so neatly?"</p> + +<p>Arved began to be interested in the sound of his own voice. He searched +his pockets and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> after some vain fumbling found a half package of +cigarettes.</p> + +<p>"Take some and be happy, my boy. They are boon-sticks indeed." Quell +suddenly arose.</p> + +<p>"Arved, what were you sent up for, may I ask?"</p> + +<p>The poet stretched his big legs, rolled over on his back again, and +scratching his tangled beard, smoked the cigarette he had just lighted. +In the hot hum of the woods there was heard the occasional dropping of +pine cones as the wind fanned lazy music from the leaves. They could not +see the sun; its power was felt. Perspiration beaded their shiny faces +and presently they removed collars and coats, sitting at ease in +shirt-sleeves.... Arved's tongue began to speed:—</p> + +<p>"Though I've only known you twenty-four hours, my son, I feel impelled +to tell you the history of my happy life—for happiness has its +histories, no matter what the poets say. But the day is hot, our time +limited. Wait until we are recaptured, then I'll spin you a yarn."</p> + +<p>"You expect to get caught for sure?"</p> + +<p>"I do. So do you. No need to argue—your face tells me that. But we'll +have the time of our life before they gather us in. Anyhow, we'll want +to go back. The whole world is crazy, but ashamed to acknowledge it. We +are not. Pascal said men are so mad that he who would not be is a madman +of a new kind. To escape ineffable dulness is the privilege of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> the +lunatic; the lunatic, who is the true aristocrat of nature—the unique +man in a tower of ivory, the elect, who, in samite robes, traverses +moody gardens. Really, I shudder at the idea of ever living again in +yonder stewpot of humanity, with all its bad smells. To struggle with +the fools for their idiotic prizes is beyond me. The lunatic asylum—"</p> + +<p>"Can't you find some other word?" asked Quell, dryly.</p> + +<p>"—is the best modern equivalent for the tub of Diogenes—he who was the +first Solitary, the first Individualist. To dream one's dreams, to be +alone—"</p> + +<p>"How about McKracken and the keepers?"</p> + +<p>"From the volatile intellects of madmen are fashioned the truths of +humanity. Mental repose is death. All our modern theocrats, +politicians,—whose minds are sewers for the people,—and lawyers are +corpses, their brains dead from feeding on dead ideas. Motion is +life—mad minds are always in motion."</p> + +<p>"Let up there! You talk like the doctor chaps over at the crazy crib," +interrupted Quell.</p> + +<p>"Ah, if we could only arrange our dreams in chapters—as in a novel. +Sometimes Nature does it for us. There is really a beginning, a +development, a dénouement. But, for the most of us, life is a crooked +road with weeds so high that we can't see the turn of the path. Now, my +case—I'm telling you my story after all—my case is a typical one of +the artistic<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> sort. I wrote prose, verse, and dissipated with true +poetic regularity. It was after reading Nietzsche that I decided to quit +my stupid, sinful ways. Yes, you may smile! It was Nietzsche who +converted me. I left the old crowd, the old life in Paris, went to +Brittany, studied new rhythms, new forms, studied the moon; and then +people began to touch their foreheads knowingly. I was suspected simply +because I did not want to turn out sweet sonnets about the pretty stars. +Why, man, I have a star in my stomach! Every poet has. We are of the +same stuff as the stars. It was Marlowe who said, 'A sound magician is a +mighty god.' He was wrong. Only the mentally unsound are really wise. +This the ancients knew. Even if Gerard de Nerval did walk the boulevards +trolling a lobster by a blue ribbon—that is no reason for judging him +crazy. As he truly said, 'Lobsters neither bark nor bite; and they know +the secrets of the sea!' His dreams simply overflowed into his daily +existence. He had the courage of his dreams. Do you remember his +declaring that the sun never appears in dreams? How true! But the moon +does, 'sexton of the planets,' as the crazy poet Lenau called it—the +moon which is the patron sky-saint of men with brains. Ah, brains! What +unhappiness they cause in this brainless world, a world rotten with +hypocrisy. A poet polishes words until they glitter with beauty, +charging them with fulminating meaning—straightway he is called<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> mad by +men who sweat and toil on the stock exchange. Have you ever, my dear +Quell, watched those little, grotesque brokers on a busy day? No? Well, +you will say that no lunatic grimacing beneath the horns of the moon +ever made such ludicrous, such useless, gestures. And for what? Money! +Money to spend as idiotically as it is garnered. The world is crazy, I +tell you, crazy, to toil as it does. How much cleverer are the apes who +won't talk, because, if they did, they would be forced to abandon their +lovely free life, put on ugly garments, and work for a living. These +animals, for which we have such contempt, are freer than men; they are +the Supermen of Nietzsche—Nietzsche whose brain mirrored both a +Prometheus and a Napoleon." Quell listened to this speech with +indifference. Arved continued:—</p> + +<p>"Nor was Nietzsche insane when he went to the asylum. His sanity was +blinding in its brilliancy; he voluntarily renounced the world of +foolish faces and had himself locked away where he would not hear its +foolish clacking. O Silence! gift of the gods, deified by Carlyle in +many volumes and praised by me in many silly words! My good fellow, +society, which is always hypocritical, has to build lunatic asylums in +self-defence. These polite jails keep the world in countenance; they +give it a standard. If <i>you</i> are behind the bars—"</p> + +<p>"Speak for yourself," growled Quell.</p> + +<p>"Then the world knows that you are crazy<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> and that <i>it</i> is not. There is +no other way of telling the difference. So a conspiracy of fools, +lawyers, and doctors is formed. If you do not live the life of the +stupid: cheat, lie, steal, smirk, eat, dance, and drink—then you are +crazy! That fact agreed upon, the hypocrites, who are quite mad, but +cunning enough to dissemble, lock behind bolted doors those free souls, +the poets, painters, musicians—artistic folk in general. They brand our +gifts with fancy scientific names, such as Megalomania, Paranoia, <i>Folie +des grandeurs</i>. Show me a genius and I'll show you a madman—according +to the world's notion."</p> + +<p>"There you go again," cried Quell, arising to his knees. "Genius, <i>I</i> +believe, is a disease of the nerves; and I don't mind telling you that I +consider poets and musicians quite crazy."</p> + +<p>Arved's eyes were blazing blue signals.</p> + +<p>"But, my dear Quell, are not all men mad at some time or another? Madly +in love, religiously mad, patriotically insane, and idiotic on the +subject of clothes, blood, social precedence, handsome persons, money? +And is it not a sign of insanity when one man claims sanity for his own +particular art? Painting, I admit, is—"</p> + +<p>"What the devil do you know about painting?" Quell roughly interposed; +"you are a poet and, pretending to love all creation,—altruism, I think +your sentimental philosophers call it,—have the conceit to believe you +bear a star in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> your stomach when it is only a craving for rum. I've +been through the game."</p> + +<p>He began to pace the sward, chewing a blade of grass. He spoke in +hurried, staccato phrases:—</p> + +<p>"Why was I put away? Listen: I tried to paint the sun,—for I hate your +moon and its misty madness. To put this glorious furnace on canvas is, +as you will acknowledge, the task of a god. It never came to me in my +dreams, so I wooed it by day. Above all, I wished to express truth; the +sun is black. Think of an ebon sun fringed with its dazzling +photosphere! I tried to paint sun-rhythms, the rhythms of the quivering +sky, which is never still even when it seems most immobile; I tried to +paint the rhythms of the atmosphere, shivering as it is with chords of +sunlight and chromatic scales as yet unpainted. Like Oswald Alving in +Ibsen's Ghosts, my last cry will be for 'the sun.' How did my friends +act? What did the critics say? A black sun was too much for the world, +though astronomers have proven my theory correct. The doctors swore I +drank too much absinthe; the critics said a species of optical madness +had set in; that I saw only the peripheral tints—I was yellow and blue +crazy. Perhaps I was, perhaps I am. So is the fellow crazy who invented +wireless telegraphy; so is the man off his base who invents a folding +bird cage. We are all crazy, and the craziest gang are our doctors at +the Hermitage." He jerked his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> thumb over his shoulder. Arved rolled his +handsome head acquiescingly.</p> + +<p>"You poets and musicians are trying to compass the inane. You are trying +to duplicate your dreams, dreams without a hint of the sun. The painter +at least copies or interprets real life; while the composer dips his +finger in the air, making endless sound-scrolls—noises with long tails +and whirligig decorations like foolish fireworks—though I think the art +of the future will be pyrotechnics. Mad, mad, I tell you! But whether +mad or not matters little in our land of freedom, where all men are born +unequal, where only the artists are sad. They are useless beings, openly +derided, and when one is caught napping, doing something that offends +church or State or society, he is imprisoned. Mad, you know! No wonder +anarchy is thriving, no wonder every true artist is an anarch, unavowed +perhaps, yet an anarch, and an atheist."</p> + +<p>"Not so fast!" interrupted Arved. "I'm an anarchist, but I don't believe +in blowing up innocent policemen. Neither do you, Quell. You wouldn't +hurt a bartender! Give an anarchist plenty to drink, and he sheds his +anarchy like a shirt. There are, I have noticed, three stages in the +career of a revolutionist: destruction, instruction, construction. He +begins the first at twenty, at forty he is teaching, at sixty he +believes in society—especially if he has money in the bank." Quell +regarded the speaker sourly.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span></p> + +<p>"You are a wonder, Arved. You fly off on a wild tangent stimulated by +the mere sound of a word. Who said anything about dynamite-anarchy? +There's another sort that men of brains—madmen if you will—believe and +indirectly teach. Emerson was one, though he hardly knew it. Thoreau +realized it for him, however. Don't you remember his stern rebuke when +Emerson visited him in Concord jail: 'Henry, why art thou here?' meekly +inquired the mystic man. 'Ralph, why art thou <i>not</i> here?' was the +counter-question. Thoreau had brave nerves. To live in peace in this +malicious swamp of a world we must all wear iron masks until we are +carted off to the <i>domino-park</i>; pious people call it the cemetery. Now, +I'm going to sleep. I'm tired of all this jabbering. We are crazy for +sure, or else we wouldn't talk so much."</p> + +<p>Arved grumbled, "Yes, I've noticed that when a man in an asylum begins +to suspect his keepers of madness he's mighty near lunacy himself."</p> + +<p>"You have crazy blue eyes, Arved! Where's that flask—I'm dry again! +Let's sleep."</p> + +<p>They drained the bottle and were soon dozing, while about them buzzed +the noon in all its torrid splendour.</p> + +<p>When they awoke it was solid night. They yawned and damned the darkness, +which smelt like stale india-rubber, so Quell said. They cursed life and +the bitter taste in their mouths.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> Quell spoke of his thirst in words +that startled the easy-going Arved, who confessed that if he could rid +himself of the wool in his throat, he would be comparatively happy. Then +they stumbled along, bumping into trees, feeling with outstretched arms, +but finding nothing to guide them save the few thin stars in the torn +foliage overhead. Without watches, they could catch no idea of the hour. +The night was far spent, declared Arved; he discovered that he was very +hungry. Suddenly, from the top of a steep, slippery bank they pitched +forward into the highroad.</p> + +<p>Arved put out his hand, searching for his comrade. "Quell, Quell!" he +whispered. Quell rose darkly beside him, a narrow lath of humanity. +Locking arms, both walked briskly until, turning a sharp, short corner, +they beheld, all smiling in the night, a summer garden, well lighted and +full of gay people, chattering, singing, eating, drinking—happy! The +two fugitives were stunned for a moment by such a joyful prospect. Tears +came slowly to their eyes, yet they never relaxed their gait. Arriving +at an outlying table and seats, they bethought themselves of their +appearance, of money, of other disquieting prospects; but, sitting down, +they boldly called a waiter.</p> + +<p>Luckily it was a country girl who timidly took their order for beer and +sandwiches. And they drank eagerly, gobbling the food as soon as it +came, ordering more so noisily that they at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span>tracted attention. The beer +made them brave. As they poured down glass after glass, reckless of the +reckoning, insolent to the servant, they began wrangling over the +subject that had possessed their waking hours.</p> + +<p>"Look here, Quell!" Arved exclaimed crustily, "you said I had crazy blue +eyes. What about your own red ones? Crazy! Why, they glow now like a +rat's. Poets may be music-mad, drunk with tone—"</p> + +<p>"And other things," sneered the painter.</p> + +<p>"—but at least their work is great when it endures; it does not fade +away on rotten canvas."</p> + +<p>"Now, I know you ought to be in the Brain-College, Arved, where your +friends could take the little green car that goes by the grounds and see +you on Sunday afternoons if weather permits."</p> + +<p>His accent seemed deliberately insulting to Arved, who, however, let it +pass because of their mutual plight. If they fell to fighting, detection +would ensue. So he answered in placatory phrases:—</p> + +<p>"Yes, my friend, we both belong to the same establishment, for we are +men of genius. As the cat said to Alice, 'We must be mad or else we +shouldn't be here.' I started to tell you why my people thought I had +better take the cure. I loved the moon too much and loathed sunlight. If +I had never tried to write lunar poetry—the tone quality of music +combined with the pictorial evocation of painting—I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> might be in the +bosom of my family now instead of—"</p> + +<p>"Drinking with a crazy painter, eh?" Quell was very angry. He shouted +for drinks so rapidly that he alarmed the more prudent Arved; and as +they were now the last guests, the head waiter approached and curtly +bade them leave. In an instant he was dripping with beer thrown at +him—glass and all—by the irate Quell. A whistle sounded, two other +waiters rushed out, and the battle began. Arved, aroused by the sight of +his friend on the ground with three men hammering his head, gave a roar +like the trumpeting of an elephant. A chair was smashed over a table, +and, swinging one-half of it, he made a formidable onslaught. Two of the +waiters were knocked senseless and the leader's nose and teeth crushed +in by the rude cudgel. The morose moon started up, a tragic hieroglyph +in the passionless sky. Quell, seeing its hated disk, howled, his face +aflame with exaltation. Then he leaped like a hoarsely panting animal +upon the poet; a moment and they were in the grass clawing each other. +And the moon foamed down upon them its magnetic beams until darkness, +caused by a coarse blanket, enveloped, pinioned, smothered them. When +the light shone again, they were sitting in a wagon, their legs tightly +bound....</p> + +<p>They began singing. The attendant interrupted:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span>—</p> + +<p>"Will you fellows keep quiet? How can a man drive straight, listening to +your cackle?"</p> + +<p>Arved touched his temple significantly and nudged Quell.</p> + +<p>"Another one of us. Another rebel of the moon!"</p> + +<p>"Shut up or I'll gag you both!" imperiously commanded the doctor, as the +wheels of the ambulance cut the pebbly road. They were entering the +asylum; now they passed the porter's lodge. In the jewelled light of a +senescent moon, his wife and little daughter gazed at them curiously, +without semblance of pity or fear. Then, as if shot from the same vocal +spring-board, the voices of poet and painter merged into crazy +rhythmatic chanting:—</p> + +<p>"Rebels of the moon, rebels of the moon! We are, we are, the rebels of +the moon!"</p> + +<p>And the great gates closed behind them with a brazen clangour—metal +gates of the moon-rebels.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span></p> +<h2>V</h2> + +<h3>THE SPIRAL ROAD</h3> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>There can be nothing good, as we know it, nor anything evil, as we +know it, in the eye of the Omnipresent and the +Omniscient.—<i>Oriental Proverb.</i></p></div> + + +<h4>I</h4> + +<h4>THE STRAND OF DREAMS</h4> + +<p>"I must see him if only for a minute. I can't go back to the city after +coming so far. Please—" but the girl's face disappeared and the rickety +door, which had been opened on a chain, was slammed after this +imperative speech, and Gerald Shannon found himself staring +exasperatedly at its rusty exterior. To have travelled on foot such a +distance only to be turned away like a beggar enraged him. Nor was the +prospect of returning over the path which had brought him to Karospina's +house a cheering one. He turned and saw that a low, creeping mist had +obliterated every vestige of the trail across the swamp lands. There was +no sun, and the twilight of a slow yellow day in late September would +soon, in complicity with the fog, leave him totally adrift on this +remote strand—he could hear the curving fall and hiss<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> of the breakers, +the monotonous rumour of the sea. So he was determined to face +Karospina, even if he had to force his way into the house.</p> + +<p>Two hours earlier, at the little railway station, they had informed him +that the road was easy flatland for the greater part of the way. He had +offered money for a horse or even a wheel; but these were luxuries on +this bleak, poverty-ridden coast. As there was no alternative, Gerald +had walked rapidly since three o'clock. And he had not been told the +truth about the road; where the oozing, green, unwholesome waters were +not he stepped, sometimes sinking over his ankles in the soft mud. Not a +sign of humanity served him for comfort or compass. He had been assured +that if he kept his back to the sun he would reach his destination. And +he did, but not without many misgivings. It was the vision of a squat +tower-like building, almost hemmed in by a monster gas reservoir, +fantastic wooden galleries, and the gigantic silhouettes of strange +machinery, that relieved his mind. But this house and its surroundings +soon repelled him. His reception was the final disenchantment.</p> + +<p>He played a lively tattoo with his blackthorn stick on the panels of the +door. For five minutes this continued, interspersed with occasional loud +calls for Karospina. At last the siege was raised. After preliminary +unboltings, unbarrings, and the rattling of the chain, Gerald saw before +him a middle-aged man with a smooth<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> face and closely shaven head, who +quietly asked his name and business.</p> + +<p>"I have a letter for you, Mr. Karospina—if you are that gentleman—and +as I have put myself to much trouble in getting to you, I think I +deserve a little consideration."</p> + +<p>"A letter, my worthy sir! And for me? Who told you to come here? How do +you know my name?" This angered the young man.</p> + +<p>"It is from Prince K. <i>The</i> Prince. Now are you satisfied?" he added, as +his questioner turned red and then paled as if the news were too +startling for his nerves.</p> + +<p>"Come in, come in!" he cried. "Mila, Mila, here is a guest. Fetch tea to +the laboratory." He literally dragged Shannon within doors and led him +across a stone corridor to a large room, but not before he had bolted +and barred the entrance to his mysterious fortress. Seeing the other's +look of quiet amusement, he laughed himself:—</p> + +<p>"Wolves, my dear sir, wolves, <i>human</i> wolves, prowl on the beach at +night, and while I have no treasures, it is well to be on the safe side. +Mila, Mila, the tea, the tea." There was a passionate intensity in his +utterance that attracted Gerald from his survey of the chamber. He saw +that in the light Karospina was a much older man than he had at first +supposed. But the broad shoulders, the thick chest, and short, powerful +figure and bullet head belied his years. Incredulously his visitor asked +himself if this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> were the wonderful, the celebrated Karospina, chemist, +revolutionary, mystic, nobleman, and millionnaire. A Russian, he knew +that—yet he looked more like the monk one sees depicted on the canvases +of the early Flemish painters. His high, wide brow and deep-set, dark +eyes proclaimed the thinker; and because of his physique, he might have +posed as a prize-fighter.</p> + +<p>He took the letter and read it as the door opened and the girl came in +with the tea. She wore her hair braided in two big plaits which hung +between her shoulders, and her bold, careless glance from eyes sea-blue +made the Irishman forget his host and the rigours of the afternoon. A +Russian beauty, with bare, plump arms, and dressed in peasant costume; +but—a patrician! Her fair skin and blond hair filled him with +admiration. What the devil!—he thought, and came near saying it aloud.</p> + +<p>"My niece, Princess Mila Georgovics, Mr. Shannon." Gerald acknowledged +the introduction with his deepest bow. He was dazzled. He had come to +this dreary place to talk politics. But now this was out of the +question. And he began explaining to the Princess; Mila he had fancied +was some slattern waiting on the old fanatic of a prince. He told Mila +this in a few words, and soon the pair laughed and chatted. In the +meantime Karospina, who had finished the letter, began to pace the +apartment. Apparently he had forgotten the others.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Tea, tea, where's the tea?" he presently shouted. As they drank, he +said: "The prince asks an impossibility, Mr. Shannon. Say to him, <i>no</i>, +simply no; he will understand, and so will you, I hope. I'm done with +all militant movements. I'm converted to the peace party. What's the use +of liberty to people who won't know what to do with it when they get it? +Tolstoy is right. Let the peasant be shown how to save his soul—that +and a little to eat and drink and a roof are all he needs in this life."</p> + +<p>Gerald was startled. He had expected to find an "advanced" leader of the +Bakounine type. Instead, a man of the "vegetarian" order,—as he had +heard them called,—who talked religion instead of dynamite;—and after +all the bother of bringing the letter down to this remote country! +Decidedly the princess was more enjoyable than a reformed anarchist. She +was gazing at him seriously now, her society manner gone. Her nose, +rather large for the harmony of her face, palpitated with eagerness. +Evidently, thought Gerald, the young lady is the real revolutionist in +this curious household. He also ventured to say so to her, but she did +not meet his smiling declaration. Her uncle, irritated by his +interrupted discourse, exclaimed:—</p> + +<p>"Never mind what the Princess Mila thinks, Mr. Shannon. Women change +their minds. The chief matter just now is that you cannot go away +to-night. You would lose your way, perhaps be drowned. Can you sleep on +a hard<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> bed?" He was assured by Gerald that, if he had been turned away, +he would have slept in an outhouse, even under one of those windmills he +saw in such number on the strand. Karospina smiled.</p> + +<p>"Hardly there—that is, if you expected to awaken." Then he left the +room, saying that some one must see to the supper. His niece burst into +laughter. Gerald joined in.</p> + +<p>"He's always like that, fussy, nervous, but with a heart of gold, +Mr.—Mr. Shannon. Thank you. It's an Irish name, is it not? And you look +like an Irishman; a soldier, too, I fancy!"</p> + +<p>Gerald blushed. "A soldier in the cause of humanity," he answered, "but +no longer a hireling in the uniform of kings." He felt so foolish after +this brave bit of rhetoric that he kept his eyes on the floor. In an +instant she was at his side.</p> + +<p>"Give me your hand—<i>comrade</i>!" she said, with a peculiar intonation. +"Oh! if you only knew how I longed to meet the right men. Uncle is a +convert—no, hardly a backslider; but he swears by the regenerating +process instead of violence. Formerly the cleverest living chemist, he +now—oh! I shame to say it—he now indulges in firework displays instead +of manufacturing bombs with which to execute tyrants." She slowly +dropped his hand and her eyes wore a clairvoyant expression. He was +astounded.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Fireworks! Doesn't the prince hold by his old faith—he, a pupil of +Bakounine, Netschajew, and Kropotkin?" Just then the prince came in, +bearing a tray. He seemed happy.</p> + +<p>"Here, sit down, dear sir, and partake of a few things. We live so far +from civilization that we seldom get a good chicken. But eggs I can +offer you, eggs and ham, cooked by me on an electric machine."</p> + +<p>"You have no servants?" Gerald ventured.</p> + +<p>"Not one. I can't trust them near my—toys. The princess plays Chopin +mazourkas after she makes the beds in the morning, and in the afternoon +she is my assistant in the laboratory." Again the young man looked about +him. If the room was a laboratory, where were the retorts, the oven, the +phials, the jars, the usual apparatus of a modern chemist? He saw +nothing, except an old-fashioned electric fan and a few dusty books. The +fireworks—were those overgrown wheels and gaunt windmills and gas-house +the secret of the prince's self-banishment to this dreary coast? What +dreams did he seek to incarnate on this strand, in this queer tower, +locked away from the world with a charming princess—a fairy princess +whose heart beat with love for the oppressed, in whose hand he might +some time see the blazing torch of freedom? He, himself, was enveloped +by the hypnotism of the place. Mila spoke:—</p> + +<p>"I fear I must leave you. I am studying to-night and—I go early to +rest. Pray dine as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> well as you can, with such a chef." She smiled +mischievously at her uncle, courtesied in peasant fashion to the +bewildered Gerald, who put out his hand, fain to touch hers, and +disappeared. The prince gazed inquiringly at the young man.</p> + +<p>"Revolutionists soon become friends, do they not? The Princess Mila is +part Russian, part Roumanian,—my sister married a Roumanian,—hence her +implacable political attitude. I can't lead her back to civilized +thinking. She sees war in the moon, sun, and stars. And I—I have +forsworn violence. Ah! if I could only make the prince change. +Bakounine's death had no effect; Netschajew's fate did not move him; nor +was Illowski's mad attempt to burn down Paris with his incendiary +symphony an example to our prince that those who take up the sword +perish by the sword. Ah, Tolstoy, dear Leon Nikolaievitch, you showed me +the true way to master the world by love and not by hate! Until I +read—but there, it's late. Come with me to your room. You may smoke and +sleep when you will. In the morning I will show you my—toys." They +shook hands formally and parted.</p> + +<p>His bed was hard, and his room cheerless, but anything, even a haymow, +rather than walking back to the station. After he went to his bed, he +rehearsed the day's doings from the three hours' ride in the train to +the tower. How weary he was! Hark—some one played the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> piano! A Chopin +mazourka! It was the princess. Mila! How lovely her touch!... Mila! What +a lovely name! A sleeping princess. A prince with such a sleepy head. +How the girl could play ... along the spiral road he saw the music glow +in enigmatic figures of fire....</p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<h4>THE PANACEA OF CORUSCATION</h4> + +<p>He seemed to be uttering her name when he awoke. It was daylight; the +sun poured its rays over his face, and he asked himself how he could +have fallen asleep leaving the lamp burning on the table near his bed. +He must have slept long, for he felt rested, cheerful—happy. As he +dressed he speculated whether it was the sunshine, or the prospect of +going back to life, or—or—Did he wish to return so soon? He wondered +what Mila was doing. Then he went into the stone corridor and coughed as +a hint that he was up. Not a sound but the persistent fall at a distance +of some heavy metallic substance. It must be Karospina in his workshop, +at his rockets, pinwheels, torpedoes, and firecrackers. What a singular +change in a bloodthirsty revolutionist. And how childish! Had he +squandered his millions on futile experimentings? What his object, what +his scheme, for the amelioration of mankind's woes? Gerald's stomach +warned him that coffee and rolls were<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> far dearer to him than the +downfall of tyranny's bastions, and impatiently he began whistling. The +rhythmic thud never ceased. He noticed an open door at the back of the +house, and he went out, his long legs carrying him about the yard, +toward the beach. The air was glorious, a soft breeze blowing landward +from the ocean. He almost forgot his hunger in the face of such a +spectacle. The breakers were racing in, and after crumbling, they +scudded, a film of green, crested by cottony white, across the hard sand +to the young man's feet. He felt exhilarated. And his hunger returned. +Then Mila's voice sounded near him. She carried a basket and fairly ran +in her eagerness.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Shannon, Mr. Shannon, good Prince Gerald—" he was amazed; where +could she have heard his Christian name?—"your breakfast. Wait—don't +swim the seas to New York for it. Here it is." She opened the basket and +handed him a jug of coffee and showed him the rolls inside. Without the +slightest embarrassment he thanked her and drank his coffee, walking; he +ate the bread, and felt, as he expressed it, like leading a forlorn +hope. They went on, the cutting sunshine and sparkling breeze alluring +them to vague distances. It was long after midday when they marched back +at a slower pace, Gerald swinging the basket like a light-hearted boy, +instead of the desperado he fancied himself.</p> + +<p>Entering the house, Mila hunted up some cold<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> meat, and with fresh tea +and stale bread they were contented. The formidable pyrotechnist did not +appear, and so the young people enjoyed the day in each other's company. +She conducted him like a river through the lands of sociology, +Dostoïewsky, and Chopin. She played, but made him sit in the hall, for +the piano was in her private room. And then they began to exchange +confidences. It was dusk before the prince returned, in the attire of a +workingman, his face and hands covered with soot and grease. A hard +day's labour, he said, and did not seem surprised to see Shannon.</p> + +<p>After supper he asked Gerald if he would smoke a pipe with him in his +laboratory. Mila must have bored him enough by this time! They lighted +their pipes; but Mila refused to be sent away. She sat down beside her +uncle and put her elbows on the table—white, strong arms she had, and +Gerald only took his eyes from their pleasing contemplation to lift them +to hers. He was fast losing what little prudence he had; he was a Celt, +and he felt that he had known Mila for a century.</p> + +<p>"Young man," said Prince Karospina, sharply, "you have the message I +gave you last night! Well—and you will say <i>no</i>, to my beloved friend +K., without knowing why. And you will think that you have been dealing +with a man whose hard head has turned to the mush of human kindness,—an +altruist. Ah! I know how you fellows despise the word. But what have +Kro<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span>potkin, Elisée Reclus, Jean Grave, or the rest accomplished? To +build up, not to tear down, should be the object of the scientific +anarch. Stop! You need not say the earth has to be levelled and ploughed +before sowing the seed. That suits turnip fields, not the garden of +humanity. Educate the downtrodden into liberty, is my message, not the +slaughtering of monarchs. How am I going to go about it? Ah! that's my +affair, my dear sir. After I read a certain book by Tolstoy, I realized +that art was as potent an agent for mischief as the knout. Music—music +is rooted in sex; it works miracles of evil—"</p> + +<p>"Now, uncle, I won't hear a word against Chopin," said Mila, looking +toward Gerald for approval.</p> + +<p>"Music, Mila, in the hands of evil men is an instrument dangerous to +religion, to civilization. What of Illowski and his crazy attack on +Paris and St. Petersburg? You remember, Shannon! Leave Wagner out of the +question—there is no fusion of the arts in his music drama—only bad +verse, foolish librettos, dealing with monsters and gods, and +indifferent scene-painting. Moreover, this new music is not understood +by the world. Even if the whole of mankind could be assembled on the +roof of the world and at a preconcerted signal made to howl the +Marseillaise, it would not be educated to the heights I imagine. Stage +plays—Shakespeare has no message for our days; Ibsen is an +anarchist<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span>—he believes in placing the torpedo under the social ark. +Painting—it is an affair for state galleries and the cabinets of +wealthy amateurs. Literature is a dead art—every one writes and reads +and no one understands. Religion! Ah! Yes, religion; the world will be a +blackened cinder or cometary gas before the love of God is stamped from +its heart. But religion and art must go hand in hand. Divorced, art has +fallen into the Slough of Despond; else has been transformed into an +acrid poison wherewith men's souls are destroyed as if by a virulent +absinthe. United with religion, art is purified. All art sprang from +religion. All great art, from a Greek statue to a Gothic cathedral, from +a Bach fugue to Michael Angelo, was religious. Therefore, if we are to +reach the hearts of the people, we must make art the handmaid of +religion." He stopped for breath. Gerald interposed:—</p> + +<p>"But, dear prince, you say 'art.' What art—painting, sculpture, +architecture, music, poetry, drama—?"</p> + +<p>"One art," harshly cried the now excited man, as he pounded the table +with his hard fist. "One art, <i>my</i> art, the fusion of all the arts. I, +Prince Igorovitch Karospina, tell you that I have discovered the secret +of the arts never dreamed of by Wagner and his futile, painted music on +a painted stage; I have gone, not to art, but to nature—colour, fire, +the elements. The eye is keener than the ear, vision is easier +compre<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span>hended than tone. Ah! I have you interested at last."</p> + +<p>He began walking as if to overtake a missing idea. His niece watched him +cynically.</p> + +<p>"I fear you are boring Mr. Shannon," she said in her most birdlike +accents. Her uncle turned on her.</p> + +<p>"I don't care if I am. Go to bed! I am nearing the climax of a lifetime, +and I feel that I must talk to a sympathetic ear. You are not bored, +dear friend. I have pondered this matter for more than thirty years. I +have studied all the arts—painting particularly; and with colour, with +colourful design I mean to teach mankind the great lessons of the +masters and of religion."</p> + +<p>"Ah, you will exhibit in large halls, panoramic pictures, I suppose," +interrupted Shannon.</p> + +<p>"Nothing of the sort," was the testy reply. "For thousands of years the +world has been gazing upon dead stones and canvases, reading dead words. +Dead—all, I tell you, all of these arts. And painting is only in two +dimensions—a poor copy of nature. The theatre has its possibilities, +but is too restricted in space. Music is alive. It moves; but its +message is not articulate to <i>all</i>. I want an art that will be +understood and admired at a glance by the world from pole to pole. I +want an art that will live and move and tell a noble tale. I want an art +that will appeal to the eye by its colouring and the soul by its +beautiful designs. Where is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span> that legend-laden art? Hitherto it has not +existed. I have found it. I have tracked it down until I am the master +who by a touch can liberate elemental forces, which will not destroy, +like those of Illowski's, but will elevate the soul and make mankind one +great nation, one loving brotherhood. Ah! to open once more those doors +of faith closed by the imperious dogmas of science—open them upon a +lovely land of mystery. Mankind must have mystery. And beyond each +mystery lies another. This will be our new religion."</p> + +<p>Gerald had caught the enthusiasm of this swelling prologue and rose, his +face alight with curiosity.</p> + +<p>"And that art is—is—?" he stammered.</p> + +<p>"That art is—pyrotechny." It was too much for the young man's nerves, +and he fell back in his chair, purple with suppressed laughter. Angrily +darting at him and catching his left shoulder in a vicelike grip, +Karospina growled:</p> + +<p>"You fool, how dare you mock something you know nothing of?" He shook +his guest roughly.</p> + +<p>"Uncle, uncle, be patient! Tell Mr. Shannon, and he, too, will become a +believer. I believe in you. I believe in him, Mr. Shannon. Don't sneer! +Tell him, uncle." Mila's words, almost imploring in their tone, calmed +the infuriated inventor, who left the room. He reëntered in a moment, +his head dripping, and he was grinning broadly.</p> + +<p>"Whenever I encounter a refractory pattern<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span> in my fireworks—as you call +them—I am compelled to throw a bucket of water over it to quench its +too ardent spirits. I have just done the same to my own head, dear Mr. +Shannon, and I ask your pardon for my rudeness. Get some fresh tea, +Mila, strong tea, Mila." Pipes were relighted and the conversation +resumed.</p> + +<p>"I forgot in my obsession, in what Jacob Boehme calls 'the shudder of +divine excitement,' that I was talking to one of the uninitiated. I +suppose you think by pyrotechny I mean the old-fashioned methods of set +pieces, ghastly portraits in fire, big, spouting wheels, rockets, war +scenes from contemporary history, seaside stuff, badly done—and flowery +squibs. My boy, all that, still admired by our country cousins, is the +very infancy of my art. In China, where nearly everything was invented +ages ago, in China I learned the first principles, also the +possibilities of the art of fireworks; yes, call it by its humble title. +In China I have seen surprising things at night. Pagodas blown across +the sky, an army of elephants in pursuit, and all bathed in the most +divine hues imaginable. But their art suffers from convention. They +accomplish miracles considering the medium they work in—largely +gunpowder. And their art has no meaning, no message, no moral principle, +no soul. Years ago I discovered all the aids necessary to the +pyrotechnist. I am not a chemist for nothing. If I can paint a fair +imitation of a Claude Monet on canvas, I can also<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> produce for you a +colourless gas which, when handled by a virtuoso, produces astonishing +illusions. In the open air, against the dark background of the horizon, +I can show you the luminous dots planewise of the Impressionists; or I +can give you the broad, sabrelike brushwork of Velasquez, or the +imperial tintings of Titian. I can paint pictures on the sky. I can +produce blazing symphonies. I will prove to you that colour is also +music. This sounds as if I were a victim to that lesion of the brain +called 'coloured-audition.' Perhaps! Not Helmholtz or Chevreul can tell +me anything new in the science of optics. I am the possessor of the +rainbow secrets—for somewhere in Iceland, a runic legend runs, there is +a region vast as night, where all the rainbows—worn out or to be +used—drift about in their vapoury limbo. I have the key to this land of +dreams. Over the earth I shall float my rainbows of art like a flock of +angels. With them I propose to dazzle the eyes of mankind, to arouse +sleeping souls. From the chords of the combined arts I shall extort +nobler cadences, nobler rhythms, for men to live by, for men to die +for!"</p> + +<p>Shannon was impressed. Through the smoke of his host's discourse he +discovered genuine fire. The philosopher took his hand and led him to +the window.</p> + +<p>"Stand there a moment!" he adjured. Mila joined him and after turning +the lamp to a pin-head of light, their shoulders touching—for the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span> +window was narrow—they peered into the night. They were on the side of +the water. Suddenly Gerald exclaimed:—</p> + +<p>"What's that light out at sea—far out? It looks like the moon!"</p> + +<p>"It is the sun," coolly replied his companion. They saw arise from the +waters a majestic, glowing sphere of light, apparently the size of the +sun. It flooded the country with its glare, and after sailing nearly in +front of the house it shrank into a scarlet cross not larger than a +man's hand. Then in a shower of sparks it ceased, its absence making the +blackness almost corporeal. Instinctively the hands of the two indulged +in a long pressure, and Mila quickly adjusted the lamp. But Gerald still +stood at the window a prey to astonishment, terror, stupefaction.</p> + +<p>Karospina entered. His face was slightly flushed and in his eyes there +burned the sombre fire of the fanatic. Triumphantly he regarded his +young friend.</p> + +<p>"That was only a little superfluous gas—nothing I cared to show you. +Read the newspapers to-morrow, and you will learn that a big meteor +burst off the north coast the night before, and fell into the sea." Then +he moved closer and whispered:—</p> + +<p>"The time is at hand. Within three weeks—not later than the middle of +October—I shall make my first public test. 'Thus saith the Lord God to +the mountains and to the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span> hills, to the rivers and to the valleys: +Behold, I, <i>even</i> I, will bring a sword upon you, and I will destroy +your high places.'"</p> + +<p>His voice rose in passion, his face worked in anger, and he shook his +clenched fists at an imaginary universe. So this man of peace was a +destroyer, after all! Gerald aroused him. Again he asked pardon. Mila +was nowhere to be seen, and with a sinking at the heart new to his +buoyant temperament, Gerald bade the magician good night. It was +arranged that he would leave the next day, for, like Milton, he was +haunted by "the ghost of a linen decency." But that night he did not +sleep, and no sound of music came to his ears from Mila's chamber. Once +he tried to open his window. It was nailed down.</p> + +<p>A gray day greeted his tired eyes. In an hour he was bidding his friends +good-by and thanking them for their hospitality. He had hoped that Mila +would accompany him a few steps on his long journey, but she made no +sign beyond a despairing look at her uncle, who was surly, as if he had +felt the reaction from too prolonged a debauch of the spirit. Gerald lit +his pipe, kissed the hand of Mila with emphasis, and parted from them. +He had not gone a hundred yards before he heard soft footsteps tracking +him. He turned and was disappointed to see that it was only Karospina, +who came up to him, breathing heavily, and in his catlike eyes the fixed +expression of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span> monomania. He stuttered, waving his arms aloft.</p> + +<p>"The time is at hand and the end of all things shall be accomplished. +You shall return for the great night. You shall hear of it in the world. +Tell K. that I said <i>no!</i> He must be with us at the transfiguration of +all things, when mankind shall go up the spiral road of perfection."</p> + +<p>Gerald Shannon fairly ran to escape knowing more about the universal +panacea. And when he turned for the last time the sea and tower and man +were blotted out by wavering mists of silver.</p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<h4>THE FIERY CHARIOT</h4> + +<p>The young man soon heard of Karospina's project. A week before the event +the newspapers began describing the experiments of the new Russian +wonder-worker, but treated the matter with calm journalistic +obliviousness to any but its most superficial aspects. A scientific +pyrotechnist was a novelty, particularly as the experimentings were to +be given with the aid of a newly discovered gas. Strange rumours of +human levitations, of flying machines seen after dark at unearthly +heights, were printed. This millionnaire, who had expended fortunes in +trying to accomplish what Maxim<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span> and Langley had failed in achieving, +was a good peg upon which to hang thrilling gossip. He promised to +convince the doubting ones that at last man would come into the empire +of the air, and by means of fireworks. In searching carefully all the +published reports Gerald was relieved not to encounter the name of Mila.</p> + +<p>That celebrated afternoon he found himself, after the distressingly +crowded cars, in company with many thousands, all clamouring and +jostling on the road to the tower. This time there were vehicles and +horses, though not in any degree commensurate with the crowd; but the +high tax imposed by the speculators gave him an opportunity of securing +a seat with a few others in a carriage drawn by four horses. Gingerly +they made their way down the narrow road—time was not gained, for the +packed mass of humans refused to separate. Fuming at the delay, he was +forced to console himself with smoking and listening to the stories told +of Karospina and his miracles. They were exaggerated. Karospina here, +Karospina there—the name of this modern magician was hummed everywhere +in the brisk October air. A little man who occupied the seat with +Shannon informed him that he knew some one who had worked for Karospina. +He declared that it was no uncommon sight for the conjurer—he was +usually called by that name—to float like a furled flag over his house +when the sun had set.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> Also he had been seen driving in the sky a span +of three fiery horses in a fiery chariot across the waters of the bay, +while sitting by his side was the star-crowned Woman of the Apocalypse +clothed with the sun and the moon under her feet. Gerald held his +counsel; but the grandeur of the spectacle he had witnessed still shook +his soul—if he had not been the victim of a hallucination! The journey +seemed endless.</p> + +<p>At last the strand came into view with the squat tower, the rusting +machinery, and the reservoir back of the house. There were, however, +changes in the scene. Within a quarter of a mile of the beach tents were +set and booths erected. Seemingly all the city had rushed to this place, +and the plain, with its swampy surfaces, was dotted by masses of noisy +men and women. Gerald, finding that approach to the house was impossible +from the land side, made a wide detour, and on reaching the shore he was +gratified to find it empty. The local constabulary, powerless to fight +off the mob near the house, had devoted their energies to clearing the +space about the gas retorts. After much bother, and only by telling his +name, did he pass the police cordon. Once inside, he rushed to the back +door and found, oh! great luck—Mila. Dressed in white, to his taste she +was angelic. He had great difficulty in keeping his arms pinioned to his +side; but his eyes shone with the truth beating at the bars of his +bosom, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> Mila knew it. He felt this and was light-headed in his +happiness.</p> + +<p>They greeted. Mila's face wore a serious expression.</p> + +<p>"I'm very glad you have come down. I think uncle will be glad also. I am +<i>happy</i> to see you again; I have missed you these past weeks. But my +happiness is nothing just now, Gerald! [He started.] My uncle, you must +speak with him. From brooding so much over the Holy Scriptures, and the +natural excitement of his discoveries—they are so extraordinary, dear +friend, that he means always to keep them to himself, for he rightly +believes that the governments of the world would employ them for wicked +purposes, war, the destruction of weaker nations—he has become +overwrought. You may not know it, he has a very strong, sane head on his +shoulders; but this scheme for lifting up the masses, I suspect, may +upset his own equilibrium. And his constant study of the Apocalypse and +the Hebraic revelations—it has filled him with strange notions. +Understand me: a man who can swim in the air like a fish in the sea is +apt to become unstrung. He has begun to identify himself with the +prophets. He insists on showing biblical pictures,—worse still, +appearing in them himself."</p> + +<p>"How 'appearing in them'?" asked Gerald, wonderingly.</p> + +<p>"In actual person. I, too, have promised to go with him."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span></p> + +<p>"In a transparency of fire, you mean? Isn't it dangerous?" She hung her +head.</p> + +<p>"No, in mid air, in a fiery chariot," she murmured.</p> + +<p>"The Woman of the Apocalypse!" he cried. "Oh! Princess Mila, dearest +Mila Georgovics, promise me that you will not risk such a crazy +experiment." Gerald pressed his fingers to his throbbing temples.</p> + +<p>"It is no experiment at all," she said, in almost inaudible tones; +<i>"last night we flew over the house."</i> He stared at her, his hands +trembling, and no longer able to play the incredulous.</p> + +<p>"But, dear friend, I fear one other thing; the gas which uncle has +discovered is so tenuous that it is a million times lighter than air; +but it is ever at a terrible tension—I mean it is dangerous if not +carefully treated. Last summer, one afternoon, a valve broke and a large +quantity escaped from the reservoir, luckily on the ocean side. It +caused a storm and water-spouts, and destroyed a few vessels. The +coruscating gas creates a vacuum into which the air rushes with +incredible velocity. So promise me that while we are flying you will +stay with the police at the gas machines and keep off the crowd. +Promise!"</p> + +<p>"But I shan't permit you to go up with this renegade to the +revolutionary cause—" he began impetuously. She put warning fingers to +her lips. In the white flowing robes of an antique priest, Karospina +came out to them and took<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span> Gerald by the hand. He was abstracted and +haggard, and his eyes glared about him. He chanted in a monotone:—</p> + +<p>"The time is at hand. Soon you will see the Angels of the Seals. I shall +show the multitude Death on the Pale Horse and the vision of Ezekiel. +And you shall behold the star called Wormwood, the great star of the +third angel, which shall fall like a burning lamp upon the waters and +turn them bitter. And at the last you will see the chariot of Elijah +caught up to heaven in a fiery whirlwind. In it will be seated the +Princess Mila—we, the conquerors of the wicked world."</p> + +<p>"Yes, but only as an image, an illusion," ejaculated the unhappy lover, +"not in reality."</p> + +<p>"As she is," imperiously answered Karospina, and seizing Mila by the +arm, said, "Come!" She threw a kiss to Gerald and in her eyes were +tears. He saw them and could have wept himself. He followed the +sacrificial pair as far as the reservoir, muttering warnings in which +were mixed the fates of Phaethon and Simon Magus—that heretic who +mimicked the miracles of the apostles.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>It was now dark; the order to extinguish all lights on the moor had been +obeyed. Only a panting sound as if from a wilderness of frightened +animals betrayed the presence of thousands. As long as the sun shone +there had been a babel of sound; at the disappearance of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span> our parent +planet, a hushed awe had fallen with the night. Gone the rude joking and +wrangling, the crying of children, and the shrill laughter of the women. +A bitter breeze swept across from the waters, and the stars were mere +twinkling points.</p> + +<p>Then from the vault of heaven darted a ribbon of emerald fire. It became +a luminous spiral when it touched the sea of glass, which was like unto +a floor of crystal. This was the sign of Karospina's undertaking, his +symbol of the road to moral perfection. Gerald recalled Whistler's +pyrotechnical extravaganzas. Following this came a pale moon which +emerged from the north; a second, a third, a fourth, started up from the +points of the compass, and after wabbling in the wind like gigantic +balloons, merged overhead in an indescribable disk which assumed the +features of Michael Angelo's Moses. Here is a new technique, indeed, +thought Gerald; yet he could not detect its moral values.</p> + +<p>A golden landscape was projected on land and sea. A central aisle of +waters, paved by the golden rays of a lyric sun high overhead, was +embellished on either side by the marmoreal splendours of stately +palaces. An ilex inclined its graceful head to its liquid image; men +moved the blocks that made famous in the mouth of the world Queen Dido's +Carthage. Clouds of pearl-coloured smoke encircled the enchanting +picture. And the galleys came and went in this symphonic, glittering +spectacle.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Turner would have died of envy," said Gerald aloud. There was a +remarkable vibration of life, not as he had seen it in mechanical +bioscopes, but the vivid life of earth and sunshine.</p> + +<p>The scenes that succeeded were many: episodes from profane and sacred +histories; simulacra of the great saints. A war between giants and +pygmies was shown with all its accompanying horrors. The firmament +dripped crimson. The four cryptic creatures of Ezekiel's vision came out +of the north, a great cloud of "infolding fire" and the colour was +amber. A cyclopean and dazzling staircase thronged by moving angelic +shapes, harping mute harps, stretched from sea to sky, melting into the +milky way like the tail of a starry serpent. Followed the opening of the +dread prophetic seals; but, after an angel had descended from heaven, +his face as the sun and at his feet pillars of fire, the people, +prostrate like stalks of corn beaten by a tempest, worshipped in fear. +These things were supernatural. The heavens were displaying the glory of +God.</p> + +<p>Not knowing whether the signs in the skies might be construed as +blasphemous, and lost in fathomless admiration for the marvellous power +of the wizard, Gerald sought to get closer to Karospina and Mila. But +wedged in by uniformed men, and the darkness thick as an Egyptian +plague, he despairingly awaited the apotheosis. His eyes were sated by +the mira<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span>cles of harmonies—noiseless harmonies. It <i>was</i> a new art, and +one for the peoples of the earth. Never had the hues of the universe +been so assembled, grouped, and modulated. And the human eye, adapting +itself to the new synthesis of arabesque and rhythm, evoked order and +symbolism from these novel chords of colour. There were solemn mountains +of opalescent fire which burst and faded into flaming colonnades, and in +an enchanting turquoise effervescence became starry spears and scimiters +and sparkling shields, and finally the whole mass would reunite and +evaporate into brilliant violet auroras or seven-tailed, +vermilion-coloured comets. There were gleaming rainbows of unknown +tints—strange scales of chromatic pigments; "a fiery snow without +wind;" and once a sun, twice the size of our own, fell into the ocean; +and Gerald could have sworn that he felt a wave of heated air as if from +a furnace; that he heard a seething sound, as if white-hot metal had +come in contact with icy water. Consumed by anxiety for Mila's safety, +he wished that these soundless girandoles, this apocalypse of +architectural fire and weaving flame, would end.</p> + +<p>He had not long to wait. A shrewd hissing apprised him that something +unusual was about to occur. Like the flight of a great rocket a black +object quickly mounted to the zenith. It did not become visible for +several seconds; Gerald's nerves crisped with apprehension. The +apparition was an incandescent chariot;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span> in it sat Karospina, and beside +him—oh! the agony of her lover—Mila Georgovics. As the fiery horses +swooped down, he could see her face in a radiant nimbus of meteors, +which encircled the equipage. Karospina proudly directed its course over +the azure route, and once he passed Gerald at a dangerously low curve +earthward, shouting:—</p> + +<p>"The Spiral! The Spiral!"</p> + +<p>It was his last utterance; possibly through some flaw in the mechanism, +the chariot zig-zagged and then drove straight upon the reservoir. To +the reverberation of smashed steel and blinding fulguration the big +sphere was split open and Mila with Karospina vanished in the nocturnal +gulf.</p> + +<p>Gerald, stunned by the catastrophe, threw himself down, expecting a +mighty explosion; the ebon darkness was appalling after the +scintillating rain of fire. But the liberated gas in the guise of an +elongated cloud had rushed seaward, and there gathering density and +strength, assumed the shape of a terrific funnel, an inky spiral, its +gyrating sides streaked with intermittent flashes. Its volcanic roaring +and rapid return to land was a signal for vain flight—the miserable +lover knew it to be the flamboyant ether of the pyromaniac transformed +into a trumpeting tornado. And he hoped that it would not spare him, as +this phantasm twirled and ululated in the heavens, a grim portent of the +iron wrath of the Almighty. In a twinkling it had passed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> him, high in +the dome of heaven, only to erase in a fabulous blast the moaning +multitude. And prone upon the strand between the stormy waters and the +field of muddy dead, Gerald Shannon prayed for a second cataclysm which +might bring oblivion to him alone.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span></p> +<h2>VI</h2> + +<h3>A MOCK SUN</h3> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>Where are the sins of yester-year?</p></div> + + +<h4>I</h4> + + +<p>The grating of the carriage wheels awoke her from the dream which had +lightly brushed away the night and the vision of the Arc de +Triomphe—looming into the mystery of sky and stars, its monumental +flanks sprawling across the Place de l'Étoile. She heard her name called +by Mrs. Sheldam as their coachman guided his horses through the gateway +of the Princesse de Lancovani's palace.</p> + +<p>"Now, Ermentrude! Wake up, dear; we are there," said Mrs. Sheldam, in +her kind, drawling tones. Mr. Sheldam sighed and threw away the +unlighted cigar he had bitten during the ride along the Champs Élysées. +Whatever the evening meant for his wife and niece, he saw little +entertainment in store for himself; he did not speak French very well, +he disliked music and "tall talk"; all together he wished himself at the +Grand Hôtel, where he would be sure to meet some jolly Americans. Their +carriage had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span> halted in front of a spacious marble stairway, lined on +either side with palms, and though it was a June night, the glass doors +were closed.</p> + +<p>Ermentrude's heart was in her throat, not because of the splendour, to +which she was accustomed; but it was to be her first meeting with a +noble dame, whose name was historic, at whose feet the poets of the +Second Empire had prostrated themselves, passionately plucking their +lyres; the friend of Liszt, Wagner, Berlioz, of Manet, Degas, Monet; the +new school—this wonderful old woman knew them all, from Goncourt and +Flaubert to Daudet and Maupassant. Had she not, Ermentrude remembered as +she divested herself of her cloak, sent a famous romancer out of the +house because he spoke slightingly of the Pope? Had she not cut the +emperor dead when she saw him with a lady not his empress? What a night +this would be in the American girl's orderly existence! And <i>he</i> was to +be there, he had promised the princess.</p> + +<p>Her heart was overflowing when she was graciously received by the great +lady who stood in the centre of a group at the back of the +drawing-room—a lofty apartment in white and gold, the panels painted by +Baudry, the furniture purest Empire. She noted the height and majestic +bearing of this cousin of kings, noted the aquiline nose drooped over a +contracted mouth—which could assume most winning curves, withal shaded +by suspicious down, that echoed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> in hue her inky eyebrows. The eyes of +the princess were small and green and her glance penetrating. Her white +hair rolled imperially from a high, narrow forehead.</p> + +<p>Ermentrude bore herself with the utmost composure. She adored the Old +World, adored genius, but after all she was an Adams of New Hampshire, +her sister the wife of a former ambassador. It was more curiosity than +<i>gaucherie</i> that prompted her to hold the hand offered her and +scrutinize the features as if to evoke from the significant, etched +wrinkles the tremendous past of this hostess. The princess was pleased.</p> + +<p>"Ah, Miss Adams," she said, in idiomatic English, "you have candid eyes. +You make me feel like telling stories when you gaze at me so +appealingly. Don't be shocked"—the girl had coloured—"perhaps I shall, +after a while."</p> + +<p>Mr. Sheldam had slipped into a corner behind a very broad table and +under the shaded lamps examined some engravings. Mrs. Sheldam talked in +hesitating French to the Marquis de Potachre, an old fellow of venerable +and burlesque appearance. His fierce little white mustaches were curled +ceilingward, but his voice was as timid as honey. He flourished his +wizened hand toward Miss Adams.</p> + +<p>"Charming! Delightful! She has something English in her <i>insouciant</i> +pose, and is wholly American in her cerebral quality. And<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> what +colouring, what gorgeous brown hair! What a race, madame, is yours!"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Sheldam began to explain that the Adams stock was famous, but the +marquis did not heed her. He peered at her niece through a gold-rimmed +monocle. The princess had left the group near the table and with two +young men slowly moved down the salon. Miss Adams was immediately +surrounded by some antiquated gentlemen wearing orders, who paid her +compliments in the manner of the eighteenth century. She answered them +with composure, for she was sure of her French, sure of herself—the +princess had not annihilated her. Her aunt, accompanied by the marquis, +crossed to her, and the old nobleman amused her with his saturnine +remarks.</p> + +<p>"Time was," he said, "when one met here the cream of Parisian wit and +fashion: the great Flaubert, a noisy fellow at times, I vow; Dumas +<i>fils</i>; Cabanel, Gérôme, Duran; ever-winning Carolus—ah, what men! Now +we get Polish pianists, crazy Belgians, anarchistic poets, and +Neo-impressionists. I have warned the princess again and again."</p> + +<p>"<i>Bécasse!</i>" interrupted the lady herself. "Monsieur Rajewski has +consented to play a Chopin nocturne. And here are my two painters, Miss +Adams—Messieurs Bla and Maugre. They hate each other like the Jesuits +and Jansenists of the good old days of Pascal."</p> + +<p>"She likes to display her learning," grumbled<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> the marquis to Mrs. +Sheldam. "That younger man, Bla, swears by divided tones; his neighbour, +Maugre, paints in dots. One is always to be recognized a half-mile away +by his vibrating waterscapes—he calls them Symphonies of the Wet; the +other goes in for turkeys in the grass, fowls that are cobalt-blue +daubs, with grass a scarlet. It's awful on the optic nerves. +<i>Pointillisme</i>, Maugre names his stuff. Now, give me Corot—"</p> + +<p>"Hush, hush!" came in energetic sibilants from the princess, who rapped +with her Japanese walking-stick for silence. Mr. Sheldam woke up and +fumbled the pictures as Rajewski, slowly bending his gold-dust aureole +until it almost grazed the keyboard, began with deliberate accents a +nocturne. Miss Adams knew his playing well, but its poetry was not for +her this evening; rather did the veiled tones of the instrument form a +misty background to the human tableau. So must Chopin have woven his +magic last century, and in a salon like this—the wax candles burning +with majestic steadiness in the sculptured sconces; the huge fireplace, +monumental in design, with its dull brass garnishing; the subdued +richness of the decoration into which fitted, as figures in a frame, the +various guests. Even the waxed floor seemed to take on new +reverberations as the pianoforte sounded the sweet despair of the Pole. +To her dismay Ermentrude caught herself drifting away from the moment's +hazy charm to thoughts of her poet. It annoyed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span> her, she sharply +reminded herself, that she could not absolutely saturate herself with +the music and the manifold souvenirs of the old hôtel; perhaps this may +have been the spell of Rajewski's playing....</p> + +<p>The music ceased. A dry voice whispered in her ear:—</p> + +<p>"Great artist, that chap Rajewski. Had to leave Russia once because he +wouldn't play the Russian national hymn for the Czar. Bless me, but he +was almost sent to Siberia—and in irons too. Told me here in this very +room that he was much frightened. They lighted fires in Poland to honour +his patriotism. He acknowledged that <i>he</i> would have played twenty +national hymns, but he couldn't remember the Russian one, or never knew +it—anyhow, he was christened a patriot, and all by a slip of the +memory. Now, that's luck, isn't it?"</p> + +<p>She began to dislike this cynical old man with his depreciating tales of +genius. She knew that her idols often tottered on clay feet, but she +hated to be reminded of that disagreeable reality. She went to Monsieur +Rajewski and thanked him prettily in her cool new voice, and again the +princess nodded approval.</p> + +<p>"She is <i>chic</i>, your little girl," she confided in her deep tones to +Mrs. Sheldam, whose tired New England face almost beamed at the +compliment.</p> + +<p>"We were in Hamburg at the Zoölogical Garden; I always go to see +animals," declaimed the princess, in the midst of a thick<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span> silence. "For +you know, my friends, one studies humanity there in the raw. Well, I +dragged our party to the large monkey cage, and we enjoyed +ourselves—immensely! And what do you think we saw! A genuine novelty. +Some mischievous sailor had given an overgrown ape a mirror, and the +poor wretch spent its time staring at its image, neglecting its food and +snarling at its companions. The beast would catch the reflection of +another ape in the glass and quickly bound to a more remote perch. The +keeper told me that for a week his charge had barely eaten. It slept +with the mirror held tightly in its paws. Now, what did the mirror mean +to the animal! I believe"—here she became very vivacious—"I really +believe that it was developing self-consciousness, and in time it would +become human. On our way back from Heligoland, where we were entertained +on the emperor's yacht at the naval manœuvres, we paid another visit to +our monkey house. The poor, misguided brute had died of starvation. It +had become so vain, so egotistical, so superior, that it refused food +and wasted away in a corner, gazing at itself, a hairy Narcissus, or +rather the perfect type of your modern Superman, who contemplates his +ego until his brain sickens and he dies quite mad."</p> + +<p>Every one laughed. Mrs. Sheldam wondered what a Superman was, and +Ermentrude felt annoyed. Zarathustra was another of her gods, and this +brusquely related anecdote did not seem<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span> to her very spirituelle. But +she had not formulated an answer when she heard a name announced, a name +that set her heart beating. At last! The poet had kept his word. She was +to meet in the flesh the man whose too few books were her bibles of art, +of philosophy, of all that stood for aspiration toward a lovely ideal in +a dull, matter-of-fact world.</p> + +<p>"Now," said the princess, as if smiling at some hidden joke, "now you +will meet <i>my</i> Superman." And she led the young American girl to Octave +Kéroulan and his wife, and, after greeting them in her masculine manner, +she burst forth:—</p> + +<p>"Dear poet! here is one of your adorers from overseas. Guard your +husband well, Madame Lys."</p> + +<p>So he was married. Well, that was not such a shocking fact. Nor was +Madame Kéroulan either—a very tall, slim, English-looking blonde, who +dressed modishly and evidently knew that she was the wife of a famous +man. Ermentrude found her insipid; she had studied her face first before +comparing the mental photograph of the poet with the original. Nor did +she feel, with unconscious sex rivalry, any sense of inferiority to the +wife of her admired one. He was nearly forty, but he looked older; gray +hairs tinged his finely modelled head. His face was shaven, and with the +bulging brow and full jaw he was more of the German or Belgian than +French. Black hair thrown off his broad forehead ac<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span>cented this +resemblance; a composer rather than a prose-poet and dramatist, was the +rapid verdict of Ermentrude. She was not disappointed, though she had +expected a more fragile type. The weaver of moonshine, of mystic +phrases, of sweet gestures and veiled sonorities should not have worn +the guise of one who ate three meals a day and slept soundly after his +mellow incantations. Yet she was not—inheriting, as she did, a modicum +of sense from her father—disappointed.</p> + +<p>The conversation did not move more briskly with the entrance of the +Kéroulans. The marquis sullenly gossiped with Mr. Sheldam; the princess +withdrew herself to the far end of the room with her two painters. +Rajewski was going to a <i>soirée</i>, he informed them, where he would play +before a new picture by Carrière, as it was slowly undraped; no one less +in rank than a duchess would be present! A little stiffly, Ermentrude +Adams assured the Kéroulans of her pleasure in meeting them. The poet +took it as a matter of course, simply, without a suspicion of posed +grandeur. Ermentrude saw this with satisfaction. If he had clay +feet,—and he must have them; all men do,—at least he wore his genius +with a sense of its responsibility. She held tightly her hands and +leaned back, awaiting the precious moment when the oracle would speak, +when this modern magician of art would display his cunning. But he was +fatuously commonplace in his remarks.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I have often told Madame Kéroulan that my successes in Europe do not +appeal to me as those in far-away America. Dear America—how it must +enjoy a breath of real literature!"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Sheldam sat up primly, and Ermentrude was vastly amused. With a +flash of fun she replied:—</p> + +<p>"Yes, America does, Monsieur Kéroulan. We have so many Europeans over +there now that our standard has fallen off from the days of Emerson and +Whitman. And didn't America give Europe Poe?" She knew that this boast +had the ring of the amateur, but it pleased her to see how it startled +him.</p> + +<p>"America is the Great Bribe," he pursued. "You have no artists in New +York."</p> + +<p>"Nor have we New Yorkers," the girl retorted. "The original writing +natives live in Europe."</p> + +<p>He looked puzzled, but did not stop. "You have depressed literature to +the point of publication," he solemnly asserted. This was too much and +she laughed in mockery. Husband and wife joined her, while Mrs. Sheldam +trembled at the audacity of her niece—whose irony was as much lost on +her as it was on the poet.</p> + +<p>"But <i>you</i> publish plays and books, do you not?" Ermentrude naïvely +asked.</p> + +<p>Madame Kéroulan interposed in icy tones:—</p> + +<p>"Mademoiselle Adams misunderstands. Monsieur Kéroulan is the Grand +Disdainer. Like his bosom friend, Monsieur Mallarmé, he cares little for +the Philistine public—"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span></p> + +<p>He interrupted her: "Lys, dear friend, you must not bore Miss Adams with +my theories of art and life. <i>She</i> has read me—"</p> + +<p>Ermentrude gave him a grateful glance. He seemed, despite his +self-consciousness, a great man—how great she could not exactly define. +His eyes—two black diamonds full of golden reflections, the eyes of a +conqueror, a seer—began to burn little bright spots into her +consciousness, and, selfishly, she admitted, she wished the two women +would go away and leave her to interrogate her idol in peace. There were +so many things to ask him, so many difficult passages in The Golden +Glaze and Hesitations, above all in that great dramatic poem, The +Voices, which she had witnessed in Paris, with its mystic atmosphere of +pity and terror. She would never forget her complex feelings, when at a +Paris theatre, she saw slowly file before her in a Dream-Masque the +wraith-like figures of the poet, their voices their only corporeal gift. +Picture had dissolved into picture, and in the vapours of these crooning +enchantments she heard voices of various timbres enunciating in +monosyllables the wisdom of the ages, the poetry of the future. This +play was, for her, and for Paris, too, the last word in dramatic art, +the supreme <i>nuance</i> of beauty. Everything had been accomplished: +Shakespeare, Molière, Ibsen; yet here was a new evocation, a fresh peep +at untrodden paths. In bliss that almost dissolved her being, the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span> +emotional American girl reached her hotel, where she tried to sleep. +When her aunt told her of the invitation tendered by the princess, a +rare one socially, she was in the ninth heaven of the Swedenborgians. +Any place to meet Octave Kéroulan!</p> + +<p>And now he sat near her signalling, she knew, her sympathies, and as the +fates would have it two dragons, her aunt and his wife, guarded the +gateway to the precious garden of his imagination. She could have cried +aloud her chagrin. Such an inestimable treasure was genius that to see +it under lock and key invited indignation. The time was running on, and +her great man had said nothing. He could, if he wished, give her a +million extraordinary glimpses of the earth and the air and the waters +below them, for his eyes were mirrors of his marvellous and +many-coloured soul; but what chance had he with a conjugal iceberg on +one side, a cloud of smoke—poor Aunt Sheldam—on the other! She felt in +her fine, rhapsodic way like a young priestess before the altar, ready +to touch with a live coal the lips of the gods, but withheld by a +malignant power. For the first time in her life Ermentrude Adams, +delicately nurtured in a social hothouse, realized in wrath the major +tyranny of caste.</p> + +<p>The evening wore away. Mrs. Sheldam aroused her husband as she cast a +horrified glance at the classic prints he had been studying. The +princess dismissed her two impres<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span>sionists and came over to the poet. +She, too plainly, did not care for his wife, and as the party broke up +there was a sense of relief, though Ermentrude could not conceal her +dissatisfaction. Her joy was sincere when Madame Kéroulan asked Miss +Adams and her aunt to call. It was slightly gelid, the invitation, +though accepted immediately by Ermentrude. The <i>convenances</i> could look +out for themselves; she would not go back to America without an +interview. The princess raised her hand mockingly.</p> + +<p>"What, I go to one of your conferences! Not I, <i>cher poète</i>. Keep your +mysteries for your youthful disciples." She looked at Ermentrude, who +did not lower her eyes—she was triumphant now. Perhaps <i>he</i> might say +something before they parted. He did not, but the princess did.</p> + +<p>"Beware, young America, of my Superman! You remember the story of the +ape with the mirror!"</p> + +<p>Ermentrude flushed with mortification. This princess was decidedly rude +at times. But she kept her temper and thanked the lady for a unique +evening. Her exquisite youth and grace pleased the terrible old woman, +who then varied her warning.</p> + +<p>"Beware," she called out in comical accents as they slowly descended the +naked marble staircase, "of the Sleeping Princess!"</p> + +<p>The American girl looked over her shoulder.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I don't think your Superman has a mirror at all."</p> + +<p>"Yes, but his princess holds one for him!" was the jesting reply.</p> + +<p>The carriage door slammed. They rolled homeward, and Ermentrude suffered +from a desperate sense of the unachieved. The princess had been +impertinent, the Kéroulans rather banal. Mrs. Sheldam watched her +charge's face in the intermittent lights of the Rue de Rivoli.</p> + +<p>"I think your poet a bore," she essayed. Then she shook her +husband—they had reached their hôtel.</p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<p>It was the garden of a poet, she declared, as, with the Kéroulans and +her aunt, Ermentrude sat and slowly fanned herself, watching the Bois de +Boulogne, which foamed like a cascade of green opposite this pretty +little house in Neuilly. The day was warm and the drive, despite the +shaded, watered avenues, a dusty, fatiguing one. Mrs. Sheldam had, +doubtfully, it is true, suggested the bourgeois comfort of the +Métropolitain, but she was frowned on by her enthusiastic niece. What! +ride underground in such weather? So they arrived at the poet's not in +the best of humour, for Mrs. Sheldam had quietly chidden her charge on +the score of her "flightiness." These foreign celebrities were well +enough in their way, but—!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> And now Ermentrude, instead of looking +Octave Kéroulan in the face, preferred the vista of the pale blue sky, +awash with a scattered, fleecy white cloud, the rolling edges of which +echoed the dazzling sunshine. The garden was not large, its few trees +were of ample girth, and their shadows most satisfying to eyes weary of +the city's bright, hard surfaces. There were no sentimental plaster +casts to disturb the soft harmonies of this walled-in retreat, and if +Ermentrude preferred to regard with obstinacy unusual in her mobile +temperament the picture of Paris below them, it was because she felt +that Kéroulan was literally staring at her.</p> + +<p>A few moments after their arrival and with the advent of tea, he had +accomplished what she had fervently wished for the night she had met +him—he succeeded, by several easy moves, in isolating her from her +aunt, and, notwithstanding her admiration, her desire to tap with her +knuckles the metal of her idol and listen for a ring of hollowness, she +was alarmed. Yet, perversely, she knew that he would not exhibit his +paces before his wife—naturally a disinterested spectator—or before +her aunt, who was hardly "intimate" enough. The long-desired hour found +her disquieted. She did not have many moments to analyze these mixed +emotions, for he spoke, and his voice was agreeably modulated.</p> + +<p>"You, indeed, honour the poor poet's abode with your youth and your +responsive soul, Miss<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> Adams. I thank you, though my gratitude will seem +as poor as my hospitality." She looked at him now, a little fluttered. +"You bring to me across seas the homage of a fresh nation, a fresh +nature." She beat a mental retreat at these calm, confident phrases; +what could he know of her homage? "And if Amiel has said, 'Un paysage +est un état de l'âme,' I may amend it by calling <i>my</i> soul a state of +landscape, since it has been visited by your image." This was more +reassuring, if exuberant.</p> + +<p>"Man is mere inert matter when born, but his soul is his own work. +Hence, I assert: the Creator of man is—man." <i>Now</i> she felt at ease. +This wisdom, hewn from the vast quarry of his genius, she had +encountered before in his Golden Glaze, that book which had built +temples of worship in America wherein men and women sought and found the +pabulum for living beautifully. He was "talking" his book. Why not? It +was certainly delightful plagiarism!</p> + +<p>"You know, dear young lady," he continued, and his eyes, with their +contracting and expanding disks, held her attention like a clear flame, +"do you know that my plays, my books, are but the drama of my conscience +exteriorized? Out of the reservoirs of my soul I draw my inspiration. I +have an æsthetic horror of evidence; like Renan, I loathe the deadly +heresy of affirmation; I have the certitude of doubt, for are we poets +not the lovers of the truth decorated?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span> When I built my lordly palace of +art, it was not with the ugly durability of marble. No; like the +Mohammedan who constructed his mosque and mingled with the cement +sweet-smelling musk, so I dreamed my mosque into existence with music +wedded to philosophy. Music and philosophy are the twin edges of my +sword. Ah! you smile and ask, Where is Woman in this sanctuary? She is +not barred, I assure you. My music—is Woman. Beauty is a promise of +happiness, Stendhal says. I go further: Life—the woman one has; +Art—the woman one loves!"</p> + +<p>She was startled. Her aunt and Madame Kéroulan had retired to the end of +the garden, and only a big bee, brumming overhead, was near. He had +arisen with the pontifical air of a man who has a weighty gospel to +expound. He encircled with his potent personality the imagination of his +listener; the hypnotic quality of his written word was carried leagues +farther in effect by his trained, soothing voice. Flattered, no longer +frightened, her nerves deliciously assaulted by this coloured rhetoric, +Ermentrude yielded her intellectual assent. She did not comprehend. She +felt only the rhythms of his speech, as sound swallowed sense. He held +her captive with a pause, and his eloquent eyes—they were of an +extraordinary lustre—completed the subjugation of her will.</p> + +<p>"Only kissed hands are white," he murmured,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> and suddenly she felt a +velvety kiss on her left hand. Ermentrude did not pretend to follow the +words of her aunt and Madame Kéroulan as they stopped before a bed of +June roses. Nor did she remember how she reached the pair. The one vivid +reality of her life was the cruel act of her idol. She was not conscious +of blushing, nor did she feel that she had grown pale. His wife treated +her with impartial indifference, at times a smile crossing her face, +with its implication—to Ermentrude—of selfish reserves. But this +hateful smile cut her to the soul—one more prisoner at his chariot +wheels, it proclaimed! Kéroulan was as unconcerned as if he had written +a poetic line. He had expected more of an outburst, more of a rebuff; +the absolute snapping of the web he had spun surprised him. His choicest +music had been spread for the eternal banquet, but the invited one +tarried. Very well! If not to-day, to-morrow! He repeated a verse of +Verlaine, and with his wife dutifully at his side bowed to the two +Americans and told them of the pleasure experienced. Ermentrude, her +candid eyes now reproachful and suspicious, did not flinch as she took +his hand—it seemed to melt in hers—but her farewell was conventional. +In the street, before they seated themselves in their carriage, Mrs. +Sheldam shook her head.</p> + +<p>"Oh, my dear! What a woman! What a man! I have <i>such</i> a story to tell +you. No wonder you admire these people. The wife is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> a genius—isn't she +handsome?—but the man—he is an angel!"</p> + +<p>"I didn't see his wings, auntie," was the curt reply.</p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<p>The Sheldams always stayed at the same hôtel during their annual visits +to Paris. It was an old-fashioned house with an entrance in the Rue +Saint-Honoré and another in the Rue de Rivoli. The girl sat on a small +balcony from which she could view the Tuileries Gardens without turning +her head; while looking farther westward she saw the Place de la +Concorde, its windy spaces a chessboard for rapid vehicles, whose +wheels, wet from the watered streets, ground out silvery fire in the +sun-rays of this gay June afternoon. Where the Avenue des Champs Élysées +began, a powdery haze enveloped the equipages, overblown with their +summer toilets, all speeding to Longchamps. It was racing day, and +Ermentrude, feigning a headache, had insisted that her uncle and aunt go +to the meeting. It would amuse them, she knew, and she wished to be +alone. Nearly a week had passed since the visit to Neuilly, and she had +been afraid to ask her aunt what Madame Kéroulan had imparted to +her—afraid and also too proud. Her sensibility had been grievously +wounded by the plainly expressed feelings of Octave Kéroulan. She had +re<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span>viewed without prejudice his behaviour, and she could not set down to +mere Latin gallantry either his words or his action. No, there was too +much intensity in both,—ah, how she rebelled at the brutal +disillusionment!—and there were, she argued, method and sequence in his +approach and attack. If she had been the average coquetting creature, +the offence might not have been so mortal. But, so she told herself +again and again,—as if to frighten away lurking darker thoughts, ready +to spring out and devour her good resolutions,—she had worshipped her +idol with reservations. His poetry, his philosophy, were so inextricably +blended that they smote her nerves like the impact of some bright +perfume, some sharp chord of modern music. Dangerously she had filed at +her emotions in the service of culture and she was now paying the +penalty for her ardent confidence. His ideas, vocal with golden +meanings, were never meant to be translated into the vernacular of life, +never to be transposed from higher to lower levels; this base betrayal +of his ideals she felt Kéroulan had committed. Had he not said that love +should be like "un baiser sur un miroir"? Was he, after all, what the +princess had called him? And was he only a mock sun swimming in a +firmament of glories which he could have outshone?</p> + +<p>A servant knocked and, not receiving a response, entered with a letter. +The superscription was strange. She opened and read:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span>—</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p><span class="smcap">Dear and Tender Child</span>: I know you were angry with me when +we parted. I am awaiting here below your answer to come to you and +bare my heart. Say yes!</p></div> + +<p>"Is the gentleman downstairs?" she asked. The servant bowed. The blood +in her head buzzing, she nodded, and the man disappeared. Standing there +in the bright summer light, Ermentrude Adams saw her face in the oval +glass, above the fireplace, saw its pallor, the strained expression of +the eyes, and like a drowning person she made a swift inventory of her +life, and, with the insane hope of one about to be swallowed up by the +waters, she grasped at a solitary straw. Let him come; she would have an +explanation from him! The torture of doubt might then be brought to an +end....</p> + +<p>Some one glided into the apartment. Turning quickly, Ermentrude +recognized Madame Kéroulan. Before she could orient herself that lady +took her by both hands, and uttering apologetic words, forced the amazed +girl into a chair.</p> + +<p>"Don't be frightened, dear young lady. I am not here to judge, but to +explain. Yes, I know my husband loves you. But do not believe in him. He +is a <i>terrific</i> man." This word she emphasized as if doubtful of its +meaning. "Ah, if you but knew the inferno of my existence! There are so +many like you—stop, do not leave! You are not to blame. I, Lillias +Kéroulan, do not censure your action. My hus<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span>band is an evil man and a +charlatan. Hear me out! He has only the gift of words. He steals all his +profundities of art from dead philosophers. He is not a genuine poet. He +is not a dramatist. I swear to you that he is now the butt of artistic +Paris. The Princesse de Lancovani made him—she is another of his sort. +He <i>was</i> the mode; now he is desperate because his day has passed. He +knows you are rich. He desires your money, not <i>you</i>. I discovered that +he was coming here this day. Oh, I am cleverer than he. I followed. Here +I am to save you from him—and from yourself—he is not now below in the +salon."</p> + +<p>"Please go away!" indignantly answered Ermentrude. She was furious at +this horrible, plain-spoken, jealous creature. Save her from herself—as +if ever she had wavered! The disinterested adoration she had entertained +for the great artist—what a hideous ending was this! The tall, blond +woman with the narrow, light blue eyes watched the girl. How could any +one call her handsome, Ermentrude wondered! Then her visitor noticed the +crumpled letter on the table. With a gesture of triumph she secured it +and smiling her superior smile she left, closing the door softly behind +her.</p> + +<p>Only kissed hands are white! Ermentrude threw herself on the couch, her +cheeks burning, her heart tugging in her bosom like a ship impatient at +its anchorage. And was this the sordid end of a beautiful dream?...<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Do you know, dearest, we have had such news!" exclaimed Mrs. Sheldam as +she entered, and so charged with her happiness that she did not notice +the drawn features of her niece. "Charlie, Charlie will be here some +time next week. He arrives at Havre. He has just cabled his father. Let +us go down to meet the boy." Charlie was the only son of the Sheldams +and fonder of his cousin than she dare tell herself. She burst into +tears, which greatly pleased her aunt.</p> + +<p>In the train, eight days later, Ermentrude sat speechless in company +with her aunt and uncle. But as the train approached Havre she +remembered something.</p> + +<p>"Aunt Clara," she bravely asked, "do you recall the afternoon we spent +at the Kéroulans'? What did Madame Kéroulan tell you then? Is it a +secret?" She held tightly clenched in her hand the arm-rest at the side +of the compartment.</p> + +<p>"Oh, dear, no! The madame was very chatty, very communicative. It's +funny I've not told you before. She confessed that she was the happiest +woman on earth; not only was she married to a grand genius,—for the +life of me I can't see where <i>that</i> comes in!—but he was a good man +into the bargain. It appears that his life is made weary by women who +pester him with their attentions. Even our princess—yes, <i>the</i> +princess; isn't it shocking?—was a perfect nuisance until Mr. Kéroulan +assured her that, though he owed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span> much of his success in the world to +her, yet he would never betray the trust reposed in him by his wife. +What's the matter, dear, does the motion of the car affect you? It +<i>does</i> rock! And <i>he</i> shows her all the letters he gets from silly women +admirers—oh, these foreign women and their queer ways! And he tells her +the way they make up to him when he meets them in society."</p> + +<p>Ermentrude shivered. The princess also! And with all her warning about +the Superman! Now she understood. Then she took the hand of Mrs. +Sheldam, and, stroking it, whispered:—</p> + +<p>"Auntie, I'm so glad I am going to Havre, going to see Charlie soon." +The lids of her eyes were wet. Mrs. Sheldam had never been so motherly.</p> + +<p>"You <i>are</i> a darling!" she answered, as she squeezed Ermentrude's arm. +"But there is some one who doesn't seem to care much for Havre." She +pointed out Mr. Sheldam, who, oblivious of picturesque Normandy through +which the train was speeding, slept serenely. Ermentrude envied him his +repose. He had never stared into the maddening mirror which turned poets +into Supermen and—sometimes monsters. Had she herself not gazed into +this distorting glass? The tune of her life had never sounded so +discouragingly faint and inutile. Perhaps she did not posses the higher +qualities that could extort from a nature so rich and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> various as Octave +Kéroulan's its noblest music! Perhaps his wife had told the truth to +Mrs. Sheldam and had lied to her! And then, through a merciful mist of +tears, Ermentrude saw Havre, saw her future.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span></p> +<h2>VII</h2> + +<h3>ANTICHRIST</h3> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>To wring from man's tongue the denial of his existence is proof of +Satan's greatest power.—<span class="smcap">Père Ravignan.</span></p></div> + + +<p>The most learned man and the most lovable it has been my good fortune to +know is Monsignor Anatole O'Bourke—alas! I should write, was, for his +noble soul is gathered to God. I met him in Paris, when I was a music +student. He sat next to me at a Pasdeloup concert in the Cirque d'Hiver, +how many years ago I do not care to say. A casual exclamation betrayed +my nationality, and during the intermission we drifted into easy +conversation. Within five minutes he held me enthralled, did this +big-souled, large-brained Irishman from the County Tipperary. We +discussed the programme—a new symphonic poem by Rimski-Korsakoff, +Sadko, had been alternately hissed and cheered—and I soon learned that +my companion mourned a French mother and rejoiced in the loving presence +of a very Celtic father. From the former he must have inherited his +vigorous, logical intellect; the latter had evidently endowed him with a +robust, jovial temperament, coupled with a wonderful perception of +things mystical.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span></p> + +<p>After the concert we walked slowly along the line of the boulevards. It +was early May, and the wheel of green which we traversed, together with +the brilliant picture made by the crowds, put us both in a happy temper. +It was not long before Monsignor heard the confession of my ideals. He +smiled quickly when I raved of music, but the moment I drifted into the +theme of mysticism—the transposition is ever an easy one—I saw his +interest leap to meet mine.</p> + +<p>"So, you have read St. John of the Cross?" I nodded my head.</p> + +<p>"And St. Teresa, that marvellous woman? The Americans puzzle me," he +continued. "You are the most practical people on the globe and yet the +most idealistic. When I hear of a new religion, I am morally certain +that it is evolved in America."</p> + +<p>"A new religion!" I started. This phrase had often assailed me, both in +print and in the depths of my imagination. He divined my thought—ah! he +was a wonder-worker in the way he noted a passing <i>nuance</i>.</p> + +<p>"When we wear out the old one, it will be time for a new religion," he +blandly announced; "you Americans, because of your new mechanical +inventions, fancy you have free entry into the domain of the spiritual. +But come, my dear young friend. Here is my hôtel. Can't I invite you to +dinner?" We had reached the Boulevard Malsherbe and, as I was miles out +of my course, I consented. The priest fascinated me<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> with his erudition, +which swam lightly on the crest of his talk. He was, so I discovered +during the evening, particularly well versed in the mystical writers, in +the writings of the Kabbalists and the books of the inspired Northman, +Swedenborg. As we sat drinking our coffee at one of the little tables in +the spacious courtyard, I revived the motive of a new religion.</p> + +<p>"Monsignor, have you ever speculated on the possible appearance of a +second Mahomet, a second Buddha? What if, from some Asiatic jungle, +there sallied out upon Europe a terrible ape-god, a Mongolian with +exotic eyes and the magnetism of a religious madman—"</p> + +<p>"You are speaking of Antichrist?" he calmly questioned.</p> + +<p>"Antichrist! Do you really believe in the Devil's Messiah?"</p> + +<p>"Believe, man! why, I have <i>seen</i> him."</p> + +<p>I leaned back in my chair, wondering whether I should laugh or look +solemn. He noted my indecision, and his eyes twinkled—they were the +blue-gray of the Irish, the eyes of a seer or an amiable ironist.</p> + +<p>"Listen! but first let us get some strong cigars. Garçon!" As we smoked +our panatelas he related this history:—</p> + +<p>"You ask me if I believe in an Antichrist, thereby betraying your +slender knowledge of the Scriptures—you will pardon the liberty! I may +refer you not only to John's Epistles, to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span> the revelations of the +dreamer of Patmos, but to so many learned doctors of the faith that it +would take a week merely to enumerate the titles of their works all +bearing on the mysterious subject. Our Holy Mother the Church has held +aloof from any doctrinal pronouncements. The Antichrist has been +predicted for the past thousand years. I recall as a boy poring over the +map of the world which a friend of my mother had left with her. This +lady my father called 'the angel with the moulting wings,' because she +was always in an ecstatic tremor over the second coming of the Messiah. +She would go to the housetop at least once every six months, and there, +with a band of pious deluded geese dressed in white flowing robes, would +inspect the firmament for favourable signs. Nothing ever happened, as we +know, yet the predictions sown about the borders of that strange-looking +chart have in a measure come true.</p> + +<p>"There were the grimmest and most resounding quotations from the +Apocalypse. 'Babylon is fallen, is fallen!' hummed in my ears for many a +day. And the pale horse also haunted me. What would I have given to hear +the music of that 'voice from heaven, as the voice of many waters, and +as the voice of great thunder.' I mean the 'harpers harping with their +harps' the 'new song before the throne, before the four beasts and the +elders.' It is recorded that 'no man could learn that song but the +hundred and forty <i>and</i> four thousand, which were<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> redeemed from the +earth.' That is a goodly multitude. Let us hope we shall be of it. +Learned Sir Thomas Browne asked what songs the sirens sang. I prefer to +hear that wonderful 'harpèd' song.</p> + +<p>"But I wander. The fault lies in that wondrous map of the world, with +its pictured hordes of Russians sweeping down upon Europe and America +like a plague of locusts, the wicked unbaptized Antichrist at the head +of them, waving a cross held in reversed fashion. Don't ask me the +meaning of this crazy symbolism. The sect to which my mother's friend +belonged—God bless her, for she was a dear weak-minded lady—must have +set great store by these signs. I admit that as a boy they scared me. +Sitting here now, after forty years, I can still see those cryptograms. +However, to my tale. About ten years ago I was in Paris, and in my +capacity as Monsignor I had to attend a significant gathering at the +embassy of the Russian ambassador in this city of light." He waved his +left hand, from which I caught the purple fire of amethyst.</p> + +<p>"It was a notable affair, and I don't mind telling you now that it was +largely political. I had just returned from a secret mission at Rome, +and I was forced to mingle with diplomatic people. Prince Wronsky was +the representative of the Czar at that time in France, a charming man +with a flavour of <i>diablerie</i> in his speech. He was a fervent Greek +Catholic, like most of his countrymen, and it pleased him to fence +mis<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span>chievously with me on the various dogmas of our respective faiths. +He called himself <i>the</i> Catholic; I was only a Roman Catholic. I told +him I was satisfied.</p> + +<p>"On this particular night he was rather agitated when I made my +salutations. He whispered to me that madame the princess had that very +day presented him with a son and heir. Naturally I congratulated him. +His restlessness increased as the evening wore on. At last he beckoned +to me—we were very old friends—to follow him into his library. There +he hesitated.</p> + +<p>"'I want you to do me a favour, an odd one; but as you are known to me +so long I venture to ask it. Do go upstairs and see my boy—' His tone +was that of entreaty. I smiled.</p> + +<p>"'Dear prince, I am, as a priest, hardly a judge of children. But if you +wish it—is there anything wrong with the little chap's health?'</p> + +<p>"'God forbid!' he ejaculated and piously crossed himself. We went to the +first <i>étage</i> of his palace—he was gorgeously housed—and there he +said:—</p> + +<p>"'Madame is in another wing of our apartments—go in here—the child is +attended by the nurse.' With that he pushed me through a swinging door +and left me standing in a semi-lighted chamber. I was very near ill +temper, I assure you, for my position was embarrassing. The room was +large and heavily hung with tapestries. A nurse, a hag, a witch, a dark +old<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> gypsy creature, came over to me and asked me, in Russian:—</p> + +<p>"'Do you wish to see his Royal Highness the King of Earth and Heaven?' +Thinking she was some stupid <i>moujik's</i> wife, I nodded my head +seriously, though amused by the exalted titles. She put up a thin hand +and I tiptoed to a cradle of gold and ivory—it certainly seemed so to +my inexperienced eyes—the nurse parted the curtains, and there I saw—I +saw—but my son, you will think I exaggerate—I saw the most exquisite +baby in the universe. You laugh at an old bachelor's rhapsody! In +reality I don't care much for children. But that child, that supreme +morsel of humanity, was too much for me. I stood and stared and stood +and stared, and all the while the tiny angel was smiling in my eyes, oh! +such a celestial smile. From his large blue eyes, like flowers, he +smiled into my very soul. I was chained to the floor as if by lead. +Every fibre of my soul, heart, and brain went out to that little +wanderer from the infinite. It was a pathetic face, full of suppressed +sorrow—<i>Dieu</i>! but he was older than his father. I found my mind +beginning to wander as if hypnotized. I tried to divert my gaze, but in +vain. Some subtle emanation from this extraordinary child entered my +being, and then, as if a curtain were being slowly lowered, a mist +encompassed my soul; I was ceding, I felt, the immortal part of me to +another, and all the time I was smiling at the baby and the baby<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> +smiling back. I remember his long blond hair, parted in the middle and +falling over his shoulders; but even that remarkable trait for an infant +a few hours old did not puzzle me, for my sanity was surely being +undermined by the persistent gaze of the boy. I vaguely recall passing +my hand across my breast as if to stop the crevice through which my +personality was filtering; I was certain that my soul was about to be +stolen by that damnable child. Then the nurse dropped something, and my +thoughts came back,—they were surely on the road to hell, for they were +red and flaming when I got hold of them,—and the spell, or whatever it +was, snapped.</p> + +<p>"I looked up and noticed the woman maliciously smiling—if it had been +in the days of the inquisition, I would have sent her to the faggots, +for she was a hell-hag. The child had fallen back in his cradle as if +the effort of holding my attention had exhausted him. Then it struck me +that there was something unholy about this affair, and I resolutely +strode to the crib and seized the baby.</p> + +<p>"'What changeling is this?' I demanded in a loud voice, for the being +that twisted in my grip was two or two hundred years old.</p> + +<p>"'Lay him down, you monster!' clamoured the nurse, as I held the +squirming bundle by both hands. It was a task—and I'm very strong. A +superhuman strength waged against my muscles; but I was an old football +half-back at the university, so I conquered the poor little devil.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> It +moaned like a querulous old man; the nurse, throwing her weight upon me, +forced me to let go my hold. As I did so the baby turned on its face, +its dainty robe split wide open, and to my horror I saw on its back, +between its angelically white shoulders, burnt in as if by branding +irons, the crucifix—and <i>upside down</i>!"</p> + +<p>I shuddered. I knew. He lowered his voice and spoke in detached phrases.</p> + +<p>"It was—oh! that I live to say it—it was the dreaded Antichrist—yes, +this Russian baby—it was predicted that he would be born in Russia—I +trembled so that my robes waved in an invisible wind. The reversed +cross—the mark of the beast—the sign by which we are to know the Human +Satan—the last opponent of Christianity. I confess that I was +discomposed at the sight of this little fiend, for it meant that the red +star, the baleful star of the north, would rise in the black heavens and +bloody war spread among the nations of the earth. It also meant that +doomsday was not far off, and, good Christian as I believe myself to be, +a shiver ran down my spine at the idea of Gabriel's trump and the +resurrection of the dead. Yes, I shan't deny it—so material are the +sons of men, I among them! And the very thought of Judgment Day and its +blasting horrors withered my heart. Still something had to be done, +prophecy or no prophecy. To fulfil the letter of the law this infernal +visitor was let loose from hell. There was one way, so I grasped—"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Great God, Monsignor, you didn't strangle the demon?" I cried.</p> + +<p>"No, no—something better. I rushed over to a marble wash-basin and +seized a ewer of water, and, going back to the crib, despite the frantic +remonstrances of the old sorceress, I baptized the Antichrist in the +name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Before my eyes I +saw the inverted cross vanish. Then I soundly spanked the presumptuous +youngster and, running down the staircase, I sought the prince and said +to him:—</p> + +<p>"'Your boy is now a Roman, not a Greek Catholic. We are quits!'"</p> + +<p>The idea of a spanked Antichrist disconsolately roaming the earth, +unwilling to return to his fiery home for fear of a scolding, his guns +of evil spiked, his virus innocuous, his mission of spiritual +destruction a failure—for what could a baptized devil's child do but +pray and repent?—all this dawned upon me, and I burst into laughter, +the worthy Monsignor discreetly participating. His bizarre recital +proved to me that, despite his Gallic first name, Monsignor Anatole +O'Bourke hailed from the County Tipperary.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span></p> +<h2>VIII</h2> + +<h3>THE ETERNAL DUEL</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What is the sorriest thing that enters Hell?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">—<span class="smcap">D.G. Rossetti</span>, <i>Vain Virtues</i>.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<p>The face set him to a strange wondering; he sat at the coffin and +watched it. His wife's face it was, and above the sorrow of irrevocable +parting floated the thought that she did not look happy as she lay in +her bed of death. Monross had seen but two dead faces before, those of +his father and mother. Both had worn upon the mask which death models an +expression of relief. But this face, the face of his wife, of the woman +with whom he had lived—how many years! He asked himself why he +shuddered when he looked down at it, shuddered and also flushed with +indignation. Had she ever been happy? How many times had she not voiced +her feelings in the unequivocal language of love! Yet she seemed so +hideously unhappy as she stretched before him in her white robes of +death. Why? What secret was this disclosed at the twelfth hour of life, +on the very brink of the grave? Did death, then, hold the solution to +the enigma of the conquering Sphinx!</p> + +<p>Monross, master of psychology, tormented by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> visions of perfection, a +victim to the devouring illusion of the artist,—Monross asked himself +with chagrin if he had missed the key in which had sounded the symphony +of this woman's life. This woman! His wife! A female creature, +long-haired, smiling, loquacious—though reticent enough when her real +self should have flashed out signals of recognition at him—this wife, +the Rhoda he had called day and night—what had she been?</p> + +<p>She had understood him, had realized his nobility of ideal, his gifts, +his occasional grandeur of soul,—like all artistic men he was desultory +in the manifestation of his talent,—and had read aloud to him those +poems written for another woman in the pitch-hot passion of his +youth—before he had met her. To her he had been always, so he told +himself, a cavalier in his devotion. Without wealth, he had kept the +soles of her little feet from touching the sidewalks of life. Upon her +dainty person he had draped lovely garments. Why then, he wondered, the +vindictive expression etched, as if in aqua fortis, upon her carved +features?</p> + +<p>Some Old World superstition held him captive as he gazed. Death is the +grand revealer, he thought; death alone stamps upon the crumbling canvas +of mortality the truth. Rhoda was dead. Yet her face was alive for the +first time. He saw its truth; and he shuddered, for he also discerned +the hate that had lurked a life long in its devious and smiling +expressions—expressions<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> like a set of scenery pushed on and off as the +order of the play demanded. Oh, the misery of it all! He, Monross, poet, +lover, egoist, husband, to be confronted by this damnable defiance, this +early-born hate! What had he done! And in the brain cells of the man +there awakened a processional fleet of pictures: Rhoda wooed; Rhoda +dazzled; Rhoda won; Rhoda smiling before the altar; Rhoda resigned upon +that other altar; Rhoda, wife, mother; and Rhoda—dead!</p> + +<p>But Rhoda loved—again he looked at the face. The brow was virginally +placid, the drooping, bitter mouth alone telling the unhappy husband a +story he had never before suspected. Rhoda! Was it possible this tiny +exquisite creature had harboured rancour in her soul for the man who had +adored her because she had adored him? Rhoda! The shell of his egoism +fell away from him. He saw the implacable resentment of this tender girl +who, her married life long, had loathed the captain that had invaded the +citadel of her soul, and conqueror-like had filched her virgin zone. The +woman seemingly stared at the man through lids closed in death—the +woman, the sex that ages ago had feared the barbarian who dragged her to +his cave, where he subdued her, making her bake his bread and bear his +children.</p> + +<p>In a wide heaven of surmise Monross read the confirmation of his +suspicions—of the eternal duel between the man and the woman; knew<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> +that Rhoda hated him most when most she trembled at his master bidding. +And now Rhoda lay dead in her lyre-shaped coffin, saying these ironic +things to her husband, when it was too late for repentance, too early +for eternity.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span></p> +<h2>IX</h2> + +<h3>THE ENCHANTED YODLER</h3> + + +<h4>A MARIENBAD ELEGY</h4> + +<h4>I</h4> + +<p>The remorseless rain had washed anew the face of the dark blue sky that +domed Marienbad and its curved chain of hills. Hugh Krayne threw open +his window and, leaning out, exclaimed, as he eagerly inhaled the soft +air of an early May morning:—</p> + +<p>"At last! And high time!" For nine days he had waded through the wet +streets, heavily leaping the raging gutters and stopping before the door +of every optician to scrutinize the barometer. And there are many in +this pretty Bohemian health resort, where bad weather means bad temper, +with enforced confinement in dismal lodgings or stuffy <i>restaurations</i>, +or—last resort of the bored—the promenade under the colonnade, while +the band plays as human beings shuffle ponderously over the cold stones +and stare at each other in sullen desperation.</p> + +<p>But this day was a glorious one; in high spirits the Englishman left the +house on the Oberkreuzbrunnenstrasse and moved slowly to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span>ward the +springs. He was not thirty, but looked much older, for his weight was +excessive. An easy-going temperament, a good appetite, a well-filled +purse, and a conscience that never disturbed his night's slumber +contributed to this making of flesh. He waddled, despite his great +height, and was sufficiently sensitive to enjoy Marienbad as much for +its fat visitors as for its curative virtues. Here at least he was not +remarkable, while in London or Paris people looked at him sourly when he +occupied a stall at the theatre or a seat in a café. Not only had he +elbow room in Marienbad, but he felt small, positively meagre, in +comparison with the prize specimens he saw painfully progressing about +the shaded walks or puffing like obese engines up the sloping roads to +the Rübezahl, the Egerländer, the Panorama, or the distant Podhorn.</p> + +<p>The park of the Kreuzbrunnen was crowded, though the hour of six had +just been signalled from a dozen clocks in the vicinity. The crowd, +gathered from the four quarters of the globe, was in holiday humour, as, +glass in hand, it fell into line, until each received the water doled +out by uniformed officials. Occasionally a dispute as to precedence +would take place when the serpentine procession filed up the steps of +the old-fashioned belvedere; but quarrels were as rare as a lean man. A +fat crowd is always good-tempered, irritable as may be its individual +members. Hugh Krayne kept in position, while two women shoved him about +as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> if he were a bale of hay. He heard them abusing him in Bohemian, a +language of which he did not know more than a few words; their +intonations told him that they heartily disliked his presence. Yet he +could not give way; it would not have been Marienbad etiquette. At last +he reached the spring and received his usual low bow from the man who +turned the polished wheel—the fellow had an eye tuned for gratuities. +With the water in his glass three-fourths cold and one-fourth warm, a +small napkin in his left hand, the Englishman moved with the jaunty +grace of a young elephant down the smooth terraced esplanade that has +made Marienbad so celebrated. The sun was riding high, and the tender +green of the trees, the flashing of the fountains, and the music of the +band all caused Hugh to feel happy. He had lost nearly a pound since his +arrival the week before, and he had three more weeks to stay. What might +not happen!</p> + +<p>Just where the promenade twists under the shaded alleys that lead to the +Ferdinandsbrunnen, he saw four women holding hands. They were dressed in +Tyrolean fashion—pleated skirts, short enough to show white, plump +stockings, feet in slippers, upon the head huge caps, starched and +balloony; their massive white necks, well exposed, were encircled by +collars that came low on bodices elaborately embroidered. Behind them +marched several burly chaps, in all the bravery of the Austrian +Tyrol<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span>—the green alpine hat, with the feather at the back, the short +gray jacket, the bare knees, and the homespun stockings. Krayne regarded +curiously this strolling band of singers. Their faces seemed familiar to +him, and he rapidly recalled souvenirs of Salzburg and an open-air +concert. But this morning there was something that arrested his +attention in the group. It was a girl of eighteen or twenty, with a +brilliant complexion, large blue eyes, and a robust, shapely figure. As +she passed she gave him such an imploring look, such an appealing look, +that all his chivalric instincts rushed into the field of his +consciousness. He awkwardly dropped his tumbler. He turned around, half +expecting to see the big child still looking at him. Instead he gazed +upon the athletic backs of her male companions and to the unpleasant +accompaniment of hearty feminine laughter. Were these women laughing at +him? No fool like a fat one, he merrily thought, as he bought a new +glass at a bazaar, which a grinning, monkey-faced creature sold him at +the regular price redoubled.</p> + +<p>Before his meagre breakfast of one egg and a dry rusk, Krayne +endeavoured to evoke the features of the pretty creature who had so +strongly attracted him. He saw a tangle of black hair, a glance that +touched his heart with its pathos, a pair of soft, parted red lips, and +dazzling teeth. It was an impression sufficiently powerful to keep him +company all the forenoon. Fat men, he reasoned on the steep pass that +conducts to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span> the Café Forstwarte, are always sentimental, by no means +always amiable, and, as a rule, subject to sudden fancies. Ten years of +his sentimental education had been sown with adventures that had begun +well, caprices that had no satisfactory endings. He had fallen in love +with the girl who played Chopin on the piano, the girl who played +Mendelssohn on the violin, the girl who played Goltermann on the +violoncello. Then followed girls who painted, poetized, botanized, and +hammered metal. Once—an exception—he had succumbed to the charms of an +actress who essayed characters in the dumps—Ibsen soubrettes, +Strindberg servants, and Máxim Górky tramps. Yet he had, somehow or +other, emerged heart whole from his adventures among those masterpieces +of the cosmos—women.</p> + +<p>Certainly this might be another romance added to the long list of his +sentimental fractures. He ate his dinner, the one satisfactory meal of +the day allowed him by a cruel doctor, with the utmost deliberation. He +had walked three hours during the morning, and now, under the spacious +balconies of the Forstwarte, he knew that his beef and spinach would be +none the worse for a small bottle of very dry, light Vöslauer. Besides, +his physician had not actually forbidden him a little liquid at the +midday meal. Just before bedtime he was entitled—so his dietetic +schedule told him—to one glass of Pilsner beer. Not so bad, after all, +this banting at Marienbad, he reflected. Anyhow, it was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span> better than the +existence of those fellows at sea-shore and mountain, who gorged and +guzzled their summer away. Then he tried to remember among his London +club friends any who were as heavy as he, but he could not. Idly +smoking, he regarded the piazzas, with their tables and groups of obese +humanity, eating, drinking, and buzzing—little fat flies, he thought, +as he drew his waistcoat in, feeling quite haughty and slender.</p> + +<p>He read on a placard that the "Präger Bavarian Sextet" would give a +"grand" concert at the Hotel Bellevue this very afternoon. "Ah ha!" said +Krayne aloud, "that's the girl I saw!" Then he wasted several hours more +loitering about the beautiful park on the Kaiserstrasse and looking in +the shop windows at views of Marienbad on postal cards, at +yellow-covered French, German, and Russian novels, at pictures of kings, +queens, and actresses. He also visited the houses wherein Goethe, +Chopin, and Wagner had dwelt. It was four o'clock when he entered the +garden of the Bellevue establishment and secured a table. The waiter at +his request removed the other chairs, so he had a nook to himself. Not a +very large crowd was scattered around; visitors at Marienbad do not care +to pay for their diversions. In a few minutes, after a march had been +banged from a wretched piano—were pianos ever tuned on the Continent, +he wondered?—the sextet appeared, looking as it did in the morning, and +sang an Austrian melody, a capella. It was not very interesting.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span></p> + +<p>The women stood in front and yelled with a hearty will; the men roared +in the background. Krayne saw his young lady, holding her apron by the +sides, her head thrown back, her mouth well opened; but he could not +distinguish her individual voice. How pretty she was! He sipped his +coffee. Then came a zither solo—that abominable instrument of plucked +wires, with its quiver of a love-sick clock about to run down; this +parody of an æolian harp always annoyed Krayne, and he was glad when the +man finished. A stout soprano in a velvet bodice, her arms bare and +brawny, the arms of a lass accustomed to ploughing and digging potatoes, +sang something about turtle doves. She was odious. Odious, too, was her +companion, in a duo through which they screamed and rumbled—"Verlassen +bin i." At last she came out and he saw by the programme that her name +was Röselein Gich. What an odd name, what an attractive girl! He +finished his coffee and frantically signalled his waitress. It was +against the doctor's orders to take more than one cup, and then the +sugar! Hang the doctor, he cried, and drank a second cup.</p> + +<p>She sang. Her voice was an unusually heavy, rich contralto. That she was +not an accomplished artiste he knew. He did not haunt opera houses for +naught, and, like all fat men who wear red ties in the forenoon, he was +a trifle dogmatic in his criticism. The young woman had the making of an +opera singer. What a Fricka, Brangaene, Ortrud, Sieglinde, Erda, this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span> +clever girl might become! She was musical, she was dramatic in +temperament—he let his imagination run away with him. She only sang an +Oberbayerische yodel, and, while her voice was not very high, she +contrived a falsetto that made her English listener shiver. This yodel +seemed to him as thrilling as the "<i>Ho yo to ho!</i>" of Brunnhilde as she +rushes over the rocky road to Valhall. <i>La la liriti! La la lirita! +Hallali!</i> chirped Röselein, with a final flourish that positively +enthralled Hugh Krayne. He applauded, beating with his stick upon the +table, his face flushed by emotion. Decidedly this girl was worth the +visit to Marienbad.</p> + +<p>And he noted with delight that Fräulein Gich had left the stage. Basket +in hand, she went from table to table, selling pictures and programmes +and collecting admission fees. At last he would be able to speak with +the enchantress, for he prided himself on the purity of his German. +Smiling until she reached his table, she suddenly became serious when +she saw this big Englishman in the plaid suit and red necktie. Again he +felt the imploring glance, the soft lips parted in childish +supplication. It was too much for his nerves. He tossed into her basket +a gold piece, grabbed at random some pictures, and as her beseeching +expression deepened, her eyes moist with wonder and gratitude, he tugged +at a ring on his corpulent finger, and, wrenching it free, presented it +to her with a well-turned phrase, adding:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span>—</p> + +<p>"Thou hast the making of a great singer in thee, Fräulein Röselein. I +wish I could help thee to fame!"</p> + +<p>The girl gave him an incredulous stare, then reddening, the muscles on +her full neck standing out, she ran like a hare back to her companions. +Evidently he had made an impression. The honest folk about him who +witnessed the little encounter fairly brimmed over with gossip. The +stout basso moved slowly to Krayne, who braced himself for trouble. Now +for it! he whispered to himself, and grasped his walking-stick firmly. +But, hat in hand, his visitor, a handsome blond man, approached and +thanked Hugh for his generosity. He was a lover of music, the yodler +assured him, and his wife and himself felt grateful for the interest he +displayed in Fräulein Röselein, his wife's sister. Yes, she had a +remarkable voice. What a pity—but wouldn't the gentleman attend the +concert to be given that evening up at the Café Alm? It was, to be sure, +rather far, the café, but the moon would be up and if he could find his +way there he might do the company the honour of coming back with them.</p> + +<p>The Fräulein would sing a lot for him—Bohemian, Tyrolean, French, and +German songs. Ah, she was versatile! The man did not speak like a +peasant, and seemed a shrewd, pleasant fellow. Hugh Krayne, in excellent +though formal German, assured the other of his pleasure and accepted the +invitation. Then he looked<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> over at Röselein, who stood on the stage, +and as he did so she waved a crimson handkerchief at him as a friendly +sign. He took off his hat, touched significantly his own tie to indicate +a reciprocity of sentiment, and all aglow he ordered a third cup of +coffee.</p> + +<p>The cure could take care of itself. <i>Man lebt nur einmal!</i></p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<p>On his way to the Alm he met the fattest man in Marienbad, a former chef +of the German emperor, and gave him a friendly salute. He liked to see +this monster, who made the scales groan at six hundred pounds, more than +double his own weight, for it put him at ease with himself. But this +evening he felt uncomfortable. What if he were to reach such a climax in +adiposity What if in the years to come he should be compelled, as was +the unfortunate man from Berlin, to sit on a chair every five minutes, a +chair carried by an impudent boy! What—here his heart sank—if the +Fräulein should mock his size! He walked so rapidly at this idea that +other victims of rotundity stopped to look at his tall figure and nodded +approval. Ach! Marienbad was wonderful!</p> + +<p>After he had found a seat at the Alm next to the low wall, across which +he could see a vast stretch of undulating country, lighted by a moon +that seemed to swing like a silver hoop in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span> sky, Krayne ordered +Pilsner. He was fatigued by the hilly scramble and he was thirsty. Oh, +the lovely thirst of Marienbad—who that hath not been within thy +hospitable gates he knoweth it not! The magic of the night was making of +him a poet. He could see his Tyrolean friends behind the glass partition +of the little hall. There would they sing, not in the open. It was +nearly the same, for presently the windows were raised and their voices +came floating out to him, the bourdon of Röselein's organ easily +distinguishable. Love had sharpened his ears. He drained his glass and +sent for another. He felt that he was tumbling down an abyss of passion +and that nothing in the world could save him.</p> + +<p>The intermission! He stood up to attract the attention of Herr Johan +Präger. Röselein saw him and at once neared him, but without the basket. +This delicacy pleased Krayne very much. It showed him that he was not on +the same footing as the public. He made the girl take a seat, and though +he felt the eyes of the crowd upon him, he was not in the least +concerned. London was far away and the season was too young for the +annual rush of his compatriots. Would the Fräulein take something? She +accepted coffee, which she drank from a long glass with plenty of milk +and sugar. She again gazed at him with such a resigned expression that +he felt his starched cuffs grow warm from their contiguity to his +leaping pulses.</p> + +<p>"Yes, Fräulein," he said, employing the famil<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span>iar <i>du</i>, "thou hast +overcome me. Why not accept my offer?" Was this the prudent Hugh Krayne +talking? She smiled sweetly and shook her head. Her voice was delicious +in colour and intonation, nor did it betray humble origin.</p> + +<p>"I fear, dear sir, that what you offer is impossible. My sister, the +soprano, would never hear of such a thing. My brother, her husband, +would not allow it. And I owe them my living, my education. How could I +repay them if I left them now?" she hesitated.</p> + +<p>"Simply enough. You would be a singer at the opera some day, and take +them all to live with you. Is there no other reason?" He recollected +with a vivid sense of the disagreeable the lively antics of a lithe +youth in the company, who, at the close of the concert, executed with +diabolic dexterity what they called a <i>Schuhplattltanz</i>. This dance had +glued Krayne's attention, for Röselein was the young tenor singer's +partner. With their wooden sabots they clattered and sang, waving wildly +their arms or else making frantic passages of pretended love and +coquetry. It upset the Englishman to see the impudence of this common +peasant fellow grasping Röselein by the waist, as he whirled her about +in the boorish dance. Hence the clause to his question. She endured his +inquiring gaze, as she simply answered:—</p> + +<p>"No, there is no other reason." She put her hand on the arm of her +companion and the lights suddenly became misty, for he was of an +apo<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span>plectic tendency. They talked of music, of the opera in Vienna and +Prague. She was born in Bavaria, not more than a day's ride from +Marienbad. You could almost see her country from the top of the +Podhornberg, in the direction of the Franconian Mountains, not far from +Bayreuth. The place was called Schnabelwaid, and it was very high, very +windy. Since her tenth year she had been singing—yes, even in the +chorus at the Vienna opera, with her sister and brother. They were no +common yodlers. They could sing all the music of the day. The yodling +was part of their business, as was the costume. Later, when she had +enough saved, she would study in Vienna for grand opera!</p> + +<p>He was enraptured. How romantic it all was! A free-born maiden—he was +certain she was reared in some old castle—wandering about earning money +for her musical education. What a picture for a painter! What a story +for a novelist! They were interrupted. The dancer, a young man with a +heavy shock of hair growing low on his forehead, under which twinkled +beady black eyes, had been sent to tell Fräulein Röselein that her +colleagues were waiting for her. With a courtesy she went away. Krayne +now thoroughly hated the dancer.</p> + +<p>It was long after eleven when the concert was over and the party started +on its homeward trip. Krayne and Röselein walked behind the others, and +soon the darkness and the narrowness of the road forced him to tread +after the girl. The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> moon's rays at intervals pierced the foliage, +making lacelike patches of light in the gloom. At times they skirted the +edges of a circular clearing and saw the high pines fringing the +southern horizon; overhead the heavens were almost black, except where +great streams of stars swept in irregular bands. It was a glorious +sight, Krayne told Röselein—too sublime to be distracted by mere mortal +love-making, he mentally added. Nevertheless he was glad when they were +again in the woods; he could barely distinguish the girl ahead of him, +but her outline made his heart beat faster. Once, as they neared the +town, he helped her down a declivity into the roadway, and he could not +help squeezing her hand. The pressure was returned. He boldly placed her +arm within his, and they at last reached the streets, but not before, +panting with mingled fright and emotion, he solemnly kissed her. She did +not appear surprised.</p> + +<p>"Call me Rösie—thou!" she murmured, and her naïveté brought the ready +tears to his eyes. They made a rendezvous for the next morning on the +Promenade Platz. The only thing he did not like was the scowling face of +the dancer when he said good night to the others under the electric +lights of the Kreuzbrunnen. He was correct, then, in his premonition.</p> + +<p>That night Hugh Krayne dreamed he was a very skeleton for thinness—not +an unusual vision of fat men—and also a Tyrolean yodler, displaying +himself before a huge audience of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> gigantic human beings, who laughed so +loudly that he could not open his lips to frame the familiar words of +his song. In the despair of a frantic nightmare, his face streaming with +anguished tears, he forced his voice:—</p> + +<p><i>La, la, liriti! La, la, larita! Hallali!</i> Then he awoke in triumph. Was +he not a yodler?</p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<p>He told her of his dream and strange ambition. She did not discourage +him. It could be settled easily enough. Why not join the company and +take a few lessons? "With such a teacher?" he had exclaimed, and his +gesture was so impassioned that the promenaders, with their shining +morning goblets of water, were arrested by the spectacle. Wonderful, +wonderful Marienbad! was the general comment! But Krayne was past +ridicule. He already saw Röselein his bride. He saw himself a yodler. +The cure? Ay, there was the rub. He laid bare his heart. She aided him +with her cool advice. She was very sensible. Her brother-in-law and her +sister would welcome him in their household, for he was a lover of music +and his intentions were honourable. Of course, he sighed, of course, and +fingered his red tie. Why not, she argued, remain at Marienbad for three +weeks more and complete his cure? Anyhow, he was not so stout! She +looked up at him archly. Again he saw mist.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span></p> + +<p>That settled it. For another three weeks he lived in a cloud of +expectation, of severe training, long walks, dieting, and Turkish baths. +No man worked harder. And he was rewarded by seeing his flesh melt away +a pound or two daily. When the company returned after its itinerary in +the neighbourhood Rösie was surprised to meet a man who did not weigh +much over two hundred pounds, healthy, vigorous, and at least five years +younger in appearance. She was very much touched. So was her sister. +There was a family consultation, and despite the surly opposition of the +dancer, Hugh Krayne was welcomed as a member of the Präger Bavarian +Sextette company. Forgetting the future he had arranged for Rösie, he +began his vocal lessons immediately.</p> + +<p>In July he sang for the first time in public at Eger. He was extremely +frightened, but as it was only a duo he managed fairly well. Then he +sang at Tepl, this time alone. His voice broke badly in the yodel and he +was jeered by a rude audience. He had grown very much thinner. His +doctor warned him against continuing the waters, and advised rice, +potatoes, and ale, but he did not listen. He now paid the bills of the +company while travelling. Rösie had confessed with tears that they were +fearfully poor. From that time he handed her his purse. He even placated +the jealous dancer with a gold watch and a box of hair pomade. Ah! how +he loathed the fellow's curly locks, his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> greasy familiarities! Rösie +told him this acrobat was necessary in the company until he could be +replaced. Already Hugh—she called him "Ü"—could yodel better. Some day +he might, when thinner, dance better. Perhaps—again that appealing +glance, the corner of her lips faintly touched by the mysterious smile +of a Monna Lisa. Krayne redoubled his arduous training, practised +yodling in the forests, danced jigs on the pine-needles, and doubled his +allowance of the waters.</p> + +<p>They went to Carlsbad. He yodled. He was applauded. The dancer was in a +fine rage. Although Krayne had asked Rösie to buy a first-class +compartment on the railroad trip over and back, they went in a +third-class car. Präger declared that it was good enough for him, and he +didn't wish to spoil his troupe! His wife now held the purse-strings, as +Rösie was too engrossed with her art and Hugh too absorbed in his love +to notice such mere sublunary matters. The girl had promised nothing +positive for the future. She kept him on the brittle edge of nervous +expectation. The opposition of the dancer had been successfully met by +threats of dismissal; Hugh continued to lose flesh and gain in vocal and +pedal agility.</p> + +<p>He danced for the first time at Königswart, not far from the château of +the Metternichs. It was August. So great was the applause that the +younger dancer was discharged. He left with muttered threats of +vengeance. The next<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> day Krayne turned over all his business affairs to +the able hand of Frau Präger; he lived only for Rösie and his art....</p> + +<p>September was at hand. The weather was so warm and clear, that the king +of England deferred his departure for a few days. One afternoon, just +before the leaves began to brown on the hills, there was a concert at +the garden of the Hotel Bellevue. The royal party attended. The yodling +was much praised, especially that of a good-looking young woman and her +escort, a very tall man of cadaverous aspect, his shanks like the wooden +stilts of the shepherds on the Bordeaux Landes. His face, +preternaturally emaciated and fatigued, opened to emit an amazing yodel. +When the <i>Schuhplattltanz</i> was reached he surprised the audience by an +extraordinary exhibition. He threw his long legs about like billiard +cues, while his arms flapped as do windmills in a hard gale. He was +pointed out as a celebrity—once a monster Englishman, who had taken the +<i>Kur</i>; who was in love, but so poor that he could not marry. The girl +with him was certain to make a success in grand opera some day. Yes, +Marienbad was proud of Krayne. He was one of her show sons, a witness to +her curative powers. Proud also of the Bavarian Präger Sextette. Herr +Präger was reputed a rich man....</p> + +<p>The night of that concert Marienbad saw the last of the Bavarian +sextette, which at midnight, joined by its old dancer with the tenor +voice,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span> left in a third-class carriage for Vienna. Hugh Krayne, not +possessing enough to pay his passage, had not been invited; nor was he +informed of the sudden departure until a day later....</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>On the road to the Alm, of moonlight nights, toiling visitors catch +glimpses of a human, almost a skeleton, dressed in rags, his head bare +as his feet, about his neck a flaming crimson handkerchief. He is known +to Marienbäders as "The Man Who Stayed Too Long." He never addresses +passers-by; but as they lose sight of him they hear the woods resound +with his elegiac howl:—</p> + +<p><i>La la liriti! La la lirita! Hallali!</i></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span></p> +<h2>X</h2> + +<h3>THE THIRD KINGDOM</h3> + + +<h4>I</h4> + +<h4>A DOUBTER</h4> + +<p>Brother Hyzlo sat in his cell and read. The gentle stillness of a rare +spring morning enveloped him with its benison. And the clear light fell +upon the large pages of a book in his hand,—the window through which it +streamed was the one link between the young recluse and the life of the +world. From it he could see the roofs of the city beneath him; when he +so wished, he might, without straining his gaze, distinguish the +Pantheon at the end of that triumphal avenue which spanned the Seine and +had once evoked for him visions of antique splendour. But Brother Hyzlo +no longer cared for mundane delights. His doubting soul was the +battle-field over which he ranged day and night searching for diabolic +opponents. Exterior existence had become for him a shadow; the only life +worth living was that of the spirit.</p> + +<p>In his book that fresh spring morning he read as if in the flare of a +passing meteor these disquieting words:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span>—</p> + +<p>"How were it if, some day or night, a demon stole after thee into thy +most solitary solitude, and said to thee: 'This life, as thou livest it +now, and hast lived it, thou shalt have to live over again, and not once +but innumerable times; and there will be nothing new in it, but every +pain and every pleasure and every thought and sigh, and everything in +thy life, the great and the unspeakably petty alike, must come again to +thee, and all in the same series and succession; this spider, too, and +this moonlight betwixt the trees and this moment likewise and I myself. +The eternal sand-glass of time is always turned again, and thou with it, +thou atom of dust'? Wouldst thou not cast thyself down and with gnashing +of teeth curse the demon who thus spoke? Or, hast thou ever experienced +the tremendous moment in which thou wouldst answer him: 'Thou art a god +and never heard I anything more divine'?"</p> + +<p>The book slipped from his hands. "Why not?" he murmured, "why not? There +is no such thing as chance. The law of probabilities is not a mere +fancy, but an austere need. Matter is ever in evolution. Energy alone is +indestructible. Radium has revealed this to us. In eternity when the +Infinite throws the dice, double-sixes are sure to come up more than +once. Miracles? But why miraculous? Infinity of necessity must repeat +itself, and then I, sitting here now, will sit here again, sit and doubt +the goodness of God, ay, doubt His<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span> existence.... How horrible!" He +paused in the whirl of his thoughts.</p> + +<p>"Yet how beautiful, for if the eternal recurrence be truth, then must +the great drama of the Redemption be repeated. Then will our foes be +convinced of Christianity and its reality. But shall we be conscious in +that far-off time of our anterior existence? Ah! hideous, coiling doubt. +What a demon is this Nietzsche to set whirring in the brains of poor, +suffering humanity such torturing questions! Better, far better for the +world to live and not to think. Thought is a disease, a morbid secretion +of the brain-cells. Ah! materialist that I am, I can no longer think +without remembering the ideas of Cabanis, that gross atheist. Why am I +punished so? What crimes have I committed in a previous +existence—Karma, again!—that I must perforce study the writings of +impious men? Yet I submitted myself as a candidate for the task, to save +my brethren in Christ from soiling their hearts. Heaven preserve me from +the blight of spiritual pride, but I believe that I am now a scapegoat +for the offences of my fellow-monks, and, thus, may redeem my own +wretched soul. Ah! Nietzsche—Antichrist."</p> + +<p>He arose and threw the volume across his cell. Then going to the window +regarded with humid gaze the world that sprawled below him in the +voluptuous sunshine. But so sternly was the inner eye fixed on the +things of the spirit that he soon turned away from the delectable<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> +picture, and as he did so his glance rested upon a crucifix. He started, +his perturbed imagination again touched.</p> + +<p>"What if Nietzsche were right? The first Christian, the only Christian, +died on the cross, he has said. What an arraignment of our precious +faith, Jesus Christ, our Lord God! What sweet names are Thine! How could +Nietzsche not feel the music of that Hebrew-Greek combination? Perhaps +he did; perhaps he masked a profound love behind his hatred. Jesus our +Lord! Hebrew-Greek. But why Greek? Why ...?" Another pause in this +sequestered chamber where the buzzing of an insect could assume a +thunderous roar. "The eternal return. Why should Christ return? Must the +earth be saved again and again and a billion times again? Awful thought +of a God descending to a horrible death to cleanse the nameless myriads +from sins which they seek ever as flies treacle. More ghastly still is +the thought that the atheist Scandinavian put into the mouth of his +Julian the Apostate: When our Christ is not saving this earth from +eternal damnation then he may be visiting remote planets or inaccessible +stars, where coloured double suns of blinding brilliancy revolve +terrifically in twin harness. There, too, are souls to be rescued. What +a grand idea! It is Ibsen's, as is the interpretation of the Third +Kingdom. It should have been Nietzsche's. Why this antinomianism? Why +this eternal conflict of evil and good, of night and day, of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span> sweet and +sour, of God and devil, of Ormuzd and Ahriman?"</p> + +<p>The exotic names transposed his thoughts to another avenue. If Christ is +to come again, and the holy word explicitly states that He will, why not +Buddha? Why not Brahma? Why not ...? Again a hiatus. This time something +snapped in his head. He sank back in his chair. Buddha! Was there ever a +Buddha? And if there was not, was there ever such a personality as +Christ's? Scholar that he was he knew that myth-building was a pastime +for the Asiatic imagination, great, impure, mysterious Asia—Asia the +mother of all religions, the cradle of the human race. To deny the +objective existence of Christ would set at rest all his doubts, one +overwhelming doubt swallowing the minor doubts. He had never speculated +at length upon the Christ legend, for did not Renan, yes, that silky +heretic, believe in the personality of Jesus, believe and lovingly +portray it? The Nietzsche doctrine of the eternal recurrence had so +worked upon his sensitive mental apparatus that he could have almost +denied the existence of Christ rather than deny that our universe +repeats itself infinitely. Eternity is a wheel, earthly events are the +spokes of this whirring wheel. It was the seeming waste of divine +material that shocked his nerves. One crucifixion—yes; but two or two +quintillions and infinitely more!</p> + +<p>Brother Hyzlo stared at the crucifix. Was it only a symbol, as some +learned blasphemers<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> averred? The human figure so painfully extended +upon it was a God, a God who descended from high heaven to become a +shield between the wrath of His Father and humanity. Why? Why should the +God who created us grow angry with our shortcomings? We are His +handiwork. Are we then to blame for our imperfections? Is not Jesus, +instead of a mediator, rather a votive offering to the wounded vanity of +the great Jehovah? Was not Prometheus—a light broke in upon Hyzlo. +Prometheus, a myth, Buddha a myth. All myths. There were other +virgin-born saviours. Krishna, Mithra, Buddha. Vishnu had not one but +nine incarnations. Christianity bears alarming resemblances to +Mithraism. Mithra, too, was born in a cave. The dates of Christ's birth +and death may be astronomical: the winter and vernal equinoxes. But the +conflict of the authorities regarding these dates is mortifying. The +four gospels are in reality four witnesses warring against each other. +They were selected haphazard at a human council. They were not composed +until the latter part of the second century, and the synoptic gospels +are compilations from unknown writers, while the fourth gospel is a much +later work. And how colourless, imitative, is the New when compared to +the Old Testament,—echoing with the antiphonal thunders of Jehovah and +his stern-mouthed Prophets! The passage in Josephus touching on Christ +is now known to have been interpolated.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> Authentic history does not +record the existence of Christ. Not one of His contemporaries mentions +him. That tremendous drama in Galilee was not even commented upon by the +Romans, a nation keen to notice any deviation from normal history. The +Jewish records are doubtful, written centuries after His supposed death. +And they are malicious. What cannot happen in two centuries? Hyzlo +reflected sadly upon Moslemism, upon Mormonism, upon the vagaries of a +strange American sect at whose head was said to be a female pope.</p> + +<p>The similarity of circumstances in the lives of Buddha and Christ also +annoyed him. Both were born of virgins, both renounced the world, both +were saviours. There were the same temptations, the same happenings; +prophecies, miracles, celestial rejoicings, a false disciple, the seven +beatitudes—a reflection of the Oriental wisdom—an expiatory death and +resurrection. The entire machinery of the Christian church, its saints, +martyrs, festivals, ritual, and philosophies are borrowed from the +mythologies of the pagans. Sun-worship is the beginning of all +religions. To the genius of the epileptic Paul, or Saul,—founders of +religions are always epilepts,—a half Greek and disciple of the +Pharisee Gamaliel, who saw visions and put to the sword his enemies, to +Paul, called a saint, a man of overwhelming personal force, to this +cruel anarchist, relentless, half-mad fanatic and his theological +doctrines we owe the preservation and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> power of the Christian Church. At +first the Christians were the miserable offscourings of society, slaves, +criminals, and lunatics. They burrowed in the Catacombs, they fastened +themselves upon a decaying and magnificent civilization like the +parasites they were. A series of political catastrophes, a popular +uprising against the rotten emperors of decadent Rome, and the wide +growth of the socialist idea—these things and an unscrupulous man, +Constantine the Great, put the Christians firmly in the saddle. And soon +came cataracts of blood. If the tales of the imperial persecutions are +true, then hath Christianity been revenged a million fold; where her +skirt has trailed there has been the cruel stain of slaughter. It must +not be forgotten, too, that immorality of the grossest sort was promised +the deluded sectarians, compared with which the Mahometan paradise is +spiritual. And the end of the world was predicted at the end of every +century, and finally relegated to the millennial celebration of +Christianity's birth. When, in 1000 <span class="smcap">a.d.</span>, this catastrophe did +not occur, the faith received its first great shock.</p> + +<p>He summoned to his memory a cloud of witnesses, all contradictory. +Josephus was barred. Philo Judæus, who was living near the centre of +things, an observer on the scent of the spiritual, a man acquainted with +the writings of Rabbi Hillel, and the father of Neoplatonism—never +mentions Jesus, nor does he speak of any religious uprising in Judea. +The passage in Virgil,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span> which has through the doubtful testimony of +monkish writers been construed into a prophecy of a forthcoming Messiah, +Hyzlo, who was a scholar, knew to have been addressed to a son of +Virgil's intimate friend. Tacitus, too, has been interpolated. Seneca's +ideal man is not Jesus, for Jesus is Osiris, Horus, Krishna, Mithra, +Hercules, Adonis,—think of this beautiful young god's death!—Buddha. +Such a mock trial and death could not have taken place under the Roman +or Jewish laws. The sacraments derive from the Greeks, from the +Indians—the mysteries of Ceres and Bacchus, from the <i>Haoma</i> sacrifice +of the Persians, originally Brahmanic. The Trinity, was it not a relic +of that ineradicable desire for polytheism implanted in the human bosom? +Was the crucifixion but a memory of those darker cults and blood +sacrifices of Asia, and also of the expiating goats sent out into the +wilderness? What became of that Hosanna-shouting crowd which welcomed +Christ on Palm Sunday? And there never were such places as Gethsemane +and Calvary. Alas! the Son of Man had indeed no spot to lay his head. +And why had He made no sign when on earth! Brother Hyzlo wept bitter +tears.</p> + +<p>But he wiped them away as he considered the similarity of the massacre +of the Innocents in Judea and the massacre of the male children ordered +by the wicked Indian Rajah of Madura, who feared the Krishna, just +conceived by divine agency. Yes, the chronicles were full of these<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span> gods +born of virgins, of crucifixions,—he could remember sixteen,—of these +solar myths. He caught tripping in a thousand cases the translations of +our holy books. The Ox and Ass legend at the Nativity he realized was +the Pseudo-Matthew's description to Habakkuk of the literal presence: +"In the midst of two animals thou shalt be known;" which is a +mistranslated Hebrew text in the Prayer ascribed to Habakkuk. It got +into the Greek Septuagint version of the Prophet made by Egyptian Jews +before 150 <span class="smcap">b.c.</span> It should read, "in the midst of the years," +not "animals." "Ah!" cried Hyzlo, "in this as in important cardinal +doctrines have the faithful been the slaves of the learned and +unscrupulous pious forgers. Even the notorious Apollonius of Tyana +imitated the miracles of Christ—all of them. And what of that wicked +wizard, Simon Magus?"</p> + +<p>The very repetition of these miracles in all races, at all epochs, +pointed to the doctrine of recurrence. But back of all the negations, +back of the inexpugnable proof that no such man or God as Christ +existed, or was known to his contemporaries, Jewish and Roman, there +must have been some legend which had crystallized into a mighty +religion. Was He an agitator who preferred His obscurity that His glory +might be all the greater? There <i>must</i> have been a beginning to the +myth; behind the gospels—though they are obviously imitated from the +older testaments, imitated and diluted<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span>—were unknown writings; previous +to these there was word of mouth and—and ...?</p> + +<p>The day had advanced, the sun was very warm. A shaft of light fell upon +the cold stone floor, and in its fiery particles darted myriads of +motes. Hyzlo followed their spiral flights, thinking all the while of +humanity which flashes from out the dark void, plays madly in the light, +only to vanish into the unknown night. His gaze was held by the +smoothness of the flagging at his feet. Then it became transformed into +marble, the walls of his cell widened, and he closed his eyes, so +blinding were the long ladders of light....</p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<h4>TWO DREAMERS</h4> + +<p>He opened them ... the harbour with its army of galleys and pleasure +craft lay in the burning sunshine, its surface a sapphire blue. Overhead +the sky echoed this tone, which modulated into deeper notes of purple on +the far-away hills whose tops were wreathed in mist. Under his sandalled +feet was marble, back of him were the gleaming spires and towers of the +great city, and at his left was a mountain of shining marble, the +Pharos.</p> + +<p>"Alexandria?" he called out as he was jostled by a melon-seller, and +startled by the fluted invitations of a young girl—an antique statue +come to life.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Of course it is Alexandria," replied a deep, harsh voice at his elbow. +He turned. It was his friend Philo.</p> + +<p>"You have at last emerged from your day-dream, Hyzlo! I thought, as our +bark clove the water, that you were enjoying visions." And it seemed to +Hyzlo that he had just awakened from a bizarre dream of a monastic cell, +to more beautiful sights and shapes and sounds. The pair now traversed +the quay, past the signal masts, the fortified towers, pushing through +the throng of sailors, courtesans, philosophers, fruitsellers, soldiers, +beggars, and idle rich toward the spacious city. Past the palace to the +wall of the Canal, along the banks of the Royal Port, they finally +struck into a broad, deserted avenue. At its head was a garden wall. +Philo introduced himself and his companion through a low door and +presently they were both in an apartment full of parchments, glittering +brass and gold instruments all reposing on a wide, long table.</p> + +<p>"Hyzlo," said the Jewish philosopher, in his slightly accented Greek, "I +have long promised you that I would reveal to you my secret, my life +work. I am downcast by sadness. Rome is full of warring cults, Greek, +African, Babylonian, Buddhistic; the writings of the great teachers, the +masters, Heraclitus, Zeno, Anaxagoras, Plato, Socrates, Epictetus, +Seneca, are overlaid with heretical emendations. The religion of my +fellow-countrymen is a fiery furnace, Jerusalem a den of warring +thieves. The rulers of earth<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> are weary and turn a deaf ear on their +peoples. The time is ripe for revolt. Sick of the accursed luxury and +debauchery, fearful of the threatening barbarians from Asia and the +boreal regions, who are hemming the civilized world, waiting like +vultures for the first sign of weakness to destroy everything, the +slaves in revolt—all these impending terrors assure me that the end of +the old order is at hand. But what will become of the new if there is no +central belief to steady the ensanguined hands of furious mobs? For +years I have bethought me of a drama, a gigantic world-drama which shall +embody all the myths of mankind, all the noblest thoughts of the +philosophers. I shall take the Buddha myth, surely the supreme myth, and +transpose its characters to Jerusalem. A humble Jew shall be <i>my</i> +Buddha. He shall be my revenge on our conquerors; for my people have +been trampled upon by the insolent Romans, and who knows—a Jewish God, +a crucified God, may be worshipped in the stead of Jupiter and his vile +pantheon of gods and goddesses! <i>One</i> God, the son of Jahveh who comes +upon earth to save mankind, is crucified and killed, is resurrected and +like Elijah is caught up to heaven in a fiery chariot. But you know the +usual style of these Asiatic legends! They are all alike; a virgin +birth, a miraculous life, and transfiguration. That sums up myths from +Adonis to Krishna, from Krishna to Buddha; though Monotheism comes from +the Hebrews, the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span> Trinity from the Indians, and the <i>logos</i> was +developed by Plato. Where I am original is that I make my hero a +Jew—the Jews are still half-cracked enough to believe in the coming of +a Messiah. And to compass a fine dramatic moment I have introduced an +incident I once witnessed in Alexandria at the landing of King Agrippa, +when the populace dressed up a vagabond named Karabas as a mock king and +stuck upon his head papyrus leaves for a crown, in his hand a reed for a +sceptre, and then saluted him as king. I shall make my Jew-God seized by +the Jews, his own blood and kin, given over to the Romans, mocked, +reviled, and set aside for some thief who shall be called Karabas. Then, +rejected, he shall be crucified, he a god born of a virgin, by the very +people who are looking for their Messiah. He is their Messiah; yet they +know it not. They shall never know it. That shall be their tragedy, the +tragedy of my race, which, notwithstanding the prophecies, turned its +back upon the Messiah because he came not clothed in the purple of +royalty. Is that not a magnificent idea for a drama?"</p> + +<p>"Excellent," answered Hyzlo, in a critical tone; "but continue!"</p> + +<p>"You seem without enthusiasm, Hyzlo. I tell you that Æschylus, +Sophocles, or Euripides never conceived a story more infinitely dramatic +or pathetic, or—thanks to my Hebraic blood—so suffused with tragic +irony. I shall make a very effective tableau at the death; on some<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> +forbidding stony hill near Jerusalem I shall plant my crucified hero, +and near him a converted courtesan—ah! what a master of the theatre I +am!—in company with a handful of faithful disciples. The others have +run away to save their cowardly skins in the tumult. The mobs that +hailed him as King of the Jews now taunt him, after the manner of all +mobs. His early life I shall borrow outright from the Buddha legends. He +shall be born of a virgin; he shall live in the desert; as a child he +shall confute learned doctors in the temple; and later in the desert he +shall be tempted by a demon. All this is at hand. My chief point is the +philosophies in which I shall submerge my characters.</p> + +<p>"My hero shall be the <i>logos</i> of Heraclitus with the superadded +authority of the Hebrew high priest. You may recall the fact that I +greatly admire the Essenes and their system. My deity is a pure essence; +not Jehovah the protector or avenger. The <i>logos</i>, or mediator, I have +borrowed from the writings of the Greek philosophers. This <i>logos</i> +returns to the bosom of God after the sacrifice. Greek philosophy +combined with Hebraic moral principles! Ah! it is grand synthesis; +Seneca with his conception of a perfected humanity, Lucretius, +Manlius—who called, rightfully too, Epicurus a god—and Heraclitus with +the first idea of a <i>logos</i>: all these ancient ideas I have worked into +my romantic play, including the old cult of the Trinities; the +Buddhistic: Buddha, Dharma,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> and Saingha; the Chinese: Heaven, Earth, +and Emperor; the Babylonian: Ea, the father, Marduk, the son, and the +Fire God, Gibil, who is also the Paraclete. So my philosophy is merely a +continuation and modification of that taught by Heraclitus and Plato, +but with a Jewish background—for <i>mine</i> is the only moral nation. The +wisdom of the Rabbis, their Monotheism and ethics, are all there." His +eyes were ablaze.</p> + +<p>"You are very erudite, Philo Judæus!" exclaimed his listener; "but, tell +me, is there no actual foundation for your Jewish god?" Hyzlo eagerly +awaited a reply, though he could not account for this curiosity.</p> + +<p>"Yes," answered Philo, lightly, "there is, I freely acknowledge, a +slight foundation. Some years ago in Jerusalem they arrested a +poverty-stricken fanatic, the son of a Jewess. His father was said to +have been an indigent and aged carpenter. This Joshua, or Ieshua, was +driven out of Jerusalem, and he took refuge among a lot of poor +fishermen on Lake Gennesareth. There he joined a sect called the +Baptists, because their founder, a socialist named Ioakanaan, poured +water on the heads of the converted. Ieshua never married and was +suspected of idolatrous practices, which he had absorbed from hermits of +the Egyptian Thebaïd. Josephus, a wise friend and companion of my youth, +wrote me these details. He said that Ieshua disappeared after his mad +attempt to take Jerusalem by storm, riding—as is depicted the Bona +Dea<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span>—on the back of a humble animal. Yet, if you wish to appeal to the +common folk, make your hero a deposed king or divinity, who walks +familiarly among the poor, as walked the gods at the dawn of time with +the daughters of men. I depict my protagonist as a half-cracked Jew. I +call him Iesus Christos—after Krishna; and this poor man's god proposes +to redeem the world, to place the lowly in the seats of the mighty—he +is an Anarchos, as they would say in Athens. He promises the Kingdom of +God to those who follow him; but only a few do. He is the friend of +outcasts, prostitutes, criminals. And though he does not triumph on +earth, nevertheless he is the spiritual ruler of earth; he is the Son of +the Trinity which comprises the Father and Holy Ghost. The contending +forces to my hero will be incarnated by Pontius Pilatus, the Roman +governor, and Judas of Kerioth, a very dangerous and powerful Hebrew +politician—a man of very liberal ideas, one who believed in the +supremacy of the West. What a glorious play it will make! I have named +it The Third Kingdom, Hyzlo. What a glorious idea it is, Hyzlo—the +greatest drama the world has ever witnessed!"</p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<h4>THE DOVE</h4> + +<p>"The greatest drama the world has ever witnessed" ... mumbled his +disciple....<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span> The sun still shone on the cold stone flagging, and upon +the wall facing him hung the crucifix. But the motes no longer danced +merrily in the light. Evening was setting in apace, and Hyzlo, accepting +one dream as equal in veracity with the other, crossed to the embrasure +and, his elbows on the sill, watched the sun—looking like a +sulphur-coloured cymbal—sink behind the sky-line. He was still in the +same attitude when the blue of the heavens—ah! but not that gorgeous, +hard Alexandrian blue—melted into peacock and cool saffron hues. He +mused aloud:—</p> + +<p>"By the very nature of his mental organs man can never grasp reality. It +is always the sensation, never the real thing, he feels. The +metaphysicians are right. We can never know the actual world outside of +ourselves. We are imprisoned in a dream cage; the globe itself is a cage +of echoes. Science, instead of contradicting religion, has but affirmed +its truths. Matter is radiant energy—matter is electric phenomenon. The +germ-plasma from which we stem—the red clay of Genesis—is eternal. The +individual is sacrificed to the species. The species never dies. And how +beautifully logical is the order of our ancestry as demonstrated by the +science of embryology. Fish, batrachians, reptiles, mammals; in which +latter are included the marsupials as well as lemurs, primates, Man. And +after what struggles Man assumed an erect position and looked into the +eyes of his mate! After Man? Nietzsche preaches<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span> that man is a link +between the primate and Superman; Superman—the angels! But intelligence +in man may be an accident caused by over-nutrition, the brain developing +from rich phosphors. If this were so—how would fall to earth our house +of pride! Are we so close to the animal? But Quinton proves that <i>after</i> +man in the zoölogical series comes the bird. Birds—half reptiles, half +angels. Angels! Do evolution and revelation meet here on common ground? +Or was Joachim, the Abbot of Flores, inspired when he wrote of the Third +Kingdom, that Kingdom in which the empire of the flesh is swallowed up +in the empire of the spirit; that Third Kingdom in which the +twin-natured shall reign, as Ibsen declares; the Messiah—neither +Emperor nor Redeemer, but the Emperor-God. The slime shall become sap +and the sap become spirit! From gorilla to God! Man in the coming Third +Kingdom may say: "I, too, am a god." But is this not blasphemous? And +after the wheel of the universe has again revolved, will I see, as +foresaw Nietzsche, the selfsame spider, the same moonlight? There is +nothing new under the sun, says Ecclesiastes. Wretched man is never to +know the entire truth but will be always at daggers drawn with his +destiny. After classic Paganism came romantic Christianity; after the +romantic will the pendulum swing back—or—alas! is there coming another +horde of atheists with a new Attila at their head?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span></p> + +<p>He threw himself before the crucifix and sobbed.</p> + +<p>"Lord Jesus, Our Christ! Thou art the real Christ and not the fiction of +that supersubtle Greek-Jewish and boastful philosopher in Alexandria! +Make for me, O God, a sign! Give me back in all its purity my faith; +faith, noblest gift of all! Oh! to hear once more the thrilling of the +harps divine, whereon the dawn plays, those precursors of the Eternal +Harmony! <i>Gloria in Excelsis</i>." He remained prostrate, his heart no +longer battered by doubts and swimming in blissful love for his +crucified God. The celestial hurricane subsided in his bosom; he arose +and again interrogated the heavens. The stars in the profound splendours +of the sky stared at him like the naked eyes of <i>houris</i>. Suddenly a +vast white cloud sailed over the edge of the horizon and as it +approached his habitation assumed the shape of a monstrous dove, its +fleecy wings moving in solemn rhythms. In the resurgence of his hopes +this apparition was the coveted sign from the Almighty.</p> + +<p>And flat upon the floor of his cell, his face abased in the dust, Hyzlo +worshipped in epileptic frenzy, crying aloud, after the manner of the +sad-tongued Preacher:—</p> + +<p>"The thing that hath been, it <i>is</i> that which shall be!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span></p> +<h2>XI</h2> + +<h3>THE HAUNTED HARPSICHORD</h3> + +<h4>[In the Style of Mock-Mediæval Fiction]</h4> + + +<p>I told Michael to look sharply to his horse. It was dusk; a few bits of +torn clouds, unresolved modulations of nebulous lace, trembled over the +pink pit in the west, wherein had sunk the sun; and one evening star, +silver pointed, told the tale of another spent day.</p> + +<p>Michael was surly, I was impatient, and the groom, who lagged in the +rear, whistled softly; but I knew that both men were tired and hungry, +and so were the horses. The road, hard and free from dust, echoed the +resilient hoof-falls of our beasts. The early evening was finely cool, +for it was the month of September. We had lost our way. Green fields on +either side, and before us the path declined down a steep slope, that +lost itself in huddled foliage.</p> + +<p>Michael spoke up:—</p> + +<p>"We are astray. I knew this damnable excursion would lead to no good."</p> + +<p>I gently chided him. "Pooh, you braggart! Even Arnold, who rides a brute +a world too wide for him, has not uttered a complaint. Brave Michael, if +her ladyship heard you now!"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span></p> + +<p>His face grew hard as he muttered:—</p> + +<p>"Her ladyship! may all the saints in the calendar watch over her +ladyship! But I wish she had never taken you at your hot-headed word. +Then we would not have launched upon this madcap adventure."</p> + +<p>I grew stern. "Her ladyship, I bid you remember, my worthy man, is our +mistress, and it ill behooves you to question her commands, especially +in the presence of a groom."</p> + +<p>Michael growled, and then the sudden turn in the road startled our +horses on a gallop, and for a quarter of an hour we thrashed our way +ahead in the twilight. We had entered a small thicket when an +ejaculation from Arnold—who had been riding abreast—brought us all up +to a sharp standstill.</p> + +<p>"There's a light," said the groom, in a most tranquil manner, pointing +his heavy crop stick to the left. How we had missed seeing the inn from +the crest of the hill was strange. A hundred yards away stood a low, +red-tiled house, with lights burning downstairs, and an unmistakable air +of hostlery for man and beast. We veered at once in our course, and in a +few minutes were hallooing for the host or the hostler.</p> + +<p>"Now I hope that you are satisfied, my friend," I said exultantly to +Michael, who only grunted as he swung off his animal. Arnold followed, +and soon we were chatting with an amiable old man in a white cap and +apron, who had run out of the house when we shouted.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Amboise?" he answered me when I told him of our destination. "Amboise; +why, sirrah, you are a good five leagues from Amboise! Step within and +remain here for the night. I have plenty of convenience for you and your +suite."</p> + +<p>I glanced at Michael, but he was busily employed in loosening his +pistols from the holster, and Arnold, in company with a lame man, led +the horses to the stable. There was little use in vain regrets. The +<i>other</i> had the start of the half-day, and surely we could go no further +that night. I gritted my teeth as the little fat landlord led us into +the house.</p> + +<p>In half an hour we were smoking our pipes before a lively fire—the +night had grown chilly—and enjoying silent recollections of a round of +beef and several bottles of fortifying burgundy.</p> + +<p>Our groom had gone to bed, and I soon saw that I could get nothing out +of Michael for the present. He stared moodily into the fire. I noticed +that his pistols were handy. The host came in and asked my permission to +join us. He felt lonely, he explained, for he was a widower, and his +only son was away in the world somewhere. I was very glad to ease myself +with gossip; my heart was not quite at peace with this expedition of +ours. I knew what her ladyship asked of us was much, so much that only a +bold spirit and a thirst for the unknown could pardon the folly of the +chase.</p> + +<p>I bade the innkeeper to take a seat at the fire,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> and soon we fell to +chatting like ladies' maids. He was a Norman and curious as a cat. He +opened his inquiries delicately.</p> + +<p>"You have ridden far and fast to-day, my sir. Your horses were all but +done for. Yet there is no cloud of war in the sky and you are too far +from Paris to be honourable envoys. I hope you like our country?"</p> + +<p>I dodged his tentative attempt at prying by asking him a question +myself.</p> + +<p>"You don't seem to have many guests, good host? Yet do I hardly wonder +at it. You are all but swallowed up in the green and too far from the +main travelled road."</p> + +<p>The little man sighed and said in sad accents: "Too true, yet the +Scarlet Dragon was once a thriving place, a fine money-breeding house. +Before my son went away—"</p> + +<p>I interrupted him. "Your son, what is he, and where is he now?"</p> + +<p>The other became visibly agitated and puffed at his pipe some minutes +before replying.</p> + +<p>"Alas! worthy sir," he said at last in a lower key, "my son dare not +return here for reasons I cannot divulge. Indeed, this was no cheerful +house for the boy. He had his ambitions and he left me to pursue them."</p> + +<p>"What does he do, this youngster?" interrupted Michael, in his gruffest +tones. The landlord started.</p> + +<p>"Indeed, good sir, I could not tell you, for I know not myself."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Humph!" grunted my sullen companion; but I observed his suspicious +little eyes fixed persistently on the man of the inn.</p> + +<p>I turned the talk, which had threatened to languish. The old man did not +relish the questions about his son, and began deploring the poor crops. +At this juncture an indefinable feeling that we were losing time in +stopping at this lonely place came over me. I am not superstitious, but +I swear that I felt ill at ease and confused in my plans.</p> + +<p>On bended knee I had sworn to my lady that I would bring back to her the +fugitive unharmed, and I would never return to her empty-handed, +confessing failure. Michael's queer behaviour disconcerted me. From the +outset of the chase he had turned sour and inaccessible, and now he was +so ill-tempered that I feared he would pick a quarrel at the slightest +provocation with our host.</p> + +<p>With a strange sinking at the heart I asked about our horses.</p> + +<p>"They will be attended to, my sirs; my servant is a good boy. He is +handy, although he can't get about lively, for he was thrown in a turnip +field from our only donkey."</p> + +<p>I was in no mood for this sort of chatter and quizzed the fellow as to +our beds.</p> + +<p>"We must be off early in the morning; we have important business to +transact at Amboise before the sun sets to-morrow," I testily remarked.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span></p> + +<p>"At Amboise—h'm, h'm! Well, I don't mind telling you that you can reach +Amboise by stroke of noon; and so you have business at Amboise, eh?"</p> + +<p>I saw Michael's brow lower at this wheedling little man's question, and +answered rather hastily and imprudently:—</p> + +<p>"Yes, business, my good man, important business, as you will see when we +return this road to-morrow night with the prize we are after."</p> + +<p>Michael jumped up and cried "Damnation!" and I at once saw my mistake. +The landlord's manner instantly altered. He looked at me triumphantly +and said:—</p> + +<p>"Beds, beds! but, my honoured sirs, I have no beds in the house. I +forgot to tell you that no guest has been upstairs in years, for certain +reasons. Indeed, sirs, I am so embarrassed! I should have told you at +once I have only a day trade. My regular customers would not dare to +stop here over night, as the house,"—here a cunning, even sinister, +look spread over the fellow's fat face—"the house bears an evil +reputation."</p> + +<p>Michael started and crossed himself, but not I. I suspected some deep +devilry and determined to discover it.</p> + +<p>"So ho? Haunted, eh? Well, ghosts and old women's stories shan't make me +budge until dawn. Go fetch more wine and open it here, mine host of the +Scarlet Dragon," I roared.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> The little man was nonplussed, hesitated a +moment, and then trotted off.</p> + +<p>I saw that Michael was at last aroused.</p> + +<p>"What diabolical fooling is this? If the place is haunted, I'm off."</p> + +<p>"I'm damned if I am," I said quite bravely, and more wine appeared. We +both sat down.</p> + +<p>The air had become nipping, and the blaze on the hearth was reassuring. +Besides, the wind was querulous, and I didn't fancy a ride at midnight, +even if my lady's quest were an urgent one.</p> + +<p>Michael held his peace as the wine was poured out, and I insisted on the +landlord drinking with us. We finished two bottles, and I sent for more. +I foresaw that sleep was out of the question, and so determined to make +a night of it.</p> + +<p>"Touching upon this ghost," I began, when the other bade me in God's +name not to jest. There were some things, he said, not to be broached in +honest Christian company.</p> + +<p>"A fig for your scruples!" I cried, emptying my glass; my head was hot +and I felt bold. "A fig, I say, for your bogie-man nonsense! Tell me at +what time doth this phantom choose to show itself." The landlord +shivered and drew his seat closer to the fire.</p> + +<p>"Oh, sir, do not jest! What I tell you is no matter for rude laughter. +Begging your pardon for my offer, if you will be patient, I will relate +to you the story, and how my misfortune came from this awful visitant."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span></p> + +<p>Even Michael seemed placated, and after I nodded my head in token of +assent the landlord related to us this story:—</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Once upon a time, sirs, when the great and good Louis, sixteenth of his +name, was King of France, this domain was the property of the Duke of +Langlois. The duke was proud and rich, and prouder and haughtier was his +duchess, who was born Berri. Ah! they were mighty folk then, before the +Revolution came with its sharp axes to clip off their heads. This inn +was the stable of the château, which stood off yonder in the woods. +Alas! nothing remains of it to-day but a few blackened foundations, for +it was burned to the earth by the red devils in '93. But at the time I +speak of, the château was a big, rich palace, full of gay folk; all the +nobility came there, and the duchess ruled the land.</p> + +<p>She was crazy for music, and to such lengths did she go in her madness +that she even invited as her guests celebrated composers and singers. +The duke was old-fashioned and hated those crazy people who lived only +to hum and strum. He would have none of them, and quarrels with his +duchess were of daily occurrence. Indeed, sirs, so bad did it become +that he swore that he would leave the house if Messire Gluck, or Messire +Piccini, or any of the other strolling vagabonds—so the duke called +them—entered his château. And he kept his word, did the duke. The +Chevalier Gluck, a fine, shapely<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span> man, was invited down by the duchess +and amused her and her guests by playing his wonderful tunes on the +beautiful harpsichord in the great salon.</p> + +<p>The duke would have none of this nonsense and went to Paris, where he +amused himself gambling and throwing gold into his mistresses' laps. The +duchess kept right on, and then the gossips of the neighbourhood began +to wag their busy tongues. The lady of the château was getting very fine +pleasure from the company of the handsome Austrian chevalier. It was +whispered that the Queen Marie Antoinette had looked with favourable +eyes upon the composer, and, furthermore, had lent him certain moneys to +further his schemes for reforming the stage.</p> + +<p>Reform, forsooth! all he cared for was the company of the duchess, and +he vowed that he could make better music at the château than up in noisy +Paris. On a fine afternoon it is said that it was no uncommon sight to +see the chevalier, all togged up in his bravest court costume, sword and +all, sitting at his harpsichord, playing ravishing music. This was out +in the pretty little park back of the château, and the duchess would sit +at Gluck's side and pour out champagne for him. All this may have been +idle talk, but at last the duke got wind of the rumours, and one night +he surprised the pair playing a duo at the harpsichord, and stabbed them +both dead.</p> + +<p>Since then the château was burned down, but the place has been haunted. +I, myself, good<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span> gentlemen, have heard ghostly music, and I swear to +you—</p> + +<p>"Oh, my God, listen, listen!"</p> + +<p>"What pagan nonsense!" blurted out Michael.</p> + +<p>I cautioned silence, and we all listened. The old man had slid off his +chair, and his face was chalky white. Michael's ugly mouth was half +opened in his black beard, and I confess that I felt rather chilly.</p> + +<p>Music, faint, tinkling, we certainly heard. It came with the wind in +little sobs, and then silence settled upon us.</p> + +<p>"It's the Chevalier Gluck, and he is playing to his duchess out in the +fields. See, I will open the door and show you," whispered the fat +landlord.</p> + +<p>He went slowly to the door, and we followed him breathlessly. The door +was pushed open, and we peered out. The wind was still high, and the +moon rode among rolling boulders of yellow, fleecy clouds.</p> + +<p>"There, there, over yonder, look; Mother of Christ, look at the ghost!" +the old man pointed a shaking hand.</p> + +<p>Just then the moonlight was blackened by a big cloud, and we heard the +tinkling music of a harpsichord again, but could see naught. The sounds +were plainer now, and presently resolved into the rhythmic accents of a +gavotte. But it seemed far away and very plaintive!</p> + +<p>"Hark," said Michael, in a hoarse voice. "That's the gavotte from +Pagliacci. Listen! Don't you remember it?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Pshaw!" I said roughly, for my nerves were all astir. "It's the Alceste +music of Gluck."</p> + +<p>"Look, look, gentlemen!" called our host, and as the moon glowed again +in the blue we saw at the edge of the forest a white figure, saw it, I +swear, although it vanished at once and the music ceased. I started to +follow, but Michael and the old man seized my arms, the door was closed +with a crash, and we found ourselves staring blankly into the fire, all +feeling a bit shaken up.</p> + +<p>It was Michael's turn to speak. "You may do what you please, but I stay +here for the night, no sleep for me," and he placed his pistols on his +knee.</p> + +<p>I looked at the landlord and I thought I saw an expression of +disappointment on his face, but I was not sure. He made some excuse +about being tired and went out of the room. We spent the rest of the +night in gloomy silence. We did not speak five words, for I saw that +conversation only irritated my companion.</p> + +<p>At dawn we walked into the sweet air and I called loudly for Arnold, who +looked sleepy and out of sorts when he appeared. The fat old man came to +see us off and smilingly accepted the silver I put into his hand for our +night's reckoning.</p> + +<p>"Au revoir, my old friend," I said as I pressed the unnecessary spur +into my horse's flank. "Au revoir, and look out for the ghost of the +gallant Chevalier Gluck. Tell him, with my compli<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span>ments, not to play +such latter-day tunes as the gavotte from Pagliacci."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I'll tell him, you may be sure," said he, quite dryly.</p> + +<p>We saluted and dashed down the road to Amboise, where we hoped to +capture our rare prize.</p> + +<p>We had ridden about a mile when a dog attempted to cross our path. We +all but ran the poor brute down.</p> + +<p>"Why, it's lame!" exclaimed Arnold.</p> + +<p>"Oh, if it were but a lame man, instead of a dog!" fervently said the +groom, who was in the secret of our quest.</p> + +<p>A horrid oath rang out on the smoky morning air. Michael, his wicked +eyes bulging fiercely, his thick neck swollen with rage, was cursing +like the army in Flanders, as related by dear old Uncle Toby.</p> + +<p>"Lame man! why, oddsbodkins, that hostler was lame! Oh, fooled, by God! +cheated, fooled, swindled and tricked by that scamp and scullion of the +inn! Oh, we've been nicely swindled by an old wives' tale of a ghost!"</p> + +<p>I stared in sheer amazement at Michael, wondering if the strangely spent +night had upset his reason. He could only splutter out between his awful +curses:—</p> + +<p>"Gluck, the rascal, the ghost, the man we're after! That +harpsichord—the lying knave—that tune—I swear it wasn't Gluck—oh, +the rascal has escaped again! The ghost story<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span>—the villain was told to +scare us out of the house—to put us off the track. A thousand devils +chase the scamp!" And Michael let his head drop on the pommel of his +saddle as he fairly groaned in the bitterness of defeat.</p> + +<p>I had just begun a dignified rebuke, for Michael's language was +inexcusable, when it flashed upon me that we had been, indeed, duped.</p> + +<p>"Ah," I cried, in my fury, "of course we were taken in! Of course his +son was the lame hostler, the very prize we expected to bag! O Lord! +what will we say to my lady? We are precious sharp! I ought to have +known better. That stuff he told us! Langlois, pshaw, Berri—pouf! A +Berri never married a Langlois, and I might have remembered that Gluck +wasn't assassinated by a jealous duke. What shall we do?"</p> + +<p>We all stood in the middle of the road, gazing stupidly at the lame dog +that gave us the clue. Then Arnold timidly suggested:—</p> + +<p>"Hadn't we better go back to the inn?"</p> + +<p>Instantly our horses' heads were turned and we galloped madly back on +our old tracks. Not a word was uttered until we reined up in front of +the lonely house, which looked more haunted by daylight than it did the +night before.</p> + +<p>"What did I tell you?" suddenly cried Michael.</p> + +<p>"What do you mean?" I asked.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Over there, you blind bat!" he said, coarsely and impatiently; and +pulling out his pistol he fired thrice, and a low, melodious sound +followed the reports of his weapon. When the smoke cleared away I saw +that he had hit an old harpsichord which stood against a tree, facing +the house.</p> + +<p>"The ghost!" we yelled, and then we laughed consumedly. But the shots +that winged the old-fashioned instrument had a greater result. The fat +host appeared on the edge of the forest, and he waved a large napkin as +a flag of truce. With him was the lame hostler.</p> + +<p>"Mercy, gentlemen, mercy, we beseech you!" he cried, and we soon +surrounded both and bound them securely.</p> + +<p>"You will pay dearly for the trick you put upon us, my man," said +Michael, grimly, and, walking our horses, we went by easy stages toward +the castle, towing our prisoners along.</p> + +<p>When I fetched the lame man to my lady, her face glowed with joy, and +her Parisian eyes grew brilliant with victory.</p> + +<p>"So you tried to escape?" she cruelly asked of the poor, cowering +wretch. "You will never get another chance, I'll warrant me. Go, let the +servants put you to work in the large music room first. Begin with the +grands, then follow with the uprights. Thank you, gentlemen both, for +the courage and finesse you displayed in this desperate quest. I'll see +that you are both suitably rewarded." I fancied that Michael regarded<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span> +me sardonically, but he held his peace about the night's adventures.</p> + +<p>We had indeed reason to feel flattered at the success of the dangerous +expedition. Had we not captured, more by sheer good luck than strategy, +the only piano-tuner in mediæval France?</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span></p> +<h2>XII</h2> + +<h3>THE TRAGIC WALL</h3> + + +<h4>I</h4> + +<h4>BY THE DARK POOL</h4> + +<p>It was not so high, the wall, as massive, not so old as moss-covered. +After Rudolph Côt, the painter, had achieved celebrity with his +historical canvas, The Death of the Antique World, now in the Louvre, he +bought the estate of Chalfontaine, which lies at the junction of two +highroads: one leading to Ecouen, the other to Villiers-le-Bel. Almost +touching the end of the park on the Ecouen side there is a little lake, +hardly larger than a pool, and because of its melancholy +aspect—sorrowful willows hem it about, drooping into stagnant +waters—Monsieur Côt had christened the spot: The Dark Tarn of Auber. He +was a fanatical lover of Poe, reading him in the Baudelaire translation, +and openly avowing his preference for the French version of the great +American's tales. That he could speak only five words of English did not +deter his associates from considering him a profound critic of +literature.</p> + +<p>After his death his property and invested<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span> wealth passed into the hands +of his youthful widow, a charming lady, a native of Burgundy, and—if +gossip did not lie—a former model of the artist; indeed, some went so +far as to assert that her face could be seen in her late husband's +masterpiece—the figure of a young Greek slave attired as a joyous +bacchante. But her friends always denied this. Her dignified bearing, +sincere sorrow for her dead husband, and her motherly solicitude for her +daughter left no doubt as to the value of all petty talk. It was her +custom of summer evenings to walk to the pool, and with her daughter +Berenice she would sit on the broad wall and watch the moon rise, or +acknowledge the respectful salutations of the country folk with their +bran-speckled faces. In those days Villiers-le-Bel was a dull town a +half-hour from Paris on the Northern Railway, and about two miles from +the station.</p> + +<p>The widow was not long without offers. Her usual answer was to point out +the tiny Berenice, playing in the garden with her nurse. Then a +landscape painter, one of the Barbizon group, appeared, and, as a former +associate of Rudolph Côt, and a man of means and position, his suit was +successful. To the astonishment of Villiers-le-Bel, Madame Valerie Côt +became Madame Théophile Mineur; on the day of the wedding little +Berenice—named after a particularly uncanny heroine of Poe's by his +relentless French admirer—scratched the long features of her +stepfather. The entire town accepted this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span> as a distressing omen and it +was not deceived; Berenice Côt grew up in the likeness of a determined +young lady whose mother weakly endured her tyranny, whose new father +secretly feared her.</p> + +<p>At the age of eighteen she had refused nearly all the young painters +between Ecouen and Domaine de Vallières; and had spent several summers +in England, and four years at a Lausanne school. She feared neither man +nor mouse, and once, when she saw a famous Polish pianist walking on his +terrace at Morges, she took him by the hand, asked for a lock of his +hair, and was not refused by the amiable virtuoso. After that Berenice +was the acknowledged leader of her class. The teachers trembled before +her sparkling, wrathful black eyes. At home she ruled the household, and +as she was an heiress no one dared to contradict her. Her contempt for +her stepfather was only matched by her impatience in the company of +young men. She pretended—so her intimates said—to loathe them. +"Frivolous idiots" was her mildest form of reproof when an ambitious boy +would trench upon her pet art theories or attempt to flirt. She called +her mother "the lamb" and her stepfather "the parrot"—he had a long +curved nose; all together she was very unlike the pattern French girl. +Her favourite lounging place was the wall, and after she had draped it +with a scarlet shawl and perched herself upon it, she was only too +happy<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span> to worry any unfortunate man who presented himself.</p> + +<p>The night Hubert Falcroft called at Chalfontaine Mademoiselle Élise +Evergonde told him that her cousin, Madame Mineur, and Berenice had gone +in the direction of the pool. He had walked over from the station, +preferring the open air to the stuffy train. So a few vigorous steps +brought to his view mother and daughter as they slowly moved, encircling +each other's waist. The painter paused and noted the general loveliness +of the picture; the setting sun had splashed the blue basin overhead +with delicate pinks, and in the fretted edges of some high floating +cloud-fleece there was a glint of fire. The smooth grass parquet swept +gracefully to the semicircle of dark green trees, against the foliage of +which the virginal white of the gowns was transposed to an ivory tone by +the blue and green keys in sky and forest.</p> + +<p>"By Jove!" he exclaimed, "paint in the foreground a few peacocks +languidly dragging their gorgeous tails, and you have a Watteau or a +Fragonard—no, a Monticelli! Only, Monticelli would have made the +peacocks the central motive with the women and trees as an arabesque."</p> + +<p>He was a portraitist who solemnly believed in the principle of +decoration—character must take its chances when he painted. Falcroft +was successful with women's heads, which he was fond of depicting in +misty shadows framed by luxuri<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span>ous accessories. They called him the +Master of Chiffon, at Julien's; when he threw overboard his old friends +and joined the new crowd, their indignation was great. His title now was +the Ribbon Impressionist, and at the last salon of the Independents, +Falcroft had the mortification of seeing a battalion of his former +companions at anchor in front of his picture, The Lady with the Cat, +which they reviled for at least an hour. He was an American who had +lived his life long in France, and only showed race in his nervous, +brilliant technic and his fondness for bizarre subjects....</p> + +<p>He had not stood many minutes when a young voice saluted him:—</p> + +<p>"Ah, Monsieur Falcroft. Come, come quickly. Mamma is delighted to see +you!" His mental picture was decomposed by the repeated waving of the +famous shawl, which only came into view as Berenice turned. Hubert +regretted that she had not worn it—the peacocks could have been +exchanged for its vivid note of scarlet. Pretending not to have heard +her speech, he gravely saluted the mother and daughter. But Berenice was +unabashed.</p> + +<p>"Mamma was wondering if you would visit us to-night, Monsieur Falcroft, +when I saw you staring at us as if we were ghosts." A burst of malicious +laughter followed.</p> + +<p>"Berenice, Berenice," remonstrated her mother, "when will you cease such +tasteless remarks!" She blushed in her pretty matronly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span> fashion and put +her hand on her daughter's mouth.</p> + +<p>"Don't mind her, Madame Mineur! I like to meet a French girl with a +little unconventionality. Berenice reminds me now of an English girl—"</p> + +<p>"Or one of your own countrywomen!" interrupted Berenice; "and +please—<i>Miss</i>, after this, I am a grown young lady." He joined in the +merriment. She was not to be resisted and he wished—no, he did not +wish—but he thought, that if he were younger, what gay days he might +have. Yet he admired her mother much more. Elaine Côt-Mineur was an +old-fashioned woman, gentle, reserved, and at the age when her beauty +had a rare autumnal quality—the very apex of its perfection; in a few +years, in a year, perhaps, the change would come and crabbed winter set +in. He particularly admired the oval of her face, her soft brown eyes, +and the harmonious contour of her head. He saw her instantly with a +painter's imagination—filmy lace must modulate about her head like a +dreamy aureole; across her figure a scarf of yellow silk; in her hands +he would paint a crystal vase, and in the vase one rose with a heart of +sulphur. And her eyes would gaze as if she saw the symbol of her +age—the days slipping away like ropes of sand from her grasp. He could +make a fascinating portrait he thought, and he said so. Instantly +another peal of irritating laughter came from Berenice:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span>—</p> + +<p>"Don't tell papa. He is <i>so</i> jealous of the portrait he tried to make of +mamma last summer. You never saw it! It's awful. It's hid away behind a +lot of canvases in the atelier. It looks like a Cézanne still-life. I'll +show it to you sometime." Her mother revealed annoyance by compressing +her lips. Falcroft said nothing. They had skirted the pool in single +file, for the path was narrow and the denseness of the trees caused a +partial obscurity. When they reached the wall, the moon was rising in +the eastern sky.</p> + +<p>"<i>L'heure exquise</i>," murmured Madame Mineur. Berenice wandered down the +road and Hubert helped her mother to the wall, where he sat beside her +and looked at her. He was a big, muscular man with shaven cheeks, dark +eyes, and plenty of tumbled hair, in which flecks of gray were showing. +He had been a classmate of Théophile Mineur, for whose talents or +personality he had never betrayed much liking. But one day at a +<i>déjeûner</i>, which had prolonged itself until evening, Mineur insisted on +his old friend—the Burgundy was old, too—accompanying him to +Villiers-le-Bel, and not without a motive. He knew Falcroft to be rich, +and he would not be sorry to see his capricious and mischievous +stepdaughter well settled. But Falcroft immediately paid court to Madame +Mineur, and Berenice had to content herself with watching him and making +fun to her stepfather of the American painter's height and ges<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span>tures. +The visit had been repeated. Berenice was amused by a dinner <i>en ville</i> +and a theatre party, and then Hubert Falcroft became a friend of the +household. When Mineur was away painting, the visits were not +interrupted.</p> + +<p>"Listen," said Madame Mineur; "I wish to speak with you seriously, my +dear friend." She made a movement as if to place her hand on his +shoulder, but his expression—his face was in the light—caused her to +transfer her plump fingers to her coiffure, which she touched +dexterously. Hubert was disappointed.</p> + +<p>"I am listening," he answered; "is it a sermon, or consent—to that +portrait? Come, give in—Elaine." He had never called her by this name +before, and he anxiously awaited the result. But she did not relax her +grave attitude.</p> + +<p>"You must know, Monsieur Falcroft, what anxieties we undergo about +Berenice. She is too wild for a French girl, too wild for her age—"</p> + +<p>"Oh, let her enjoy her youth," he interrupted.</p> + +<p>"Alas! that youth will be soon a thing of the past," she sighed. +"Berenice is past eighteen, and her father and I must consider her +future. Figure to yourself—she dislikes young men, eligible or not, and +you are the only man she tolerates."</p> + +<p>"And I am hopelessly ineligible," he laughingly said.</p> + +<p>"Why?" asked the mother, quietly.</p> + +<p>"Why! Do you know that I am nearing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> forty? Do you see the pepper and +salt in my hair? After one passes twoscore it is time to think of the +past, not of the future. I am over the brow of the hill; I see the easy +decline of the road—it doesn't seem as long as when I climbed the other +half." He smiled, threw back his strong shoulders, and inhaled a huge +breath of air.</p> + +<p>"Truly you are childish," she said; "you are at the best part of your +life, of your career. Yes, Théophile, my husband, who is so chary in his +praise, said that you would go far if you cared." Her low, warm voice, +with its pleading inflections, thrilled him. He took her by the wrist.</p> + +<p>"And would it please <i>you</i>, if I went far?" She trembled.</p> + +<p>"Not too far, dear friend—remember Berenice."</p> + +<p>"I remember no one but you," he impatiently answered; and relaxing his +hold, he moved so that the moonlight shone on her face. She was pale. In +her eyes there were fright and hope, decision and delight. He admired +her more than ever.</p> + +<p>"Let me paint you, Elaine, these next few weeks. It will be a surprise +for Mineur. And I shall have something to cherish. Never mind about +Berenice. She is a child. I am a middle-aged man. Between us is the +wall—of the years. Never should it be climbed. While you—"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Be careful—Hubert. Théophile is your friend."</p> + +<p>"He is not. I never cared for him. He dragged me out here after he had +been drinking too much, and when I saw you I could not stay away. Hear +me—I insist! Berenice is nice, but the wall is too high for her to +climb; it might prove a—"</p> + +<p>"How do you know the wall is too steep for Berenice?" the girl cried as +she scaled the top with apish agility, where, after a few mocking steps +in the moonlight, she sank down breathless beside Hubert, and laughed so +loudly that her mother was fearful of hysteria.</p> + +<p>"Berenice! Berenice!" she exclaimed.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Berenice is all right, mamma. Master Hubert, I want you to paint my +portrait before papa returns—that's to be in four weeks, isn't it?" The +elder pair regarded her disconcertedly.</p> + +<p>"Oh, you needn't look so dismal. I'll not tell tales out of school. +Hubert and mamma flirting! What a glorious jest! Isn't life a jest, +Hubert? Let's make a bargain! If you paint mamma, you paint me, also. +Then—you see—papa will not be jealous, and—and—" She was near tears +her mother felt, and she leaned over Hubert and took the girl's hand. +She grazed the long fingers of the painter, who at once caught both +feminine hands in his.</p> + +<p>"Now I have you both," he boasted, and was shocked by a vicious tap on +the cheek—Bere<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span>nice in rage pulled her left hand free. Silence ensued. +Hubert prudently began to roll another cigarette, and Madame Mineur +retreated out of the moonlight, while Berenice turned her back and soon +began to hum. The artist spoke first:</p> + +<p>"See here, you silly Berenice, turn around! I want to talk to you like a +Dutch uncle—as we say in the United States. Of course I'll paint you. +But I begin with your mother. And if you wish me to like you better than +ever, don't say such things as you did. It hurts your—mother." His +voice dropped into its deepest bass. She faced him, and he saw the +glitter of wet eyelashes. She was charming, with her hair in disorder, +her eyes two burning points of fire.</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon, mamma; I beg your pardon, Hubert. I'll be good the +rest of this evening. Isn't it lovely?" She sniffed in the breeze with +dilating nostrils, and the wild look of her set him to wondering how +such a gentle mother could have such a gypsy daughter. Perhaps it was +the father—yes, the old man had been an Apache in his youth according +to the slang of the studios.</p> + +<p>"But you must paint me as I wish, not as you will," resumed Berenice. "I +hate conventional portraits. Papa Mineur chills me with his cabinet +pictures of haughty society ladies, their faces as stiff as their +starched gowns."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Berenice, will you never say polite things of your father?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Never," she defiantly replied. "He wouldn't believe me if I did. No, +Hubert, I want to pose as Ophelia. Oh, don't laugh, please!" They could +not help it, and she leaped to the grass and called out:—</p> + +<p>"I don't mean a theatrical Ophelia, singing songs and spilling flowers; +I mean Ophelia drowned—" she threw herself on the sward, her arms +crossed on her bosom, and in the moonlight they could see her eyes +closed as if by death.</p> + +<p>"Help me down, Hubert. That girl will go mad some day." He reached the +earth and he gave her a hand. Berenice had arisen. Sulkily she said:—</p> + +<p>"Shall I step into the Dark Tarn of Auber and float for you? I'll make a +realistic picture, my Master Painter—who paints without imagination." +And then she darted into the shrubbery and was lost to view. Without +further speech the two regained the path and returned to the house.</p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<h4>THE CRIMSON SPLASH</h4> + +<p>When Éloise was asked by Berenice how long Monsieur Mineur would remain +away on his tour, she did not reply. Rather, she put a question herself: +why this sudden solicitude about the little-loved stepfather. Berenice +jokingly answered<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span> that she thought of slipping away to Switzerland for +a <i>vacance</i> on her own account. Éloise, who was not agreeable looking, +viewed her charge suspiciously.</p> + +<p>"Young lady, you are too deep for me. But you'll bear watching," she +grimly confessed. Berenice skipped about her teasingly.</p> + +<p>"I know something, but I won't tell, unless you tell."</p> + +<p>"What is it?"</p> + +<p>"Will you tell?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"When is he coming back, and where is he now?" she insisted.</p> + +<p>"Your father, you half-crazy child, expects to return in a month—by the +first of June. And if you wish to wire or write him, let me know."</p> + +<p>"Now I won't tell you <i>my</i> secret," and she was off like a gale of wind. +Éloise shook her head and wondered.</p> + +<p>In the atelier Hubert painted. Elaine sat on a dais, her hands folded in +her lap; about her head twisted nun's-veiling gave her the old-fashioned +quality of a Cosway miniature—the very effect he had sought. It was to +be a "pretty" affair, this picture, with its subdued lighting, the face +being the only target he aimed at; all the rest, the suave background, +the gauzy draperies, he would brush in—suggest rather than state.</p> + +<p>"I'll paint her soul, that sensitive soul of hers which tremulously +peeps out of her eyes," he thought. Elaine was a patient subject. She<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> +took the pose naturally and scarcely breathed during the weary sittings. +He recalled the early gossip and sought to evoke her as a professional +model. But he gave up in despair. She was hopelessly "ladylike," and to +interpret her adequately, only the decorative patterns of earlier +men—Mignard, Van Loo, Nattier, Largillière—would translate her native +delicacy.</p> + +<p>For nearly four weeks he had laboured on the face, painting it in with +meticulous touches only to rub it out with savage disgust. To transcribe +those tranquil, liquid eyes, their expression more naïve than her +daughter's—this had proved too difficult a problem for the usually +facile technique of Falcroft. Give him a brilliant virtuoso theme and he +could handle it with some of the sweep and splendour of the early +Carolus Duran or the brutal elegance of the later Boldini. But Madame +Mineur was a pastoral. She did not express nervous gesture. She was +seldom dynamic. To "do" her in dots like the <i>pointillistes</i> or in +touches after the manner of the earlier impressionists would be +ridiculous. Her abiding charm was her repose. She brought to him the +quiet values of an eighteenth-century eclogue—he saw her as a divinely +artificial shepherdess watching an unreal flock, while the haze of +decorative atmosphere would envelop her, with not a vestige of real life +on the canvas. Yet he knew her as a natural, lovable woman, a mother who +had suffered and would<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span> suffer because of her love for her only child. +It was a paradox, like many other paradoxes of art.</p> + +<p>The daughter—ah! perhaps she might better suit his style. She was +admirable in her madcap carelessness and exotic colouring. Decidedly he +would paint her when this picture was finished—if it ever would be.</p> + +<p>Berenice avoided entering the studio during these sittings. She no +longer jested with her mother about the picture, and with Hubert she +preserved such an air of dignity that he fancied he had offended her. He +usually came to Villiers-le-Bel on an early train three or four times a +week and remained at Chalfontaine until ten o'clock. Never but once had +a severe storm forced him to stay overnight. Since the episode on the +wall he had not attempted any further advances. He felt happy in the +company of Elaine, and gazing into her large eyes rested his spirit. It +was true—he no longer played with ease the rôle of a soul-hunter. His +youth had been troubled by many adventures, many foolish ones, and now +he felt a calm in the midway of his life and that desire for domestic +ease which sooner or later overtakes all men. He fancied himself +painting Elaine on just such tranquil summer afternoons under a soft +light. And oh! the joys of long walks, discreet gossip, and dinners at a +well-served table with a few chosen friends. Was he, after all, longing +for the flesh-pots of the philistine—he, Hubert Falcroft, who<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span> had +patrolled the boulevards like other sportsmen of midnight!</p> + +<p>At last the picture began to glow with that inner light he had so +patiently pursued. Elaine Mineur looked at him from the canvas with +veiled sweetness, a smile almost enigmatic lurking about her lips. +Deepen a few lines and her expression would be one of contented +sleekness. <i>That</i> Hubert had missed by a stroke. It was in her eyes that +her chief glory abided. They were pathetic without resignation, liquid +without humidity, indescribable in colouring and form. Their full cup +and the accents which experience had graven under them were something he +had never dreamed of realizing. It was a Cosway; but a Cosway broadened +and without a hint of genteel namby-pamby or overelaborate finesse. +Hubert was fairly satisfied. Madame Mineur had little to say. During the +sittings she seldom spoke, and if their eyes met, the richness of her +glance was a compensation for her lack of loquacity. Hubert did not +complain. He was in no hurry. To be under the same roof with this +adorable woman was all that he asked.</p> + +<p>The day after he had finished his picture, he returned to Chalfontaine +for the midday breakfast. Berenice was absent—in her room with a +headache, her mother explained. The weather was sultry. He questioned +Elaine during the meal. Had Berenice's temper improved? They passed out +to the balcony where their coffee was served, and when he lighted his +cig<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span>arette, Madame Mineur begged to be excused. She had promised Cousin +Éloise to pay some calls. He strolled over the lawn, watching the +hummocks of white clouds which piled up in architectural masses across +the southern sky. Then he remembered the portrait and mounted to the +atelier. As he put his hand on the knob of the door he thought he heard +some one weeping. Suddenly the door was pulled from his grasp and +Berenice appeared. Her hair hung on her shoulders. She was in a white +dressing-gown. Her face was red and her eyes swollen. She did not +attempt to move. Affectionately Hubert caught her in his arms and asked +about her headache.</p> + +<p>"It is better," she answered in scarcely audible accents.</p> + +<p>"Why, you poor child! I hope you are not going to be ill! Have you been +racing in the sun without your hat?"</p> + +<p>"No. I haven't been out of doors since yesterday."</p> + +<p>"What's the matter, little Berenice? Has some one been cross with her?" +She pushed him from her violently.</p> + +<p>"Hubert Falcroft, when you treat me as a woman and not as a child—"</p> + +<p>"But I am treating you as a woman," he said. Her dark face became +tragic. She had emerged from girlhood in a few hours. And as he held her +closer some perverse spirit entered into his soul. Her vibrating youth +and beauty forced<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span> him to gaze into her blazing eyes until he saw the +pupils contract.</p> + +<p>"Let me go!" she panted. "Let me free! I am not a doll. Go to your +portrait and worship it. Let me free!"</p> + +<p>"And what if I do not?" Something of her rebellious feeling filled his +veins. He felt younger, stronger, fiercer. He put his arms about her +neck and, after a silent battle, kissed her. Then she pushed by him and +disappeared. He could see nothing, after the shock of the adventure, for +some moments, and the semi-obscurity of the atelier was grateful to his +eyes. A picture stood on the easel, but it was not, he fancied, the +portrait. He went to the centre of the room where hung the cords that +controlled the curtains covering the glass roof. Then in the flood of +light he barely recognized the head of Elaine. It was on the easel, and +with a sharp pain at his heart he saw across the face a big crimson +splash.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<h4>MOON-RAYS</h4> + +<p>The dewy brightness of tangled blush roses had faded in the vague +twilight; through the aisles of the little wood leading to the pool the +light timidly flickered as Hubert and Elaine walked with the hesitating +steps of perplexed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span> persons. They had not spoken since they left the +house—there in a few hurried words he told her of the accident and +noted with sorrow the look of anguish in her eyes. Without knowing why, +they went in the direction of the wall.</p> + +<p>There was no moon when they reached the highroad. It would rise later, +Elaine said in her low, slightly monotonous voice. Hubert was so stunned +by the memory of his ruined picture that he forgot his earlier encounter +with Berenice—that is, in describing it he had failed to minutely +record his behaviour. But in the cool evening air his conscience became +alive and he guiltily wondered whether he dare tell his misconduct—no, +imprudence? Why not? She regarded him as a possible husband for +Berenice—but how embarrassing! He made up his mind to say nothing; when +the morrow came he would write Elaine the truth and bid her good-by. He +could not in honour continue to visit this home where resided the woman +he loved—with a jealous daughter. Why jealous? What a puzzle, and what +an absurd one! He helped Elaine to a seat on the wall and sat near her. +For several minutes neither spoke. They were again facing the pool, +which looked in the dusk like a cracked mirror.</p> + +<p>"It is not clear yet to me," murmured Elaine. "That the unfortunate +child has always been more or less morbid and sick-brained, I have been +aware. The world, marriage, and active<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span> existence will mend all that, I +hope. I fear she is a little spoilt and selfish. And she doesn't love me +very much. She has inherited all her father's passion for Poe's tales. +My dear friend, she is jealous—that's the only solution of this +shocking act. She disliked the idea of my portrait from the start. You +remember on this spot hardly a month ago she challenged you to paint her +as the drowned Ophelia!—and all her teasing about Monsieur Mineur and +his jealousy, and—"</p> + +<p>"Our flirtation," added Hubert, sadly.</p> + +<p>"Oh, pray do not say such a thing! She is so hot-headed, so fond of you. +Yes, I saw it from the beginning, and your talk about the insurmountable +wall of middle-age did not deceive me. I only hope that will not be a +tragic wall for her, for you—or for me...."</p> + +<p>Her words trailed into a mere whisper. He put his hand over hers and +again they were silent. About them the green of the forest had been +transformed by the growing night into great clumps of velvety darkness +and the vault overhead was empty of stars. June airs fanned their +discontent into mild despair, and simultaneously they dreamed of another +life, of a harmonious existence far from Paris, into which the phantom +of Théophile Mineur would never intrude. Yet they made no demonstration +of their affection—they would have been happy to sit and dream on this +moon-haunted wall, near this nocturnal pool, forever. Hubert pictured<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span> +Berenice in her room, behind bolted doors, lying across the bed weeping, +or else staring in sullen repentance at the white ceiling. Why had she +indulged in such vandalism? The portrait was utterly destroyed by the +flaring smear laid on with a brush in the hand of an enraged young +animal. What sort of a woman might not develop from this tempestuous +girl! He knew that he had mortally offended her by his rudeness. But it +was after, not before, the cruel treatment of his beloved work. Yet, how +like a man had been his rapid succumbing to transitory temptation! For +it was transitory—of that he was sure. The woman he loved, with a +reverent love, was next to him, and if his pulse did not beat as +furiously at this moment as earlier in the day, why—all the better. He +was through forever with his boyish recklessness.</p> + +<p>"Another peculiar thing," broke in Elaine, as if she had been thinking +aloud, "is that Berenice has been pestering Éloise for her father's +address."</p> + +<p>"Her father's address?" echoed her companion.</p> + +<p>"Yes; but whether she wrote to him Éloise could not say."</p> + +<p>"Why should she write to him? She dislikes him—dislikes him almost as +much—" he was about to pronounce his own name. She caught him up.</p> + +<p>"Yes, that is the singular part of this singular affair. She felt +slighted because you painted<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span> my portrait before hers. I confess I have +had my misgivings. You should have been more considerate of her +feelings, Hubert, my friend." She paused and sighed. For him the sigh +was a spark that blew up the magazine of his firmest resolves. He had +been touching her hands fraternally. His arm embraced her so that she +could not escape, as this middle-aged man told his passion with the +ardour of an enamoured youth.</p> + +<p>"You dare not tell me you do not care for me! Elaine—let us reason. I +loved you since the first moment I met you. It is folly to talk of +Mineur and my friendship for him. I dislike, I despise him. It is folly +to talk of Berenice and her childish pranks. What if she did cruelly +spoil my work, <i>our</i> work! She will get over it. Girls always do get +over these things. Let us accept conditions as they are. Say you love +me—a little bit—and I'll be content to remain at your side, a friend, +<i>always</i> that. I'll paint you again—much more beautifully than before." +He was hoarse from the intensity of his feelings. The moon had risen and +tipped with its silver brush the tops of the trees.</p> + +<p>"And—my husband? And Berenice?"</p> + +<p>"Let things remain as they are." He pressed her to him. A crackling in +the underbrush and a faint plash in the lake startled them asunder. They +listened with ears that seemed like beating hearts. There was no +movement; only a night bird plaintively piped in the distance and a +clock struck the quarter.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span></p> + +<p>Elaine, now thoroughly frightened, tried to get down from the wall. +Hubert restrained her, and as they stood thus, a moaning like the wind +in autumnal leaves reached them. The moon-rays began to touch the water, +and suddenly a nimbus of light formed about a floating face in the pool. +The luminous path broadened, and to their horror they saw Berenice, her +hair outspread, her arms crossed on her young bosom, lying in the little +lake. Elaine screamed:—</p> + +<p>"My God! My God! It is Berenice!—Berenice, I am punished for my +wickedness to you!" Hubert, stunned by the vision, did not stir, as the +almost fainting mother gripped his neck.</p> + +<p>And then the eyes of the whimsical girl opened. A malicious smile +distorted her pretty face. Slowly she arose, a dripping ghost in white, +and pointing her long, thin fingers in the direction of the Ecouen road +she mockingly cried:—</p> + +<p>"There is some one to see your portrait at last, dear Master Painter." +And saying this she vanished in the gloom, instantly followed by her +agitated mother.</p> + +<p>Hubert turned toward the wall, and upon it he recognized the stepfather +of Berenice. After staring at each other like two moon-struck wights, +the American spoke:—</p> + +<p>"I swear that I, alone, am to blame for this—" The other wore the grin +of a malevolent satyr. His voice was thick.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Why apologize, Hubert? You know that it has been my devoted wish that +you marry Berenice." He swayed on his perch. Hubert's brain was in a +fog.</p> + +<p>"Berenice!" said he.</p> + +<p>"Yes—Berenice. Why not? She loves you."</p> + +<p>"Then—you—Madame Mineur—" stammered Hubert. The Frenchman placed his +finger on his nose and slyly whispered:—</p> + +<p>"Don't be afraid! I'll not tell my wife that I caught Berenice with you +alone in the park—you Don Juan! Now to the portrait—I must see that +masterpiece of yours. Berenice wrote me about it." He nodded his head +sleepily.</p> + +<p>"Berenice wrote you about it!" was the mechanical reply.</p> + +<p>"I'll join you and we'll go to the house." He tried to step down, but +rolled over at Hubert's feet.</p> + +<p>"What a joke is this champagne," he growled as he was lifted to his +tottering legs. "We had a glorious time this afternoon before I left +Paris. Hurrah! You're to be my son-in-law. And, my boy, I don't envy +you—that's the truth. With such a little demon for a wife—I pity you, +pity you—hurrah!"</p> + +<p>"I am more to be despised," muttered Hubert Falcroft, as they moved away +from the peaceful moonlit wall.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span></p> +<h2>XIII</h2> + +<h3>A SENTIMENTAL REBELLION</h3> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>I came not to send peace, but a sword.... I am come to send fire on +the earth.</p></div> + + +<h4>I</h4> + +<p>Her living room was a material projection of Yetta Silverman's soul. The +apartment on the north side of Tompkins Square, was small, sunny, and +comfortable. From its windows in spring and summer she could see the +boys and girls playing around the big, bare park, and when her eyes grew +tired of the street she rested them on her beloved books and pictures. +On one wall hung the portraits of Herzen, Bakounine and Kropotkin—the +Father, Son, and Holy Ghost of the anarchistic movement, as she piously +called them. Other images of the propaganda were scattered over the +walls: Netschajew—the St. Paul of the Nihilists—Ravachol, Octave +Mirbeau, Jean Grave, Reclus, Spies, Parsons, Engels, and Lingg—the last +four victims of the Haymarket affair, and the Fenians, Allen, Larkin, +and O'Brien, the Manchester martyrs. Among the philosophers, poets, and +artists were Schopenhauer, Tolstoy, Max Stirner<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span>—a rare drawing—Ibsen, +Thoreau, Emerson—the great American individualists—Beethoven, Zola, +Richard Strauss, Carlyle, Nietzsche, Gorky, Walt Whitman, Dostoiēwsky, +Mazzini, Rodin, Constantin Meunier, Shelley, Turgénieff, Bernard Shaw, +and finally the kindly face and intellectual head of the lawyer who so +zealously defended the Chicago anarchists. This diversified group, +together with much revolutionary literature, poems, pamphlets, the works +of Proudhon, Songs Before Sunrise, by Swinburne, and a beautiful etching +of Makart's proletarian Christ, completed, with an old square +pianoforte, the ensemble of an individual room, a room that expressed, +as her admirers said, the strong, suffering soul of Yetta Silverman, +Russian anarchist, agitator, and exile.</p> + +<p>"Come in," she cried out in her sharp, though not unpleasant, voice. A +thin young man entered. She clapped her hands.</p> + +<p>"Oh, so you changed your mind!" He looked at her over his glasses with +his weak, blue eyes, the white of which predominated. Simply dressed, he +nevertheless gave the impression of superior social station. He was of +the New England theological-seminary type—narrow-chested, gaunt as to +visage, by temperament drawn to theology, or, in default of religious +belief, an ardent enthusiast in sociology. The contracted temples, +uncertain gaze, and absence of fulness beneath the eyes betrayed the +unimaginative man. Art was a sealed book to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span> him, though taxation fairly +fired his suspicious soul. He was nervous because he was dyspeptic, and +at one time of his career he mistook stomach trouble for a call to the +pulpit. And he was a millionnaire more times than he took the trouble to +count.</p> + +<p>"Yes," he timidly replied, "I <i>did</i> change my wavering mind—as you call +that deficient organ of mine—and so I returned. I hope I don't disturb +you!"</p> + +<p>"No, not yet. I am sitting with my hands folded in my lap, like the +women of your class—<i>ladies</i>, you call them." She accented the title, +without bitterness. A cursory estimate of her appearance would have +placed her in the profession of a trained nurse, or perhaps in the +remotest analysis, a sewing woman of superior tastes. She was small, +wiry, her head too large for her body; but the abounding nervous +vitality, the harsh fire that burned in her large brown eyes, and the +firm mouth would have attracted the attention of the most careless. Her +mask, with its high Slavic cheek-bones and sharp Jewish nose, proclaimed +her a magnetic woman. In her quarter on the far East Side the children +called her "Aunt Yetta." She was a sister of charity in the guise of a +revolutionist.</p> + +<p>"You sit but you think, and <i>my</i> ladies never think," he answered, in +his boyish voice. He seemed proud to be so near this distinguished +creature. Had she not been sent to Siberia, driven out of France and +Germany, and arrested<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span> in New York for her incendiary speeches? She +possessed the most extraordinary power over an audience. Once, at Cooper +Union, Arthur had seen her control a crazy mob bent on destroying the +building because a few stupid police had interfered with the meeting. +Among her brethren Yetta Silverman was classed with Louise Michel, +Sophia Perowskaia, and Vera Zassoulitch, those valiant women, true +guardian angels, veritable martyrs to the cause. He thought of them as +he watched the delicate-looking young woman before him.</p> + +<p>Arthur was too chilly of blood to fall in love with her; his admiration +was purely cerebral. He was unlucky enough to have had for a father a +shrewd, visionary man, that curious combination of merchant and dreamer +once to be found in New England. A follower of Fourier, a friend of +Emerson, the elder Wyartz had gone to Brook Farm and had left it in a +few months. Dollars, not dreams, was his true ambition. But he +registered his dissatisfaction with this futile attempt by christening +his only son, Arthur Schopenhauer; it was old Wyartz's way of getting +even with the ideal. Obsessed from the age of spelling by his +pessimistic middle name, the boy had grown up in a cloudy compromise of +rebellion and the church. For a few years he vacillated; he went to +Harvard, studied the Higher Criticism, made a trip abroad, wrote a +little book recording the contending impulses of his pale, harassed +soul—Oscillations was the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span> title—and returned to Boston a mild anarch. +Emerson the mystic, transposed to the key of France, sometimes makes +bizarre music.</p> + +<p>She arose and, walking over to him, put her hand nonchalantly on his +shoulder.</p> + +<p>"Arthur, comrade, what do you mean to do with yourself—come, what will +all this enthusiasm bring forth?" He fumbled his glasses with his thumb +and index finger—a characteristic gesture—and nervously regarded her +before answering. Then he smiled at his idea.</p> + +<p>"We might marry and fight the great fight together like the Jenkins +crowd."</p> + +<p>"Marry!" she exclaimed—her guttural Russian accent manifested itself +when she became excited—"marry! You are only a baby, Arthur +Schopenhauer Wyartz—<i>Herrgott</i>, this child bears <i>such</i> a name!—and +while I am sure the thin Yankee blood of the Jenkins family needed a +Jewish wife, and a Slav, I am not that way of thinking for myself. I am +married to the revolution." Her eyes dwelt with reverence on her new +Christian saints, those Christs of the gutter, who had sacrificed their +lives in the modern arena for the idea of liberty, who were thrown to +the wild beasts and slaughtered by the latter-day pagans of wealth, and +barbarians in purple. He followed her glance. It lashed him to jerky +enthusiasm.</p> + +<p>"I am not joking," he earnestly asserted, "so pardon my rashness. Only +believe in my sincerity. I am no anarch on paper. I am de<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span>voted to your +cause and to you, Yetta, to my last heart's blood. Do you need my +wealth? It is yours. You can work miracles with millions in America. +Take it all."</p> + +<p>"It's not money we need, but men," she answered darkly. "Your millions, +which came to you innocently enough, represent the misery of—how many? +Let the multi-millionnaires give away their money to found theological +colleges and libraries—<i>my</i> party will have none of it. Its men are +armed by the ideas that we prefer. I don't blame the rich or the +political tyrants—the mob has to be educated, the unhappy proletarians, +who have so long submitted to the crack of the whip that they wouldn't +know what to do with their freedom if they had it. All mobs believe +alike in filth and fire, whether antique slaves free for their day's +Saturnalia, or the Paris crowds of '93. Their ideas of happiness are +pillage, bloodshed, drunkenness, revenge. Every popular uprising sinks +the <i>people</i> deeper in their misery. Every bomb thrown discredits the +cause of liberty."</p> + +<p>Astonished by this concession, Arthur wondered how she had ever earned +her reputation as the Russian "Red Virgin," as an unequivocal terrorist. +Thus he had heard her hailed at all the meetings which she addressed. +But she did not notice his perturbation, she was following another +train.</p> + +<p>"You Americans do not love money as much as the Europeans—who hoard it +away, who wor<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span>ship it on their naked knees; but you do something +worse—you love it for the sake of the sport, a cruel sport for the +poor. You go into speculation as the English go after big game. It is a +sport. This sport involves food—and you gamble with wheat and meat for +counters, while starving men and women pay for the game. America is yet +rich enough to afford this sport, but some day it will become crowded +like Europe, and then, beware! Wasn't it James Hinton who said that +'Overthrowing society means an inverted pyramid getting straight'?</p> + +<p>"And America," she continued, "bribes us with the gilded sentimental +phrases of Rousseau, Mirabeau, and Thomas Paine woven into your national +constitution, with its presumptuous declaration that all men are born +free and equal—shades of Darwin and Nietzsche!—and that universal +suffrage is a panacea for all evils. In no country boasting itself +Christian is there a system so artfully devised for keeping the <i>poor</i> +free and unequal, no country where so-called public opinion, as +expressed in the press, is used to club the majority into submission. +And you are all proud of this liberty—a liberty at which the despised +serf in Russia or the man of the street in London sneers—there is +to-day more <i>individual</i> liberty in England and Germany than in the +United States. Don't smile! I can prove it. As for France or Italy—they +are a hundred years ahead of you in municipal government. But I shan't +talk blue-books at you, Arthur!"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Why not, why not?" he quickly interposed. "You always impress me by +your easy handling of facts. And why won't my money be of use to the +social revolution?" Scornfully she started up again and began walking.</p> + +<p>"Why? Because convictions can't be bought with cash! Why! Because +philanthropy is the most selfish of vices. You may do good here and +there—but you do more harm. You create more paupers, you fine +gentlemen, with your Mission houses and your Settlement workers! You are +trying to cover the ugly sores with a plaster of greenbacks. It won't +heal the sickness—it won't heal it, I tell you." Her eyes were flaming +and she stamped the floor passionately.</p> + +<p>"We workers on the East Side have a name for you millionnaires. We call +you the White Mice. You have pretty words and white lies, pretty ways +and false smiles. Lies! lies! lies! You are only giving back, with the +aid of your superficial fine ladies, the money stolen from the true +money earners. You have discovered the Ghetto—you and the impertinent +newspaper men. And like the reporters you come down to use us for +'copy.' You live here in comfort among us and then go away, write a book +about our wretchedness and pose as altruistic heroes in your own silly +set. How I loathe that word—altruism! As if the sacrifice of your +personality does not always lead to self-deception, to hypocrisy! It is +an excuse for the busybody-rich to advertise their charities. If they +were as many armed as Briareus or the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> octopus, their charity would be +known to each and every hand on their arms. These sentimental anarchs! +They even marry our girls and carry them off to coddle their conscience +with gilded gingerbread. Yet they would turn their backs on Christ if he +came to Hester Street—Christ, the first modern anarch, a +destructionist, a proletarian who preached fire and sword for the evil +rich of his times. Nowadays he would be sent to Blackwell's Island for +six months as a disturber of the peace or for healing without a license +from the County Medical Association!"</p> + +<p>"Like Johann Most," he ventured. She blazed at the name.</p> + +<p>"No jokes, please. Most, too, has suffered. But I am no worshipper of +bombs—and beer." This made him laugh, but as the laugh was not echoed +he stared about him.</p> + +<p>"But Yetta,—we must begin somewhere. I wish to become—to +become—something like you.—"</p> + +<p>She interrupted him roughly:</p> + +<p>"To become—you an anarch! You are a sentimental rebel because your +stomach is not strong enough for the gourmands who waste their time at +your clubs. If your nerves were sound you might make a speech. But the +New England conscience of your forefathers—they were nearly all +clergymen, weren't they?—has ruined your strength. The best thing you +can do, my boy, is to enter a seminary and later go<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span> to China as a +missionary; else turn literary and edit an American edition of Who's Who +in Hell! But leave our East Side alone. Do you know what New York +reminds me of? Its centre is a strip of green and gold between two +smouldering red rivers of fire—the East and West Sides. If they ever +spill over the banks, all the little parasites of greater parasites, the +lawyers, brokers, bankers, journalists, ecclesiastics, and middle men, +will be devoured. Oh, what a glorious day! And oh, that terrible night +when we marched behind the black flag and muffled drums down Broadway, +that night in 1887 when the four martyrs were murdered, the hero Lingg +having killed himself. What would you have done in those awful times?"</p> + +<p>"Try me," he muttered, as he pulled down his cuffs, "try me!"</p> + +<p>"Very well, I'll try you. Like Carlo Cafiero, the rich Italian anarch, +you must give your money to us—every cent of it. Come with me to-night. +I address a meeting of the brethren at Schwab's place—you know, the +saloon across the street, off the square. We can eat our supper there, +and then—"</p> + +<p>"Try me," he reiterated, and his voice was hoarse with emotion, his +pulse painfully irregular.</p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<p>Notwithstanding his vows of heroism, Arthur could not force himself to +like the establishment<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span> of Schwab, where the meeting was to take place. +It was a beer-saloon, not one of those mock-mediæval uptown palaces, but +a long room with a low ceiling, gaslit and shabby. The tables and chairs +of hard, coarse wood were greasy—napkins and table-cloths were not to +be mentioned, else would the brethren suspect the presence of an +aristocrat. At the upper end, beyond the little black bar, there was a +platform, upon it a table, a pianoforte, and a stool. Still he managed +to conceal his repugnance to all these uninviting things and he sipped +his diluted Rhine wine, ate his sandwich—an unpalatable one—under the +watchful eyes of his companion. By eight o'clock the room was jammed +with working-people, all talking and in a half dozen tongues. +Occasionally Yetta left him to join a group, and where she went silence +fell. She was the oracle of the crowd. At nine o'clock Arthur's head +ached. He had smoked all his Turkish cigarettes, the odour of which +caused some surprise—there was a capitalist present and they knew him. +Only Yetta prevented disagreeable comment. The men, who belonged to the +proletarian class, were poorly dressed and intelligent; the women wore +shawls on their heads and smoked bad cigarettes. The saloon did not +smell nice, Arthur thought. He had offered Yetta one of his imported +cigarettes, but she lighted a horrible weed and blew the smoke in his +face.</p> + +<p>At ten o'clock he wished himself away. But<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span> a short, stout man with a +lopsided face showing through his tangled beard, stood up and said in +German:—</p> + +<p>"All who are not <i>our</i> friends, please leave the house."</p> + +<p>No one stirred. The patron went from group to group saluting his +customers and eying those who were not. Whether any password or signal +was given Arthur could not say. When the blond, good-natured Schwab +reached him, Yetta whispered in his ear. The host beamed on the young +American and gave him a friendly poke in the back; Arthur felt as if he +had been knighted. He said this to Yetta, but her attention was +elsewhere. The doors and windows were quickly shut and bolted. She +nudged his elbow—for they were sitting six at the table, much to his +disgust; the other four drank noisily—and he followed her to the top of +the room. A babble broke out as they moved along.</p> + +<p>"It's Yetta's new catch. Yetta's rich fellow. Wait until she gets +through with him—poor devil." These broken phrases made him shiver, +especially as Yetta's expression, at first enigmatic, was now openly +sardonic. What did she mean? Was she only tormenting him? Was this to be +his test, his trial? His head was almost splitting, for the heat was +great and the air bad. Again he wished himself home.</p> + +<p>They reached the platform. "Jump up, Arthur, and help me," she +commanded. He<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span> did so. But his discomfiture only grew apace with the +increased heat—the dingy ceiling crushed him—and the rows in front, +the entire floor seemed transformed to eyes, malicious eyes. She told +him to sit down at the piano and play the Marseillaise. Then standing +before the table she drew from her bosom a scarlet flag, and accompanied +by the enthusiastic shoutings she led the singing. Arthur at the +keyboard felt exalted. Forgotten the pains of a moment before. He +hammered the keys vigorously, extorting from the battered instrument a +series of curious croakings. Some of the keys did not "speak," some gave +forth a brazen clangour from the rusty wires. No one cared. The singing +stopped with the last verse.</p> + +<p>"Now La Ravachole for our French brethren." This combination of +revolutionary lyrics—Ça Ira and Carmagnole—was chanted fervidly. Then +came for the benefit of the German the stirring measures from the +Scotch-German John Henry Mackay's Sturm:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Das ist der Kampf, den allnächtlich<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bevor das Dunkel zerrinnt,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Einsam und gramvoll auskämpt<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Des Jahrhunderts verlorenes Kind.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Yetta waved her long and beautifully shaped hands—they were her +solitary vanity. The audience became still. She addressed them at first +in deliberate tones, and Arthur noted that the interest was genuine—he +wondered how<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span> long his fat-witted club friends could endure or +appreciate the easy manner in which Yetta Silverman quoted from great +thinkers, and sprinkled these quotations with her own biting +observations.</p> + +<p>"Richard Wagner—who loved humanity when he wrote Siegfried and +regretted that love in Parsifal!</p> + +<p>"Richard Wagner—who loved ice-cream more than Dresden's +freedom—Wagner: the Swiss family bell-ringer of '48!</p> + +<p>"To Max Stirner, Ibsen, and Richard Strauss belongs the twentieth +century!</p> + +<p>"Nietzsche—the anarch of aristocrats!</p> + +<p>"Karl Marx—or the selfish Jew socialist!</p> + +<p>"Lassalle—the Jew comedian of liberty!</p> + +<p>"Bernard Shaw—the clever Celt who would sacrifice socialism for an +epigram.</p> + +<p>"Curse all socialists!" she suddenly screamed.</p> + +<p>Arthur, entranced by the playful manner with which she disposed of +friend and foe, was aghast at this outbreak. He saw another Yetta. Her +face was ugly and revengeful. She sawed the air with her thin arms.</p> + +<p>"Repeat after me," she adjured her hearers, "the Catechism of Sergei +Netschajew, but begin with Herzen's noble motto: 'Long live chaos and +destruction!'"</p> + +<p>"Long live chaos and destruction!" was heartily roared.</p> + +<p>The terrific catechism of the apostle Netschajew made Arthur shake with +alternate woe and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span> wrath. It was bloody-minded beyond description. Like +a diabolic litany boomed the questions and answers:—</p> + +<p>"Day and night we must have but one thought—inexorable destruction." +And Arthur recalled how this pupil of Bakounine had with the assistance +of Pryow and Nicolajew beguiled a certain suspected friend, Ivanow, into +a lonely garden and killed him, throwing the body into a lake. After +that Netschajew disappeared, though occasionally showing himself in +Switzerland and England. Finally, in 1872, he was nabbed by the Russian +government, sent to Siberia, and—!</p> + +<p><i>Ugh!</i> thought Arthur, what a people, what an ending! And Yetta—why did +she now so openly proclaim destruction as the only palliative for social +crime when she had so eloquently disclaimed earlier in the day the +propaganda by force, by dagger, and dynamite?—He had hardly asked +himself the question when there came a fierce rapping of wooden clubs at +door and window. Instantly a brooding hush like that which precedes a +hurricane fell upon the gathering. But Yetta did not long remain silent.</p> + +<p>"Quick, Arthur, play the Star-Spangled Banner! It's the police. I want +to save these poor souls—" she added, with a gulp in her throat; +"quick, you idiot, the Star-Spangled Banner." But Arthur was almost +fainting. His ringers fell listlessly on the keys, and they were too +weak to make a sound. The police!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span> he moaned, as the knocking deepened +into banging and shouting. What a scandal! What a disgrace! He could +never face his own world after this! To be caught with a lot of crazy +anarchists in a den like this!—Smash, went the outside door! And the +newspapers! They would laugh him out of town. He, Arthur Schopenhauer +Wyartz, the Amateur Anarch! He saw the hideous headlines. Why, the very +daily in which some of his fortune was invested would be the first to +mock him most!</p> + +<p>The assault outside increased. He leaped to the floor, where Yetta was +surrounded by an excited crowd. He plucked her sleeve. She gazed at him +disdainfully.</p> + +<p>"For God's sake, Yetta, get me out of this—this awful scrape. My +mother, my sisters—the disgrace!" She laughed bitterly.</p> + +<p>"You poor chicken among hawks! But I'll help you—follow me." He reached +the cellar stairs, and she showed him a way by which he could walk +safely into the alley, thence to the street back of their building. He +shook her hand with the intensity of a man in the clutches of the ague.</p> + +<p>"But you—why don't you go with me?" he asked, his teeth chattering.</p> + +<p>The brittle sound of glass breaking was heard. She answered, as she took +his feverish hand:—</p> + +<p>"Because, you brave revolutionist, I must stick to my colours. +Farewell!" And remounting the stairs, she saw the bluecoats awaiting +her.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I hope the police will catch him anyhow," she said. It was her one +relapse into femininity, and as she quietly surrendered she did not +regret it.</p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<p>Old Koschinsky's store on the avenue was the joy of the neighbourhood. +For hours, their smeary faces flattened against the glass, the children +watched the tireless antics of the revolving squirrels; the pouter +pigeons expand their breasts into feathered balloons; the goldfish, as +they stolidly swam, their little mouths open, their eyes following the +queer human animals imprisoned on the other side of the plate-glass +window. Canary birds by the hundreds made the shop a trying one for +sensitive ears. There were no monkeys. Koschinsky, whose heart was as +soft as butter, though he was a formidable revolutionist—so he swore +over at Schwab's—declared that monkeys were made in the image of +tyrannical humans. He would have none of them. Parrots? There were +enough of the breed around him, he told the gossiping women, who, with +their <i>scheitels</i>, curved noses, and shining eyes, lent to the quarter +its Oriental quality.</p> + +<p>It was in Koschinsky's place that Arthur first encountered Yetta. He was +always prowling about the East Side in search of sociological prey, and +the modest little woman with her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span> intelligent and determined face +attracted him strongly. They fell into easy conversation near a cage of +canaries, and the acquaintance soon bloomed into a friendship. A week +after the raid on Schwab's, Arthur, very haggard and nervous, wandered +into Koschinsky's. The old man greeted him:—</p> + +<p>"Hu! So you've just come down from the Island! Well—how did you like it +up there? Plenty water—eh?" The sarcasm was too plain, and the young +man, mumbling some sort of an answer, turned to go.</p> + +<p>"Hold on there!" said Koschinsky. "I expect a very fine bird soon. You'd +better wait. It was here only last night; and the bird asked whether you +had been in." Arthur started.</p> + +<p>"For me? Miss Silverman?"</p> + +<p>"I said a bird," was the dogged reply. And then Yetta walked up to +Arthur and asked:—</p> + +<p>"Where have you been? Why haven't you called?" He blushed.</p> + +<p>"I was ashamed."</p> + +<p>"Because you were so, so—frightened, that night?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"But nothing came of the affair. The police could get no evidence. We +had no flags—"</p> + +<p>"That scarlet one I saw you with—what of it?" She smiled.</p> + +<p>"Did you look in your pockets when you got home? I stuffed the flag in +one of them while<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span> we were downstairs." He burst into genteel laughter.</p> + +<p>"No, I threw off my clothes in such disgust that night that I vowed I +would never get into them again. I gave the suit to my valet."</p> + +<p>"Your valet," she gravely returned; "he may become <i>one of us</i>."</p> + +<p>"Fancy, when I reached the house—I went up in a hansom, for I was +bareheaded—my mother was giving the biggest kind of a ball. I had no +end of trouble trying to sneak in unobserved."</p> + +<p>She regarded him steadily. "Isn't it strange," she went on, "how the +bull-dog police of this town persecute us—and they <i>should</i> be +sympathetic. They had to leave their own island because of tyranny. Yet +as soon as they step on this soil they feel themselves self-constituted +tyrants. Something of the sort happened with your own ancestors—" she +looked at him archly—"the Pilgrim Fathers were not very tolerant to the +Quakers, the Jews, Catholics, or any sect not their own. Now you do not +seem to have inherited that ear-slicing temperament—"</p> + +<p>"Oh, stop, Yetta! Don't make any more fun of me. I confess I am +cowardly—I hate rows and scandals—"</p> + +<p>"'What shall it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his +liberty?'"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I know. But this was such a nasty little affair. The newspapers +would have driven me crazy."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span></p> + +<p>"But suppose, for the sake of argument," she said, "that the row would +not have appeared in the newspapers—what then?"</p> + +<p>"What do you mean? By Jove, there was nothing in the papers, now that I +come to think of it. I went the next morning out to Tuxedo and +forgot—what do you mean by this mystery, Yetta?"</p> + +<p>"I mean this—suppose, for the sake of further argument, I should tell +you that there was no row, no police, no arrests!" He gasped.</p> + +<p>"O-h, what an ass I made of myself. So that was your trial! And I +failed. Oh, Yetta, Yetta—what shall I say?" The girl softened. She took +both his hands in her shapely ones and murmured:—</p> + +<p>"Dear little boy, I treated you roughly. Forgive me! There was a real +descent by the police—it was no deception. That's why I asked you to +play the Star-Spangled Banner—"</p> + +<p>"Excuse me, Yetta; but why did you do that? Why didn't you meet the +police defiantly chanting the Marseillaise? That would have been +braver—more like the true anarchist." She held down her head.</p> + +<p>"Because—because—those poor folks—I wanted to spare them as much +trouble with the police as possible," she said in her lowest tones.</p> + +<p>"And why," he pursued triumphantly, "why did you preach bombs after +assuring me that reform must come through the spiritual propaganda?" She +quickly replied:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span>—</p> + +<p>"Because our most dangerous foe was in the audience. You know. The man +with the beard who first spoke. He has often denounced me as lukewarm; +and then you know words are not as potent as deeds with the +proletarians. One assassination is of more value than all the philosophy +of Tolstoy. And that old wind-bag sat near us and watched us—watched +me. That's why I let myself go—" she was blushing now, and old +Koschinsky nearly dropped a bird-cage in his astonishment.</p> + +<p>"Yetta, Yetta!" Arthur insisted, "wind-bag, you call your comrade? Were +you not, just for a few minutes, in the same category? Again she was +silent.</p> + +<p>"I feel now," he ejaculated, as he came very close to her, "that we must +get outside of these verbal entanglements. I want you to become my +wife." His heart sank as he thought of his mother's impassive, high-bred +air—with such a figure for a Fifth Avenue bride! The girl looked into +his weak blue eyes with their area of saucer-like whiteness. She shook +her stubborn head.</p> + +<p>"I shall never marry. I do not believe in such an institution. It +degrades women, makes tyrants of men. No, Arthur—I am fond of you, +perhaps—" she paused,—"so fond that I might enter into any relation +but marriage,—that never!"</p> + +<p>"And I tell you, Yetta, anarchy or no anarchy, I could never respect the +woman if she were<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span> not mine legally. In America we do these things +differently—" he was not allowed to finish.</p> + +<p>She glared at him, then she strode to the shop door and opened it.</p> + +<p>"Farewell to you, Mr. Arthur Schopenhauer Wyartz, amateur anarchist. +Better go back to your mother and sisters! <i>Mein Gott</i>, Schopenhauer, +too!" He put his Alpine hat on his bewildered head and without a word +went out. She did not look after him, but walked over to the old +bird-fancier and sat on his leather-topped stool. Presently she rested +her elbows on her knees and propped her chin with her gloveless hands. +Her eyes were red. Koschinsky peeped at her and shook his head.</p> + +<p>"Yetta—you know what I think!—Yetta, the boy was right! You shouldn't +have asked him for the Star-Spangled Banner! The Marseillaise would have +been better."</p> + +<p>"I don't care," she viciously retorted.</p> + +<p>"I know, I know. But a nice boy—<i>so</i> well fixed."</p> + +<p>"I don't care," she insisted. "I'm married to the revolution."</p> + +<p>"Yah, yah! the revolution, Yetta—" he pushed his lean, brown forefinger +into the cage of an enraged canary—"the revolution! Yes, Yetta +Silverman, the revolution!" She sighed.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span></p> +<h2>XIV</h2> + +<h3>HALL OF THE MISSING FOOTSTEPS</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So I saw in my dream that the man began to run.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">—<i>Pilgrim's Progress</i>.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<h4>I</h4> + +<p>As the first-class carriage rolled languidly out of Balak's only railway +station on a sultry February evening, Pobloff, the composer, was not +sorry.</p> + +<p>"I wish it were Persia instead of Ramboul," he reflected. Luga, his +wife, he had left weeping at the station; but since the day she +disappeared with his orchestra for twenty-four hours, Pobloff's +affection had gradually cooled; he was leaving the capital without a +pang on a month's leave of absence—a delicate courtesy of the king's +extended to a brother ruler, though a semi-barbarous one, the khedive of +Ramboul.</p> + +<p>Pobloff was not sad nor was he jubilantly glad. The journey was an easy +one; a night and day and the next night would see him, God willing,—he +crossed himself,—in the semi-tropical city of Nirgiz. From Balak to +Nirgiz, from southeastern Europe to Asia Minor!</p> + +<p>The heir-apparent was said to be a music-<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span>loving lad, very much under +the cunning thumb of his grim old aunt, who, rumour averred, wore a +black beard, and was the scourge of her little kingdom. All that might +be changed when the prince would reach his majority; his failing health +and morbid melancholy had frightened the grand vizier, and the king of +Balakia had been petitioned to send Pobloff, the composer, designer of +inimitable musical masques, Pobloff, the irresistible interpreter of +Chopin, to the aid of the ailing youth.</p> + +<p>So this middle-aged David left his nest to go harp for a Saul yet in his +adolescence. What his duties were to be Pobloff had not the slightest +idea. He had received no special instructions; a member of the royal +household bore him the official mandate and a purse fat enough to soothe +his wife's feelings. After appointing his first violin conductor of the +Balakian Orchestra during his absence, the fussy, stout, good-natured +Russian (he was born at Kiew, 1865, the biographical dictionaries say) +secured a sleeping compartment on the Ramboul express, from the windows +of which he contemplated with some satisfaction the flat land that +gradually faded in the mists of night as the train tore its way noisily +over a rude road-bed.</p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<p>Pobloff slept. He usually snored; but this evening he was too fatigued. +He heard not the sudden stoppages at lonely way stations where<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span> hoarse +voices and a lantern represented the life of the place; he did not heed +the engine as it thirstily sucked water from a tank in the heart of the +Karpakians; and he was surprised, pleased, proud, when a hot February +sun, shining through his window, awoke him.</p> + +<p>It was six o'clock of a fine morning, and the train was toiling up a +precipitous grade to the spine of the mountain, where the down-slope +would begin and air-brakes rule. Pobloff looked about him. He scratched +his long nose, a characteristic gesture, and began wondering when coffee +would be ready. He pressed the bell. The guard entered, a miserable +bandit who bravely wore his peaked hat with green plumes à la Tyrol. He +spoke four tongues and many dialects; Pobloff calculated his monthly +salary at forty roubles.</p> + +<p>"No, Excellency, the coffee will be hot and refreshing at Kerb, where we +arrive about seven." He cleared his throat, put out his hand, bowed low, +and disappeared. The composer grumbled. Kerb!—not until that wretched +eyrie in the clouds! And such coffee! No matter. Pobloff never felt in +robuster health; his irritable nerves were calmed by a sound night's +sleep. The air was fresher than down in the malarial valley, where stood +the shining towers of Balak; he could see them pinked by the morning sun +and low on the horizon. All together he was glad....</p> + +<p>Hello, this must be Kerb! A moment later<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span> Pobloff bellowed for the +guard; he had shattered the electric annunciator by his violence. Then, +not waiting to be served, he ran into the vestibule, and soon was on the +station platform, inhaling huge drafts of air into his big chest. Ah! It +was glorious up there. What surprised him was the number of human beings +clambering over the steps, running and gabbling like a lot of animals +let loose from their cages. The engineer beside his quivering machine +enjoyed his morning coffee. And there were many turbaned pagans and some +veiled women mixed with the crowd.</p> + +<p>The sparkling of bright colours and bizarre costumes did not disturb +Pobloff, who had lived too long on anonymous borders, where Jew, +Christian, Turk, Slav, African, and outlandish folk generally melted +into a civilization which still puzzled ethnologists.</p> + +<p>A negro, gorgeously clad, guarding closely a slim female, draped from +head to foot in virginal white, attracted the musician. The man's face +was monstrous in its suggestion of evil, and furthermore shocking, +because his nose was a gaping hole. Evidently a scimiter had performed +this surgical operation, Pobloff mused.</p> + +<p>The giant's eyes offended him, they so stared, and threateningly.</p> + +<p>Pobloff was not a coward. After his adventure in Balak, he feared +neither man nor devil, and he insolently returned the black fellow's +gaze. They stood about a buffet and drank<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span> coffee. The young woman—her +outlines were girlish—did not touch anything; she turned her face in +Pobloff's direction, so he fancied, and spoke at intervals to her +attendant.</p> + +<p>"I must be a queer-looking bird to this Turk and her keeper—probably +some Georgian going to a rich Mussulman's harem in company with his +eunuch," Pobloff repeated to himself.</p> + +<p>A gong was banged. Before its strident vibrations had ceased troubling +the thin morning air, the train began to move slowly out of Kerb. +Pobloff again was glad.</p> + +<p>He remained on the rear platform of his car as long as the white +station, beginning to blister under a tropical sun, was in sight. Then +he sought his compartment. His amazement and rage were great when he +found the two window seats occupied by the negro and the mysterious +creature. Pobloff's bag was tumbled in a corner, his overcoat, hat, and +umbrella tossed to the other end of the room. The big black man bared +his teeth smilingly, the shrouded girl shrank back as if in fear.</p> + +<p>"Well, I'll be—!" began the composer. Then he leaned over and pushed +the button, the veins in his forehead like whipcords, his throat parched +with wrath. But to no avail—the bell was broken. Pobloff's first +impulse was to take the smiling Ethiopian by the neck and pitch him out. +There were several reasons why he did not: the giant looked dangerous; +he plainly carried a brace of pistols, and at least one dag<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span>ger, the +jewelled handle of which flashed over his glaring sash of many tints. +And then the lady—Pobloff was very gallant, too gallant, his wife said. +The bell would not ring! What was he to do? He soon made up his mind, +supple Slav that he was. With a muttered apology he sank back and closed +his eyes in polite despair.</p> + +<p>His consternation was overwhelming when a voice addressed him in +Russian, a contralto voice of some indefinable timbre, the voice of a +female, yet not without epicene intonations. His eyes immediately +opened. From her gauze veiling the young woman spoke:—</p> + +<p>"We are sorry to derange you. The guard made a mistake. Pardon!" The +tone was slightly condescending, as if the goddess behind the cloud had +deigned to notice a mere mortal. Her attendant was smiling, and to +Pobloff his grin resembled a newly sliced watermelon. But her voice +filled him with ecstasy. His ear, as sensitive as the eye of a Claude +Monet, noted every infinitesimal variation in tone-colour, and each +shade was a symbol for the fantastic imagination of this poetic +composer. The girlish voice affected him strangely. It pierced his soul +like a poniard. It made his spine chilly. It evoked visions of white +women languorously moving in processional attitudes beneath the chaste +rays of an implacable moon. The voice modulated into crisp morning +inflections:—</p> + +<p>"You are going far, Excellency?" She knew<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span> him! And the slave who +grinned and grinned and never spoke—what was <i>he</i>? She seemed to follow +Pobloff's thought.</p> + +<p>"Hamet is dumb. His tongue was cut at the same time he lost his nose. It +all happened at the siege of Yerkutz."</p> + +<p>Pobloff at last found words.</p> + +<p>"Poor fellow!" he said sympathetically, and then forgot all about the +mutilated one. "You are welcome to this compartment," he assured her in +his oiliest manner. "What surprises me is that I did not see your Serene +Highness when we left Balak." She started at the title that he bestowed +upon her, and he inwardly chuckled. Clever dog, Pobloff, clever dog! Her +eyes were brilliant despite obstructing veils.</p> + +<p>"I was <i>en route</i> to Balak yesterday, but my servant became ill and I +stopped over night at Kerb." Pobloff was entranced. She was undoubtedly +a young dame of noble birth and her freedom, the freedom of a European +woman, delighted him. It also puzzled.</p> + +<p>"How is it—?" he asked.</p> + +<p>But they had begun that fearful descent, at once the despair and delight +of engineers. The mountain fell away rapidly as the long, clumsy train +raced down its flank at a breakneck pace. Pobloff shivered and clutched +the arms of his seat. He saw nothing but deep blue sky and the tall top +of an occasional tree. The racket was terrific, the heat depressing. She +sat in her corner, apparently sleeping, while the giant<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span> smiled, always +smiled, never removing his ugly eyes from the perspiring countenance of +Pobloff.</p> + +<p>As they neared earth's level, midday was over. Pobloff hungered. Before +he could go in search of the ever absent guard, the woman suddenly sat +up, clapped her hands, and said something; but whether it was Turkish, +Roumanian, or Greek, he couldn't distinguish. A hamper was hauled from +under the seat by the servant, and to his joy Pobloff saw white rolls, +grapes, wine, figs, and cheese. He bowed and began eating. The others +looked at him and for a moment he could have sworn he heard faint +laughter.</p> + +<p>"I am so hungry," he said apologetically. "And you, Serenity, won't you +join me?" He offered her fruit. It was declined with a short nod. He was +dying to smoke, and, behold! priceless Turkish tobacco was thrust into +his willing hand. He rolled a stout cigarette, lighted it. Then a sigh +reached his ears. "The lady smokes," he thought, and slyly chuckled.</p> + +<p>A sound of something tearing was heard, and a pair of beautiful hands +reached for the tobacco. In a few moments the slender fingers were +pressing a cigarette; the slave lighted a wax fusee; the lady took it, +put the cigarette in a rent of her veil, and a second volume of odorous +vapour arose. Pobloff leaned back, stupefied. A Mohammedan woman smoking +in a Trans-Caucasian railway carriage before a Frank! Stupendous! He +felt unaccountably gay.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span></p> + +<p>"This is joyful," he said aloud. She smoked fervently. "Western manners +are certainly invading the East," he continued, hoping to hear again +that voice of marvellous resonance. She smoked. "Why, even Turkish women +have been known to study music in Paris."</p> + +<p>"I am not a Turk," she said in her deepest chest tones.</p> + +<p>"Pardon! A Russian, perhaps? Your accent is perfect. I am a Russian." +She did not reply.</p> + +<p>The day declined, and there was no more conversation. As the train +devoured leagues of swampy territory, villages were passed. The +journey's end was nearing. Soon meadows were seen surrounding +magnificent villas. A wide, shallow river was crossed, the Oxal; Pobloff +knew by his pocket map that Nirgiz was nigh. And for the first time in +twenty-four hours he sorrowed. Despite his broad invitations and +unmistakable hints, he could not trap his travelling companion into an +avowal of her identity, of her destination. Nothing could be coaxed from +the giant, and it was with a sinking heart—Pobloff was very +sentimental—that he saw the lights of Nirgiz; a few minutes later the +train entered the Oriental station. In the heat, the clamour of half a +thousand voices, yelling unknown jargons, his resolution to keep his +companions in view went for naught. Beset by jabbering porters, he did +not have an opportunity to say farewell to the veiled lady; with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span> her +escort she had disappeared when the car stopped—and without a word of +thanks! Pobloff was wretched.</p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<p>It was past nine o'clock as he roamed the vast garden surrounding the +Palace of a Thousand Sounds—thus named because of the tiny bells +tinkling about its marble dome. He had eaten an unsatisfying meal in a +small antechamber, waited upon by a stupid servant. And worse still, the +food was ill cooked. On presenting his credentials, earlier in the +evening, the grand vizier, a sneaky-appearing man, had welcomed him +coldly, telling him that her Serene Highness was too exhausted to +receive so late in the day; she had granted too many audiences that +afternoon.</p> + +<p>"And the prince?" he queried. The prince was away hunting by moonlight, +and could not be seen for at least a day. In the interim, Pobloff was +told to make himself at home, as became such a distinguished composer +and artistic plenipotentiary of Balakia's king. Then he was bowed out of +the chamber, down the low malachite staircase, into his supper room. It +was all very disturbing to a man of Pobloff's equable disposition.</p> + +<p>He thought of Luga, his little wife, his dove; but not long. She did not +appeal to his heart of hearts; she was a coquette. Pobloff sighed.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span> He +was midway in his mortal life, a dangerous period for susceptible +manhood. He lifted moist eyes to the stars; the night was delicious. He +rested upon a cushioned couch of stone. About him the moonlight painted +the trees, until they seemed like liquefied ermine; the palace arose in +pyramidal surges of marble to the sky, meeting the moonbeams as if in +friendly defiance, and casting them back to heaven with triumphant +reflections. And the stillness, profound as the tomb, was punctuated by +glancing fireflies. Pobloff hummed melodiously.</p> + +<p>"A night to make music," whispered a deep, sweet voice. Before he could +rise, his heart bounding as if stung to its centre, a woman, swathed in +white, sat beside him, touched him, put such a pressure upon his +shoulder that his blood began to stir. It was she. He stumbled in his +speech. She laughed, and he ground his teeth, for this alone saved him +from foolishness, from mad behaviour.</p> + +<p>"Maestro—you could make music this lovely night?" Pobloff started.</p> + +<p>"In God's name, who are you, and what are you doing here? Where did you +go this evening? I missed you. Ah! unhappy man that I am, you will drive +me crazy!"</p> + +<p>She did not smile now, but pressed close to him.</p> + +<p>"I am a prisoner—like yourself," she replied simply.</p> + +<p>"A prisoner! How a prisoner? I am not a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span> prisoner, but an envoy from my +king to the sick princeling."</p> + +<p>She sighed.</p> + +<p>"The poor, mad prince," she said, "he is in need of your medicine, +sadly. He sent for me a year ago, and I am now his prisoner for life."</p> + +<p>"But I saw you on the train, a day's journey hence," interrupted the +musician.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I had escaped, and was being taken back by black Hamet when we +met."</p> + +<p>Pobloff whistled. So the mystery was disclosed. A little white slave +from the seraglio of this embryo tyrant had flown the cage! No wonder +she was watched, little surprise that she did not care to eat. He +straightened himself, the hair on his round head like porcupine quills.</p> + +<p>"My dear young lady," he exclaimed in accents paternal, "leave all to +me. If you do not wish to stay in this place, you may rely on me. When I +see this same young man,—he must be a nice sprig of royalty!—I propose +to tell him what I think of him." Pobloff threw out his chest and +snorted with pride. Again he fancied that he heard suppressed laughter. +He darted glances in every direction, but the fall of distant waters +smote upon his ears like the crepuscular music of Chopin. His companion +shook with ill-suppressed emotion. It was some time before she could +speak.</p> + +<p>"Pobloff," she begged, in her dangerous contralto, a contralto like the +medium register of a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span> clarinet, "Pobloff, let me adjure you to be +careful. Your coming here has caused political disturbances. The aunt of +the prince hates music as much as he adores it. She is no party to your +invitation. So be on your guard. Even now there may be spies in the +shrubbery." She put her hand on his arm. It was too much. In an instant, +despite her feeble struggle, the ardent musician grasped the creature +that had tantalized him since morning, and kissed her a dozen times. His +head whirled. Pobloff! Pobloff! a voice cried in his brain—and only +yesterday you left your Luga, your pretty pigeon, your wife!</p> + +<p>The girl was dragged away from him. In the moonshine he saw the grinning +Hamet, suspiciously observing him. The runaway stood up and pressed +Pobloff's hand desperately, uttering the cry of her forlorn heart:—</p> + +<p>"Don't play in the great hall; don't play in that accursed place. You +will be asked, but refuse. Make any excuse, but do not set foot on its +ebon floors."</p> + +<p>He was so confused by the strangeness of this adventure, so confused by +the admonition of the unknown when he saw her white draperies disappear, +that his jaw fell and his courage wavered. A moment later two oddly +caparisoned soldiers, bearing lights, approached, and in the name of her +Highness invited him make midnight music in the Palace of a Thousand +Sounds.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span></p> +<h4>IV</h4> + +<p>Seated before a Steinway grand pianoforte, an instrument that found its +way to this far-away province through the caprice of some artistic +potentate, Pobloff nervously preluded. Notwithstanding the warning of +the girl, he had allowed himself to be convoyed to the great Hall of +Ebony, and there, quite alone, he sat waiting for some cue to begin. +None came. He glanced curiously about him. For all the signs of humanity +he might as well have been on the heights of Kerb, out among its thorny +groves, or in its immemorial forests. He preluded as he gazed around. He +could see, by the dim light of two flambeaux set in gold sconces, column +after column of blackness receding into inky depths of darkness. A +fringe of light encircled his instrument, and beside him was a gallery, +so vast that it became a gulf of the infinite at a hundred paces. Now, +Pobloff was a brave man. He believed that once upon a time he had peered +into strange crevices of space; what novelty could existence hold for +him after that shuddering experience? Again he looked into the tenebrous +recesses of the hall. He saw nothing, heard nothing.</p> + +<p>His fingers went their own way over the keyboard. Finally, following +some latent impulse, they began to shape the opening measures of +Chopin's Second Ballade, the one of the enigmatic tonalities, sometimes +called <i>The Lake<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span> of the Mermaids</i>. It began with the chanting, childish +refrain, a Lithuanian fairy-tale of old, and as its naïve, drowsy, +lulling measures—the voices of wicked, wooing sirens—sang and sank in +recurrent rhythms, Pobloff heard—this time he was sure—the regular +reverberation of distant footsteps. It was as if the monotonous beat of +the music were duplicated in some sounding mirror, some mirror that +magnified hideously, hideously mimicked the melody. Yet these footfalls +murmured as a sea-shell. Every phrase stood out before the pianist, +exquisitely clear; his brain had only once before harboured such an +exalted mood. There was the expectation of great things coming to pass; +dim rumours of an apocalyptic future, when the glory that never was on +sea or land should rend the veil of the visible and make clear all that +obscures and darkens. The transfiguration which informs the soul of one +taken down in epileptic seizure possessed him. Every cranny of his being +was flooded with overmastering light—and the faint sound of footsteps +marking sinister time to his music, drew closer, closer.</p> + +<p>Shaking off an insane desire to join his voice in the immortal choiring +of the Cherubim, Pobloff dashed into the passionate storm-scream of the +music, and like a pack of phantom bloodhounds the footsteps pressed him +in the race. He played as run men from starving wolves in Siberian +wastes. To stop would mean—God! what would it mean? These were no +mortal<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span> steps that crowded upon his sonorous trail. His fingers flew +over the keys as he finished the scurrying tempests of tone. Again the +first swaying refrain, and Pobloff heard the invisible multitude of feet +pause in the night, as if waiting the moment when the Ballade would +cease. He quivered; the surprises and terrors were telling upon his +well-seasoned nerves.</p> + +<p>Still he sped on, fearing the tremendous outburst at the close, where +Chopin throws overboard his soul, and with blood-red sails signals the +hellish <i>Willis</i>, the Lamias of the lake, to his side. Ah, if Pobloff +could but thus portion his soul as hostage to the infernal host that now +hemmed him in on all sides! Riding over the black and white rocks of his +keyboard, he felt as if in the clutches of an unknown force. He +discerned death in the distance—death and the unknown horror—and was +powerless to resist. Still the galloping of unseen feet, horrible, naked +flesh, that clattered and scraped the earth; the panting, hoarse and +subdued, of a mighty pack, whose thirst for destruction, for revenge, +was unslaked. And always the same trampling of human feet! Were they +human? Did not resilient bones tell the tale of brutes viler than men? +The glimmering lights seemed cowed, as they sobbed in vacuity and slowly +expired.</p> + +<p>Pobloff no longer asked himself what it meant; he was become a maniac, +pursued by deathless devils. He could have flown to the end of the +universe in this Ballade; but, at last, his heart<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span> cracking, head +bursting, face livid, overtaken by the Footsteps of the Missing, he +smashed both fists upon the keys and fell forward despairingly....</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>... The gigantic, noseless negro, the grand vizier himself, sternly +regarded the prince, who stood, torch in hand, near the shattered +pianoforte. The dumb spoke:—</p> + +<p>"Let us hope, Exalted Highness, that your masquerades and mystifications +are over forever. To-day's prankish sport may put us to trouble for a +satisfactory explanation." He waved his hand vaguely in the direction of +the prostrate composer. "And hasheesh sometimes maddens for a lifetime!" +He lightly touched the drugged Pobloff with his enormous foot.</p> + +<p>The youthful runaway ashamedly lowered his head—in reality he adored +music with all the fulness of his cruel, faunlike nature.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span></p> +<h2>XV</h2> + +<h3>THE CURSORY LIGHT</h3> + + +<p>To this day Pinton could never explain why he looked out of that pantry +window. He had reached his home in a hungry condition. He was tired and +dead broke, so he had resolved to forage. He had listened for two or +three, perhaps five, minutes in the hall of his boarding-house; then he +went, soft-footed, to Mrs. Hallam's pantry on the second floor. He was +sure that it was open, he was equally sure that it contained something +edible on its hospitable shelves. Ah! who has not his bread at midnight +stolen, ye heavenly powers, ye know him not!</p> + +<p>Pinton, however, knew one thing, and that was a ravenous desire to sink +his teeth into pie, custard, or even bread. He felt with large, eager +hands along the wall on the pantry side. With feverish joy he touched +the knob—a friendly knob, despite its cold, distant glaze—of the door +he sought.</p> + +<p>Pinton gave a tug, and then his heart stopped beating. The door was +locked. Something like a curse, something like a prayer, rose to his +lips, and his arms fell helplessly to his side.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Hallam, realizing that it was Saturday<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span> night—the predatory night +of the week—had secured her pastry, her confitures, her celebrated +desserts; and so poor Pinton, all his sweet teeth furiously aching, his +mouth watering, stood on the hither side of Paradise, a baffled peri in +pantaloons!</p> + +<p>After a pause, full of pain and troublous previsions of a restless, +discontented night, Pinton grew angry and pulled at the knob of the +door, thinking, perhaps, that it might abate a jot of its dignified +resistance. It remained immovable, grimly antagonistic, until his +fingers grew hot and cold as they touched a bit of cold metal.</p> + +<p>The key in the lock! In a second it was turned, and the hungry one was +within and restlessly searching and fumbling for food. He felt along the +lower shelves and met apples, oranges, and sealed bottles containing +ruined, otherwise miscalled preserved, fruit. He knelt on the dresser +and explored the upper shelf. Ah, here was richness indeed! Pies, pies, +cakes, pies, frosted cakes, cakes sweating golden, fruity promises, and +cakes as icy as the hand of charity. Pinton was happy, glutton that he +was, and he soon filled the pockets of his overcoat. What Mrs. Hallam +might say in the morning he cared not. Let the galled jade wince, his +breakfast appetite would be unwrung; and then he started violently, lost +his balance, and almost fell to the floor.</p> + +<p>Opposite him was the window of the pantry, which faced the wall of the +next house. Pinton<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[Pg 268]</a></span> had never been in the pantry by daylight, so he was +rudely shocked by the glance of a light—a cursory, moving light. It +showed him a window in the other house and a pair of stairs. It +flickered about an old baluster and a rusty carpet, it came from below, +it mounted upward and was lost to view.</p> + +<p>The burglar of pies, the ravisher of cakes, was almost shocked by this +unexpected light. He watched it dancing fantastically on the discoloured +wall of the house; he wondered—ill at ease—if it would flash in his +face. His surmise was realized, for a streak of illumination reached the +narrow chamber in which he cowered, and then he was certain some one was +looking at him. He never budged, for he was too frightened. Suddenly the +light vanished and a head was dimly silhouetted in the window opposite. +It nodded to Pinton. Pinton stared stupidly, and the head disappeared. +The hungry man, his appetite now gone, was numb and terrified.</p> + +<p>What did it mean, who was the man? A detective, or a friend of Mrs. +Hallam's in a coign from which the plunderers of her pantry could be +noted? Beady repentance stood out on Pinton's forehead.</p> + +<p>And the light came back. This time it was intelligible, for it was a +lantern in the hand of a young man of about thirty. His face was open +and smiling. He wore his hair rather long for an American, and it was +blond and curling.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[Pg 269]</a></span></p> + +<p>He surveyed Pinton for a moment, then he said, in a most agreeable +voice:—</p> + +<p>"What luck, old pal?"</p> + +<p>Pinton dropped his pies, slammed the window, and got to his bedroom as +fast as his nervous legs could carry him. He undressed in a nightmare, +and did not sleep until the early summer sun shot hot shafts of heat +into his chamber.</p> + +<p>With a shamed Sabbath face he arose, dressed, and descended to his +morning meal. Mrs. Hallam was sitting in orotund silence, but seemed in +good humour. She asked him casually if he had enjoyed his Saturday +evening, and quite as casually damned the wandering cats that had played +havoc in her pantry. She remarked that leaving windows open was a poor +practice, even if hospitable in appearance, and nervous Mr. Pinton drank +his coffee in silent assent and then hurried off to the church where he +trod the organ pedals for a small salary's sake.</p> + +<p>The following Friday was rehearsal night, and the organist left his +choir in a bad humour. His contralto had not attended, and as she was +the only artiste and the only good-looking girl of the lot, Pinton took +it into his head to become jealous. She had not paid the slightest +attention to him, so he could not attribute her absence to a personal +slight; but he felt aggrieved and vaguely irritated.</p> + +<p>Pinton's musicianship was not profound. He had begun life as an organ +salesman. He ma<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[Pg 270]</a></span>nipulated the cabinet organ for impossible customers in +Wisconsin, and he came to New York because he was offered a better +chance.</p> + +<p>The inevitable church position occurred. Then came Zundel voluntaries +and hard pedal practice. At last Mendelssohn's organ sonatas were +reached and with them a call—organists, like pastors, have calls—to a +fashionable church. The salary was fair and Mr. Pinton grew +side-whiskers.</p> + +<p>He heard Paderewski play Chopin, and became a crazy lover of the piano. +He hired a small upright and studied finger exercises. He consulted a +thousand books on technic, and in the meantime could not play Czerny's +velocity studies.</p> + +<p>He grew thin, and sought the advice of many pianists. He soon found that +pressing your foot on the swell and pulling couplers for tone colour +were not the slightest use in piano playing. Subtle finger pressures, +the unloosening of the muscles, the delicate art of <i>nuance</i>, the art +unfelt by many organists, all were demanded of the pianist, and Pinton +almost despaired.</p> + +<p>He grew contemptuous of the king of instruments as he essayed the C +major invention of Bach. He sneered at stops and pedals, and believed, +in his foolish way, that all polyphony was bound within the boards of +the Well-Tempered Clavichord. Then the new alto came to the choir, and +Pinton—at being springtide, when the blood is in the joyful +mood—thought that he was in love. He was really athirst.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[Pg 271]</a></span></p> + +<p>This Friday evening he was genuinely disappointed and thirsty. He turned +with a sinking heart and parched throat into Pop Pusch's dearly beloved +resort. Earlier in his life he had often solaced himself with the free +lunch that John, the melancholy waiter, had dispensed. Pinton's mind was +a prey to many emotions as he entered the famous old place. He sat down +before a brown table and clamoured for amber beer.</p> + +<p>He was not alone at the table. As Pinton put the glass of Pilsner to his +lips he met the gaze of two sardonic eyes. He could not finish his +glass. He returned the look of the other man and then arose, with a +nervous jerk that almost upset the table.</p> + +<p>"Sit down, old pal; don't be crazy. I'll never say a word. Sit down, you +fool; don't you see people are looking at you?"</p> + +<p>The voice was low, kindly in intonation, but it went through Pinton like +a saw biting its way into wood.</p> + +<p>He sat down all in a heap. He knew the eyes; he knew the voice. It was +the owner of the dark lantern—the mysterious man in the other house of +that last Saturday night. Pinton felt as if he were about to become ill.</p> + +<p>"Lord, but you are a nervous one!" said the other, most reassuringly. +"Sit still and I'll order brandy. It will settle your stomach."</p> + +<p>That brought Pinton to his senses at once.</p> + +<p>"No, no, I'll be all right in a moment," he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[Pg 272]</a></span> said rather huskily. "I +never drink spirits. Thank you, all the same."</p> + +<p>"Don't mention it," said the man, and he tossed off his Würzburger. Each +man stealthily regarded the other. Pinton saw the stranger of the +lantern and staircase. Close by he was handsome and engaging. His hair +was worn like a violin virtuoso's, and his hands were white, delicate, +and well cared for. He spoke first.</p> + +<p>"How did you make out on that job?—I don't fancy there was much in it. +Boarding-houses, you know!"</p> + +<p>Pinton, every particle of colour leaving his flabby face, asked:—</p> + +<p>"What job?"</p> + +<p>The stranger looked at him keenly and went on rather ironically:—</p> + +<p>"You are the most nervous duck I ever ran across. When I saw you last +your pocket was full of the silver plate of that pantry, and I can thank +you for a fright myself, for when I saw you, I was just getting ready to +crack a neat little crib. Say! why didn't you flash your glim at me or +make some friendly signal at least? You popped out of sight like a +prairie rabbit when a coyote heaves in view."</p> + +<p>Pinton felt the ground heave beneath him. What possible job could the +man mean? What was a "glim," and what did the fellow suggest by silver +plate? Then it struck him all of a sudden. Heavens! he was taken for a +burglar<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[Pg 273]</a></span> by a burglar. His presence in the pie pantry had been +misinterpreted by a cracksman; and he, the harmless organist of Dr. +Bulgerly's church, was claimed as the associate of a dangerous, perhaps +notorious, thief. Pinton's cup of woe overflowed.</p> + +<p>He arose, put on his hat, and started to go. The young man grasped his +arm, and said in a most conciliatory fashion:—</p> + +<p>"Perhaps I have hurt your sensitive nature. It was far from my intention +to do so. I saluted you at first in the coarse, conventional manner +which is expected by members of our ancient and honourable craft, and if +I have offended you, I humbly beg your pardon."</p> + +<p>His accent was that of a cultivated gentleman. Pinton, somewhat assured, +dropped back in his seat, and, John passing by just then, more beer was +ordered.</p> + +<p>"Hear me before you condemn me," said the odd young man. "My name is +Blastion and I am a burglar by profession. When I saw you the other +night, at work on the premises next door to me, I was struck by your +refined face. I said to myself: 'At last the profession is being +recruited by gentlemen, men of culture, men of refinement. At last a +profitable, withal risky, pursuit is being dignified, nay, graced, by +the proper sort of person.' And I saluted you in a happy, haphazard +fashion, and then you flew the coop. Pardon my relapse into the +vernacular."</p> + +<p>Pinton felt that it was time to speak.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[Pg 274]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Pardon me, if I interrupt you, Mr. Blastion; but I fear we are not +meeting on equal ground. You take me for a—for a man of your +profession. Indeed, sir, you are mistaken. When you discovered me last +Saturday night I was in the pantry of Mrs. Hallam, my boarding-house +keeper, searching for pie. I am not a burglar—pardon my harsh +expression; I am, instead, an organist by profession."</p> + +<p>The pallor of the burglar's countenance testified to the gravity of his +feeling. He stared and blushed, looked apprehensively at the various +groups of domino players in the back room, then, pulling himself +together, he beckoned to melancholy John, and said:—</p> + +<p>"Johann, two more beers, please. Yes?"</p> + +<p>Pinton became interested. There was something appealing in the signal +the man flashed from his eyes when he realized that he had unbosomed +himself to a perfect stranger, and not to a member of his beloved guild. +The organist put his hand on the man's arm and said—faint memories of +flatulent discourses from the Reverend Bulgerly coming to his aid: "Be +not alarmed, my friend. I will not betray you. I am a musician, but I +respect art ever, even when it reveals itself in manifold guises."</p> + +<p>Pinton felt that he was a man of address, a fellow of some wit; his +confidential and rather patronizing pose moved his companion, who slyly +grimaced.</p> + +<p>"So you are an organist and not a member of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[Pg 275]</a></span> the noble Knights of the +Centrebit and Jimmy?" he asked rather sarcastically.</p> + +<p>"Yes," admitted Pinton, "I am an organist, and an organist who would +fain become a pianist." The other started.</p> + +<p>"I am a pianist myself, and yet I cannot say that I would like to play +the organ."</p> + +<p>"You are a pianist?" said Pinton, in a puzzled voice.</p> + +<p>"Well, why not? I studied in Paris, and I suppose my piano technic stood +me in good stead in my newer profession. Just look at my hands if you +doubt my word."</p> + +<p>Aghast, the organist examined the shapely hands before him. Without +peradventure of a doubt they were those of a pianist, an expert pianist, +and one who had studied assiduously. He was stupefied. A burglar and a +pianist! What next?</p> + +<p>Mr. Blastion continued his edifying remarks: "Yes, I studied very hard. +I was born in the Southwest, and went to Paris quite young. I had good +fingers and was deft at sleight-of-hand tricks. I could steal a +handkerchief from a rabbi—which is saying volumes—and I played all the +Chopin études before I was fifteen. At twenty-one I knew twenty-five +concertos from memory, and my great piece was the <i>Don Juan Fantasy</i>. +Oh, I was a wonder! When Liszt paid his last visit to Paris I played +before him at the warerooms of the Pleyels.</p> + +<p>"Monsieur Théodore Ritter was anxious for his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[Pg 276]</a></span> old master to hear such a +pupil. I assure you there must be some congenital twist of evil in me, +for I couldn't for the life of me forbear picking the old fellow's +pockets and lifting his watch. Now don't look scandalized, Mr. —— eh? +Oh! thank you very much, Mr. Pinton. If you are born that way, all the +punishments and preachments—excuse the alliteration—will not stand in +your way as a warning. I have done time—I mean I have served several +terms of imprisonment, but luckily not for a long period. I suffered +most by my incarceration in not having a piano. Not even a dumb keyboard +was allowed, and I practised the Jackson finger exercises in the air and +thus kept my fingers limber. On Saturdays the warden allowed me, as a +special favour, to practise on the cabinet organ—an odious +instrument—so as to enable me to play on Sundays in chapel. Of course +no practice was needed for the wretched music we poor devils howled once +a week, but I gained one afternoon in seven for study by my ruse.</p> + +<p>"Oh, the joy of feeling the ivory—or bone—under my expectant fingers! +I played all the Chopin, Henselt, and Liszt études on the miserable +keyboard of the organ. Yes, of course, without wind. It was, I assure +you, a truly spiritual consolation. You can readily imagine if a man has +been in the habit of practising all day, even if he does 'burgle' at +night, that to be suddenly deprived of all instrumental resources is a +bitter blow."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[Pg 277]</a></span></p> + +<p>Pinton stuttered out an affirmative response. Then both arose after +paying their checks, and the organist shook the burglar's hand at the +corner, after first exacting a promise that Blastion should play for him +some morning.</p> + +<p>"With pleasure, my boy. You're a gentleman and an artist, and I trust +you absolutely." And he walked away, whistling with rare skill the D +flat valse of Chopin.</p> + +<p>"You can trust me, I swear!" Pinton called after him, and then went +unsteadily homeward, full of generous resolves and pianistic ambitions. +As he intermittently undressed he discovered, to his rage and amazement, +that both his purse and watch had disappeared. The one was well filled; +the other, gold. Blastion's technic had proved unimpeachable.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[Pg 278]</a></span></p> +<h2>XVI</h2> + +<h3>AN IRON FAN</h3> + + +<p>Effinghame waited for Dr. Arn in the study, a small chamber crowded with +the contents of the universe—so it seemed to the visitor. There was a +table unusual in size, indeed, big enough to dissect a body thereon. It +was littered with books and medical publications and was not very +attractive. The walls were covered with original drawings of famous +Japanese masters, and over the fireplace hung a huge fan, dull gray in +colouring, with long sandalwood spokes. Not a noteworthy example of +Japanese art, thought Effinghame, as he glanced without marked curiosity +at its neutral tinting, though he could not help wondering why the +cunning artificers of the East had failed to adorn the wedge-shaped +surfaces of this fan with their accustomed bold and exquisite +arabesques.</p> + +<p>He impatiently paced the floor. His friend had told him to come at nine +o'clock in the evening. It was nearly ten. Then he began to finger +things. He fumbled the papers in the desk. He examined the two Japanese +swords—light as ivory, keen as razors. He stared at each of the prints, +at Hokusai, Toyokimi, Kuni<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[Pg 279]</a></span>yoshi, Kiyonaga, Kiosai, Hiroshighé, Utamaro, +Oukoyo-Yé,—the doctor's taste was Oriental. And again he fell to +scrutinizing the fan. It was large, ugly, clumsy. What possessed Arn to +place such a sprawling affair over his mantel? Tempted to touch it, he +discovered that it was as silky as a young bat's wing. At last, his +curiosity excited, he lifted it with some straining to the floor. What +puzzled him was its weight. He felt its thin ribs, its soft, paper-like +material, and his fingers chilled as they closed on the two outermost +spokes. They were of metal, whether steel or iron he could not +determine. A queer fan this, far too heavy to stir the air, and—</p> + +<p>Effinghame held the fan up to the light. He had perceived a shadowy +figure in a corner. It resolved itself into a man's head—bearded, +scowling, crowned with thorns or sunbeams. It was probably a Krishna. +But how came such a face on a Japanese fan? The type was Oriental, +though not Mongolian, rather Semitic. It vaguely recalled to Effinghame +a head and face he had seen in a famous painting. But where and by whom? +It wore a vile expression, the eyes mean and revengeful; there was a +cruel mouth and a long, hooked, crafty nose. The forehead was lofty, +even intellectual, and bore its thorns—yes, he was sure they were +thorns—like a conqueror. Just then Dr. Arn entered and laughed when he +saw the other struggling with the fan.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[Pg 280]</a></span></p> + +<p>"My <i>Samurai</i> fan!" he exclaimed, in his accustomed frank tones; "how +did you discover it so soon?"</p> + +<p>"You've kept me here an hour. I had to do something," answered the +other, sulkily.</p> + +<p>"There, there, I apologize. Sit down, old man. I had a very sick patient +to-night, and I feel worn out. I'll ring for champagne." They talked +about trifling personal matters, when suddenly Effinghame asked:—</p> + +<p>"Why <i>Samurai</i>? I had supposed this once belonged to some prehistoric +giant who could waft it as do ladies their bamboo fans, when they brush +the dust from old hearts—as the Spanish poet sang."</p> + +<p>"That fan is interesting enough," was the doctor's reply. "When a +<i>Samurai</i>, one of the warrior caste Japanese, was invited to the house +of a doubtful friend, he carried this fan as a weapon of defence. +Compelled to leave his two swords behind a screen, he could close this +fighting machine and parry the attack of his hospitable enemy until he +reached his swords. Just try it and see what a formidable weapon it +would prove." He took up the fan, shut it, and swung it over his head.</p> + +<p>"Look out for the bottles!" cried Effinghame.</p> + +<p>"Never fear, old chap. And did you notice the head?"</p> + +<p>"That's what most puzzled me."</p> + +<p>"No wonder. I too was puzzled—until I found the solution. And it took +me some years<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[Pg 281]</a></span>—yes, all the time you were in Paris learning how to +paint and live." He paused, and his face became gloomy.</p> + +<p>"Well—well?"</p> + +<p>"There is no well. It's a damned bad fan, that iron one, and I don't +mind saying so to you."</p> + +<p>"Superstitious—you! Where is your Haeckel, your Wundt, your Weismann? +Do you still believe in the infallibility of the germ-plasm? Has the fan +brought you ill-luck? The fact is, Arn, ever since your return from +China you've been a strange bird!" It was Effinghame's turn to laugh.</p> + +<p>"Don't say another word." The doctor was vivacious in a moment and +poured out wine. They both lighted cigars. Slowly puffing, Arn took up +the fan and spread it open.</p> + +<p>"See here! That head, as you must have noticed, is not Japanese. It's +Jewish. Do you recall the head of Judas painted by Da Vinci in his Last +Supper? Now isn't this old scoundrel's the exact duplicate—well, if not +exact, there is a very strong resemblance." Effinghame looked and +nodded.</p> + +<p>"And what the devil is it doing on a fan of the <i>Samurai</i>? It's not +caprice. No Japanese artist ever painted in that style or ever expressed +that type. I thought the thing out and came to the conclusion—"</p> + +<p>"Yes—yes! What conclusion?" eagerly interrupted his listener.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[Pg 282]</a></span></p> + +<p>"To the conclusion that I could never unravel such a knotty question +alone." Effinghame was disappointed.</p> + +<p>"So I had recourse to an ally—to the fan itself," blandly added Arn, as +he poured out more wine.</p> + +<p>"The fan?"</p> + +<p>"Precisely—the fan. I studied it from tip to tip, as our bird-shooting +friends say, and I, at last, discovered more than a picture. You know I +am an Orientalist. When I was at Johns Hopkins University I attended the +classes of the erudite Blumenfeld, and what you can't learn from +him—need I say any more? One evening I held the fan in front of a vivid +electric light and at once noticed serried lines. These I deciphered +after a long time. Another surprise. They were Chinese characters of a +remotely early date—Heaven knows how many dynasties back! Now what, you +will ask, is Chinese doing on a <i>Samurai</i> fighting fan! I don't know. I +never shall know. But I do know that this fan contains on one side of it +the most extraordinary revelation ever vouchsafed mankind, particularly +Christian mankind." Excited by his own words, Arn arose.</p> + +<p>"Effinghame, my dear fellow, I know you have read Renan. If Renan had +seen the communication on this iron fan, he would have never written his +life of the Messiah." His eyes blazed.</p> + +<p>"Why, what do you mean?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[Pg 283]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I mean that it might have been a life of Judas Iscariot."</p> + +<p>"Good God, man, are you joking?" ejaculated Effinghame.</p> + +<p>"I mean," sternly pursued Arn, "that if De Quincey had studied this +identical fan, the opium-eater would have composed another gorgeous +rhetorical plea for the man preëlected to betray his Saviour, the +apostle who spilt the salt." He sat down and breathed heavily.</p> + +<p>"Go on! Go on!"</p> + +<p>"Shall I relate the history upon the fan?" And without waiting for an +answer he began at the left of the fan and slowly read to the right:—</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>I who write this am called Moâ the Bonze. What I write of I +witnessed in a walled city of Judea. I travelled there attracted by +the report of miraculous happenings brought about by the magic art +of a youthful barbarian called Ieshua. The day I arrived in the +city they had sentenced the wise man to death by crucifixion. I was +disappointed. I had come many moons and many leagues from the +Yellow Kingdom to see something rare. I was too late. The magician, +whom his disciples called a god, had been executed. I tarried a few +days in the city. After many questions put to beggars and outcasts, +I heard that a certain woman of rank had a portrait of Ieshua. I +called and without hesitation asked her to show me this picture. +She was an exalted soul. She wept bitter tears as she drew<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[Pg 284]</a></span> from a +secret cabinet a scarf upon which was imprinted a bloody image. She +continued to weep as I made a copy of the head. I confess I was not +impressed. The face was bearded and ugly. The new god was said to +have been as fair as the sun. And I told the woman this. She only +wept the more.</p> + +<p>"If he were a god," I asked, "where are outward evidences?" She +became frantic.</p> + +<p>"The real man!" she cried; "<i>this</i> one died for the man he +betrayed," and again fell to lamenting. Seeing I could gain nothing +more from her, I left, wondering at the strange heretics I had +encountered. I went back to my country and after weaving this tale +and painting the head, there awaited the fifth Buddha, the +successor to Siddartha, whose coming has been predicted.</p></div> + +<p>Arn's voice ceased. There was silence in the chamber. Then Effinghame +started up and fiercely growled:—</p> + +<p>"What do <i>you</i> make of it, Arn?"</p> + +<p>"Isn't it clear enough? There's been a frightful error somewhere, one of +incalculable consequences. A tremendous act of heroism has been +committed by a man whose name has been universally execrated through the +ages. Perhaps he repented at the eleventh hour and by some means +impersonated his betrayed friend; perhaps—"</p> + +<p>"But that <i>other</i> body found in the blasted<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[Pg 285]</a></span> field of Aceldama!" +demanded the agitated Effinghame. Dr. Arn did not answer.</p> + +<p>After a lugubrious pause, he whispered:—</p> + +<p>"There's more to follow. You haven't heard the worst."</p> + +<p>"What—more! I thought your damnable old Bonze died in the odour of +sanctity over there in his Yellow Kingdom."</p> + +<p>"True. He died. But before he died he recorded a vision he had. It is +inscribed on the other side of the fan."</p> + +<p>Effinghame's features lengthened.</p> + +<p>"Still the same fan."</p> + +<p>"The same. Here is what it prophesies." Reversing the clumsy fan, Arn +again read:—</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>Before I pass over into Nirvana I must relate what I saw in the +country of the Christians. It was not a dream. It was too real. And +yet it is to be, for it has not yet happened. The Campagna was now +become a shallow lake from the sea almost to the Sabine Mountains. +What had been Rome was a black waste spot, full of stones and +weeds. And no two stones stood together. Ah! our war with the white +races had been successful. We had not used their fighting machines, +as did that nation of little brown men, the Japanese. The Chinese +were too sage. They allowed the Christians to exterminate the +Japanese; but when they attacked us and attempted to rob us of our +land, we merely resorted to our old-time weapon—the Odour-Death.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[Pg 286]</a></span> +With it we smothered their armies, sunk their navies, swept through +their countries like the simoon. The awful secret of the +Odour-Death is one that has been ours from the beginning of time. +Known only to the College of Bonzes, it was never used except in +extreme peril. Its smell is more revolting in its consequences than +the Black Plague. It ravaged the earth.</p> + +<p>I sat in a flat-bottomed boat, enjoying the soft melancholy Italian +evening. Not a human did I see; nor had I encountered one on my +slow voyage from the Middle Seas. In meditation I pondered the +ultimate wisdom of Confucius and smiled at the folly of the white +barbarians who had tried to show us a new god, a new religion. At +last they, too, had succumbed like the nations before their era. +The temple of Jupiter on the Capitol had fallen, so had the holy +temple of Jerusalem. And now St. Peter's. Their central religion +had been destroyed, and yet prophecies of the second coming of +their divinity had not been accomplished. When the last Pope of +Rome dies, so it was said, then time would be accomplished. The +last Pope <i>had</i> died. Their basilica with its mighty dome was a +desert where scorpions and snakes abounded. The fifth Buddha would +appear, not the second Christos. Suddenly I saw before me in a puny +boat a beautiful beardless youth. He was attired in some symbolical +garments and upon his head a triple tiara. I could not believe my +aged eyes. He sat upright. His attitude was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[Pg 287]</a></span> hieratic. His eyes +were lifted heavenwards. He clasped his hands and prayed:—</p> + +<p>"O Lord, remove thy servant. The time is at hand foretold by thy +slaughtered saints. I am the last Pope and the humblest of thy +servants. Though the heathen hath triumphed upon the earth, I go to +thy bosom, for all things are now accomplished." And he tumbled +forward, dead. The last Pope! I had seen him. Nothing could happen +after that.</p> + +<p>And as I turned my boat in the direction of the sea a moaning came +upon the waters. The sky became as brass. A roar, like the rending +asunder of the firmament, caused my soul to expand with horror and +joy. Yes, time <i>was</i> accomplished. The last Pope had uttered the +truth. Eternity was nigh. But the Buddha would now prove to the +multitudes awakened from their long sleep that <i>He</i>, not other +gods, was the true, the only God. In a flare of light sounded the +trumpets of destiny; eternity unrolled before me, and on the vast +plain I saw the bones of the buried dead uniting, as men and women +from time's beginnings arose in an army, the number whereof is +unthinkable. And oh! abomination of desolation, the White Horse, +not <i>Kalki</i> the tenth incarnation of Vishnu, but the animal +foretold in <i>their</i> Apocalypse, came through the lightnings, and in +the whirlwinds of flame and thunder I saw the shining face of Him, +the Son of Man! Where our Buddha? Alas! the last Pope spake truth. +I, Moâ the Bonze, tell<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[Pg 288]</a></span> you this ere it be too late to repent your +sins and forswear your false gods. The Galilean is our master....</p></div> + +<p>"<i>Farceur!</i> Do you know what I would do with that accursed fan? I'd +destroy it, sell it, get rid of it somehow. Or else—" Effinghame +scrutinized the doctor, whose eyes were closed—"or else I would return +to the pious practices of my old religion." No smile crossed the face of +his friend as he firmly held the fighting fan, the iron and mystical fan +of the <i>Samurai</i>.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[Pg 289]</a></span></p> +<h2>XVII</h2> + +<h3>THE WOMAN WHO LOVED CHOPIN</h3> + + +<h4>I</h4> + +<p>When Marco Davos left Ischl on the midday train, that picturesque, +huddled Austrian watering-place was stuffy. He was surprised then most +pleasantly by the coolness of Aussee, further down the line in the +direction of Vienna. Ischl is not a bad place, but it lies, as the +natives say, smothered in a kettle. He rode over from the station to the +stadt park, where the band was playing. There he dismounted, for he was +going further—Aussee is not very interesting, but it principally serves +as a good starting-point for trips to many of the charming lakes with +which Styria is dotted. After asking his way, Davos passed the swimming +baths, and keeping on the left bank of a tiny stream, he presently found +himself walking through an earthly paradise. Since his advent in Ischl, +where he drank the waters and endeavoured to quiet his overtaxed nerves, +he had made up his mind to visit Alt-Aussee; several Viennese friends +had assured him that this hamlet, beneath a terrific precipice<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[Pg 290]</a></span> and on +the borders of a fairy-like lake, would be well worth the while.</p> + +<p>It was a relief to breathe the thinner mountain air, and the young +artist inhaled it with satisfaction, his big hat in hand, his long curly +black hair flowing in the gentle breeze. He found himself in tunnels of +verdure, the sunlight shut off by the heavy leafage; then the path +debouched into the open and, skirting closely the rocky wall, it widened +into an island of green where a shady pagoda invited. He sat down for a +few minutes and congratulated himself that he had escaped the intimate +discomforts of the omnibus he discerned on the opposite bank, packed +with stout people. This was the third week of his vacation, one enforced +by a nerve specialist in the Austrian capital, and for the first time +Davos felt almost cheerful. Perhaps the absolute hush of the country and +the purity of the atmosphere, with its suggestion of recent rain,—the +skies weep at least once a day in the Salzkammergut region,—proved a +welcome foil to fashionable Ischl, with its crowds, its stiffness, its +court ceremonial—for the emperor enjoys his <i>villegiatura</i> there. And +Davos was sick and irritable after a prolonged musical season. He had +studied the pianoforte with Rosenthal, and his success, from his début, +had been so unequivocal that he played too much in public. There was a +fiery particle in his interpretations of Chopin, Schumann, and Liszt +that proclaimed the temperament, if not the actual<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[Pg 291]</a></span> possession, of +genius. Still in his early manhood—he was only twenty—the maturity of +his musical intelligence and the poetry of his style created havoc in +impressionable hearts. With his mixed blood, Hungarian and Italian, +Marco Davos' performance of romantic composers was irresistible; in it +there was something of Pachmann's wayward grace and Paderewski's +plangency, but with an added infusion of gypsy wildness which evoked for +old concert-goers memories of Liszt the brilliant rhapsodist.</p> + +<p>But he soon overpaid the score presented by the goddess Fortune—his +nerves were sadly jangled. A horror of the human face obsessed his +waking and sleeping hours; he dreamed of colossal countenances with +threatening eyes, a vast composite of the audiences he nightly faced. As +his popularity increased the waning of his self-respect told him that he +must go into retreat, anywhere out of the musical world—else would his +art suffer. It did suffer. The nervous diffidence, called stage-fright, +which had never assailed his supreme self-balance, intruded its +unwelcome presence. Marco, several months after he had discovered all +these mischievous symptoms, the maladies of artistic adolescence, was +not assured when the critics hinted of them—the public would surely +follow suit in a few weeks. Then came the visit to the learned Viennese +doctor and the trip to Ischl. A few more months of this appalling +absorption in his own personality, this morbid marriage of man to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[Pg 292]</a></span> his +own image, and he suspected that his brain would be irretrievably +injured.</p> + +<p>He was a curious student of matters psychologic as well as musical. A +friendly laboratory had inducted him into many biologic mysteries. +Particularly fascinating to him was the tactile sense, that sense of +touch wherewith man acquaints himself with this earth-clot swimming in +space. Davos contemplated the tips of his fingers as he sat in the +grateful cool, his ten voices as he named them. With them he sang, +thundered, and thought upon the keyboard of his grand piano-forte. A +miracle, indeed, these slender cushions of fat, ramified by a network of +nerves, sinews, and bones as exquisite in their mechanism as the motion +of the planets. If hearing is a miracle, so is touch; the ear is not a +resonator, as has been so long maintained, but an apparatus which +records variations of pressure. This makes it subservient to the laws of +sensation; touch and hearing are akin. It aroused the pride of Davos +after he had read the revolutionary theories of Pierre Bounier regarding +the touch. So subtle could the art of touch be cultivated, the pianist +believed, that the blind could <i>feel</i> colour on the canvas of the +painter. He spent weeks experimenting with a sensitive manometer, +gauging all the scale of dynamics. No doubt these fumblings on the edge +of a new science temporarily hurt his play. With a dangerous joy he +pressed the keys of his instru<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[Pg 293]</a></span>ment, endeavouring to achieve more +delicate shadings. He quarrelled with the piano manufacturers for their +obstinate adherence to the old-fashioned clumsy action; everything had +been improved but the keyboard—that alone was as coldly unresponsive +and inelastic as a half-century ago. He had fugitive dreams of wires +that would vibrate like a violin. The sounding-board of a pianoforte is +too far from the pianist, while the violinist presses his strings as one +kisses the beloved. Little wonder it is the musical monarch. A new +pianoforte, with passionately coloured overtones, that could sob like a +violoncello, sing like a violin, and resound with the brazen clangours +of the orchestra—Liszt had conceived this synthesis, had by the sheer +force of his audacious genius compelled from his instrument ravishing +tones that were never heard before or—alas!—since.</p> + +<p>Even the antique harpsichord had its compensations; not so powerful in +its tonal capacity, it nevertheless gave forth a pleading, human quality +like the still small angelic voice. Davos pondered these problems, +pondered Chopin's celestial touch and the weaving magic of his many-hued +poems; Chopin—Keats, Shelley, and Heine battling within the walls of a +frail tender soul.</p> + +<p>The sound of footsteps and voices aroused him. He shivered with disgust. +More people! Two men, well advanced in life, followed by two women, +barely attracted his notice, until he saw<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[Pg 294]</a></span> that the little creature who +waddled at the rear of the party was a Japanese in European clothes. +Notwithstanding her western garb, she resembled a print of Utamaro. +Beside her walked a tall, grave girl, with dark hair and gray eyes, +attired in the quaint garb of some early nineteenth-century epoch—1840 +or thereabouts. As old-fashioned as she looked, a delicate girlish +beauty was hers, and when she indifferently gazed at Davos, straightway +he heard humming in his head the "glance motive" from Tristan and +Isolde. They passed on, but not leaving him as he was before; a voice +whispered in the secret recesses of his being: "You love! Follow! Seek +her!" And under the sudden impulsion of this passion he arose and made a +few steps toward the curve of the path around which the girl and her +companions had disappeared. The absurdity of this hasty translation into +action of his desire halted him. Yes, his nerves must be in a bad way if +a casual encounter with a pretty woman—but was she pretty? He did not +return to his seat. He continued his stroll leisurely. Pretty! Not +exactly pretty—distinguished! Noble! Lovely! Beautiful! He smiled. Here +he was playing the praises of the unknown in double octaves. He did not +overtake her. She had vanished on the other side of the bridge, and in a +few minutes he found himself entering Alt-Aussee. It wore a bright +appearance, with its various-coloured villas on the lake shores, and its +church<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[Pg 295]</a></span> and inn for a core. The garden of this hotel he found to be +larger than he had imagined; it stretched along the bank and only +stopped as if stone and mortar had been too lazy to go farther.</p> + +<p>Again he hesitated. The garden, the <i>restauration</i>—full of people: +women knitting, children bawling, men reading; and all sipping coffee to +a background of gossip. He remembered that it was the sacred hour of +<i>Kaffeeklatsch</i>, and he would have escaped by a flight of steps that led +down to the beach, but he was hailed. A company of a half-dozen sat at a +large table under the trees, and the host was an orchestral conductor +well known to Davos. There was no alternative. He took a chair. He was +introduced as the celebrated pianoforte-virtuoso to men and women he had +never seen before, and hoped—so rancorous was his mood—never to see +again. A red-headed girl from Brooklyn, who confessed that she thought +Maeterlinck the name of some new Parisian wickedness, further bothered +him with questions about piano teachers. No, he didn't give lessons! He +never would! She dropped out of the conversation. Finally by an effort +he swore that his head was splitting, that he must return to Ischl. He +broke away. When he discovered that the crowd was also bound for the +same place, he abruptly disappeared. It took him just two hours to +traverse the irregular curves of the lake on the Franz Carl Promenade, +and he ate his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[Pg 296]</a></span> dinner in peace at the inn upon a balcony that projected +over the icy waters.</p> + +<p>Davos decided, as he smoked a mild cigarette, that he would remain at +Alt-Aussee for the night. The peace of the landscape purified his soul +of its irritability, though he wished that the Dachstein would not +dominate so persistently the sky-line—it was difficult to avoid the +view of this solitary and egotistic peak, the highest in Styria. He was +assigned a comfortable chamber, but the night was too fine for bed. He +did not feel sleepy, and he went along the road he had come by; the +church was an opaque mass, the spire alone showing in the violet +twilight, like some supernatural spar on a ship far out at sea. He +attempted to conjure to his tired brain the features, the expression, of +the girl. They would not reappear; his memory was traitorous.</p> + +<p>The murmur of faint music, piano music, made his ears wince—how he +hated music! But afar as were these tonal silhouettes, traced against +the evening air, his practised hearing told him that they were made by +an artist. He languidly followed the clue, and soon he was at the gate +of a villa, almost buried in the bosk, and listening with all his +critical attention to a thrilling performance—yes, thrilling was the +word—of Chopin's music. What! The last movement of the B flat minor +sonata, the funeral march sonata, but no more like the interpretation he +had heard from others—from himself—than—than....<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[Pg 297]</a></span></p> + +<p>But, good heavens! <i>Who</i> was playing! The unison passages that mount and +recede were iridescent columns of mist painted by the moonlight and +swaying rhythmically in the breeze. Here was something rare. No longer +conscious of the technical side of the playing, so spiritualized was it, +so crystalline the touch, Davos forgot his manners and slipped through +the gateway, through the dark garden, toward an open window in which +burned a solitary candle. The mystery of this window and the quicksilver +dartings of the music—gods, what a touch, what gossamer delicacy!—set +his heart throbbing. He forgot his sick nerves. When the trumpet blows, +the war-horse lusts for action—and this was not a trumpet, but a horn +of elf-land. He moved as closely as he dared to the window, and the +music ceased—naturally enough, the movement had concluded. His ears +burned with the silence. <i>She</i> came to the window. Arrested by the +vision—the casement framed her in a delicious manner—he did not stir. +She could not help seeing this intruder, the light struck him full in +the face. She spoke:—</p> + +<p>"Dear Mr. Davos, won't you come into the house? My father and my uncle +will be most happy to receive you."</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>She knew him! Stunned by his overstrung emotions, he could only bow his +head.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[Pg 298]</a></span></p> +<h4>II</h4> + +<p>He received the welcome of a king. The two men he had seen earlier in +the day advanced ceremoniously and informed him that the honour of his +presence was something they had never hoped for; that—as news flies +swiftly in villages—they had heard he was at Alt-Aussee; they had +recognized the <i>great</i> Marco Davos on the road. These statements were +delivered with exaggerated courtesy, though possibly sincere. The elder +of the pair was white-whiskered, very tall and spare, his expression a +sadly vague one. It was her father. The other an antique person, a +roly-poly fellow who chuckled and quavered, was her uncle. Davos sat in +a drawing-room containing a grand pianoforte, a few chairs, and couches. +The floor was stained, and when a cluster of lights was brought by the +uncle, he noticed that only Chopin portraits hung on the walls. He +apologized for his intrusion—the music had lured him from the highroad.</p> + +<p>"We are very musical," said the father.</p> + +<p>"I should say so," reiterated his brother-in-law.</p> + +<p>"Musical!" echoed Davos. "Do you call it by such an everyday phrase? I +heard the playing of a marvellous poet a moment ago." The two men looked +shyly at each other. She entered. He was formally presented.</p> + +<p>"Monsieur Davos, this is Constantia Grabowska, my daughter. My name is +Joseph<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[Pg 299]</a></span> Grabowski; my late wife's brother, Monsieur Pelletier." Davos +was puzzled by the name, Constantia Grabowska! She sat before him, +dressed in black silk with crinoline; two dainty curls hung over her +ears; her profile, her colouring, were slightly Oriental, and in her +nebulous gray eyes with their greenish light there was eternal youth. +Constantia! Polish. And how she played Chopin—ah! it came to him before +he had finished his apologies.</p> + +<p>"You are named after Chopin's first love," he ejaculated. "Pardon the +liberty." She answered him in her grave, measured contralto.</p> + +<p>"Constantia Gladowska was my grandmother." The playing, the portraits, +were now explained. A lover of the Polish composer, Davos knew every +incident of his biography.</p> + +<p>"I am the son of that Joseph Grabowski, the Warsaw merchant who married +the soprano singer, Constantia Gladowska, in 1832," said the father, +smilingly. "My father became blind."</p> + +<p>"Chopin's <i>Ideal</i>!" exclaimed Marco. He was under the spell of the +girl's beauty and music. He almost stared at her, for the knowledge that +she was a great artiste, perhaps greater than himself, rather dampened +his passion. She was adorable as she returned without coquetry his +ardent gaze; but she was—he had to admit it—a rival. This composite +feeling he inwardly wrestled with as the conversation placidly +proceeded. They only spoke of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[Pg 300]</a></span> Poland, of Chopin. Once the name of +Emilia Plater, the Polish Joan of Arc, was mentioned—she, too, was a +distant connection. The young pianist hinted that more music would be +agreeable, but there was no response. He was quite alone with +Constantia, and they talked of Poland's tone-poet. She knew much more of +Chopin than he did, and she recited Mickïewicz's patriotic poems with +incomparable verve.</p> + +<p>"Do you believe in heredity?" he cried, as the father entered with the +tea. "Do you believe that your love of Chopin is inherited? Chopin +composed that wonderful slow movement of the F minor concerto because of +his love for your grandmother. How I wish I could have seen her, heard +her."</p> + +<p>The girl, without answering him, detached from her neck a large brooch +and chain. Davos took it and amazedly compared the portrait with the +living woman.</p> + +<p>"You <i>are</i> Constantia Gladowska." She smiled.</p> + +<p>"Her love of Chopin—she must have loved her youthful adorer—has been +transmitted to you. Oh, please play me that movement again, the one +Rubinstein called 'the night wind sweeping over the churchyard graves.'" +Constantia blushed so deeply that he knew he had offended her. She had +for him something of the pathos of old dance music—its stately +sweetness, its measured rhythms. After<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[Pg 301]</a></span> drinking a cup of tea he drifted +to the instrument—flies do not hanker after honey as strongly as do +pianists in the presence of an open keyboard. A tactful silence ensued. +He began playing, and, as if exasperated at the challenge implied by her +refusal, he played in his old form. Then he took the theme of Chopin's E +flat minor Scherzo, and he juggled with it, spun it into fine fibres of +tone, dashed it down yawning and serried harmonic abysses. He was +magnificent as he put forth all the varied resources of his art. +Constantia, her cheeks ablaze, her lips parted, interposed a fan between +her eyes and the light. There was something dangerous and passionate in +her regard. In all the fury of his play he knew that he had touched her. +Once, during a pause, he heard her sigh. As he finished in a thunderous +crash he saw in the doorway the figure of the Japanese maid—an ugly, +gnarled idol with slitted eyes. She withdrew when he arose to receive +the unaffected homage of his hosts. He was curious. Monsieur Pelletier, +who looked like a Brazilian parrot in beak and hue, cackled:—</p> + +<p>"That's Cilli, our Japanese. She was born in Germany, and is my niece's +governess. Quite musical, too, I should say so. Just look at my two +Maltese cats! I call them Tristan and Isolde because they make noises in +the night. Don't you <i>loathe</i> Wagner?"</p> + +<p>It was time to go. Enamoured, Davos took<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[Pg 302]</a></span> his leave, promising to call +the next forenoon before he went back to Ischl. He held her fingers for +a brief moment and longed to examine their tips,—the artist still +struggled to subdue the man,—but the pressure he received was so +unmistakable that he hurried away, fearing to betray his emotion. He +hovered in the vicinity of the house, longing for more music. He was +disappointed. For a full hour he wandered through the dusty lanes in the +faded light of an old moon. When he reached his chamber, it was long +past one o'clock; undaunted, his romantic fervour forced him to the +window, and he watched the shining lake. He fell asleep thinking of +Constantia. But he dreamed of Cilli, the Japanese maid with the hideous +eyes.</p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<p>Not only that morning, but every morning for two weeks, did Marco Davos +visit Alt-Aussee. He came down from Ischl on the earliest train, and +some nights he stopped at the hotel near his new friends. After a few +visits he saw little of the father and uncle, and he was not sorry—they +were old bores with their archaic anecdotes of dead pianists. Two +maniacs on the subject of music, Davos wished them to the devil after he +had known them twenty-four hours. His passion had reached the acute key. +He could not eat or drink in normal fashion, and no sooner had he left +the girl than the sky became sombre,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[Pg 303]</a></span> his pulse weakened, and he longed +to return to her side to tell her something he had forgotten. He did +this several times, and hesitated in his speech, reddened, and left her, +stumbling over the grass like a lame man. Never such a crazy wooer, +never a calmer maiden. She looked unutterable sentiment, but spoke it +not.</p> + +<p>When he teased her about her music, she became a statue. She was too +timid to play before artists; her only master had been her father. Once +more he had heard the piano as he returned unexpectedly, and almost +caught her; he saw her at the instrument, but some instinct must have +warned her that she was being spied upon. She stopped in the middle of a +phrase from a Mendelssohn song, and even to his prejudiced ears her +touch had seemed commonplace. Yet he loved her all the more despite her +flat refusal to play. The temptation to his excited artistic temperament +was removed. He played, often, gloriously. His nerves were steel. This +was a cure his doctor had not foreseen. What did it matter, anyhow?—he +was near Constantia daily, and the sunshine was royal. Only—why did her +relatives absent themselves so obstinately! She told him, with her +secret smile, that she had scolded them for talking so much; but when he +played they were never far away, she assured him. Nor was the Japanese +woman, Cilli—what a name! A nickname given by Constantia in her +babyhood. Cilli was a good soul. He hoped so—her good<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[Pg 304]</a></span>ness was not +apparent. She had a sneering expression as he played. He never looked up +from the keyboard that he did not encounter her ironical gaze. She was +undoubtedly interested. Her intensity of pose proved it; but there was +no sympathy in her eyes. And she had a habit of suddenly appearing in +door or window, and always behind her mistress. She ended by seriously +annoying him, though he did not complain. It was too trivial.</p> + +<p>One afternoon he unfolded his novel views on touch. If the action of the +modern pianoforte could be made as sensitive in its response as the +fingerboard of a fiddle.... Constantia listened with her habitual +gravity, but he knew that she was bored. Then he shifted to the subject +of fingers. He begged to be allowed the privilege of examining hers. At +first she held back, burying her hand in the old Mechlin lace flounce of +her sleeves. He coaxed. He did not attempt to conceal his chagrin when +he finally saw her fingers. They were pudgy, good-humoured, fit to lift +a knife and fork, or to mend linen. They did not match her cameo-like +face, and above all they did not reveal the musical soul he knew her to +possess. For the first time since he met her she gave evidence of ill +humour. She sharply withdrew her hand from his, and as she did so a +barbaric croon was heard, a sort of triumphant wailing, and Constantia, +without making an excuse, hurriedly left the room. The singing stopped.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[Pg 305]</a></span></p> + +<p>"It's that devil of a Japanese woman," he muttered testily. He waited +for nearly an hour, and in a vile temper took up his hat and stick and +went away. Decidedly this was his unlucky day, he grumbled, as he +reached the water. He saw Grabowski and Pelletier, arm in arm, trudging +toward the villa, but contrived to evade them. In ten minutes he found +himself spying on the house he had quitted. He skirted a little private +way back of the villa, and to his amazement father, uncle, and +Constantia came out and hailed the omnibus which travelled hourly to +Aussee. Davos was furious. He did not risk following them, for he +realized he had been treated shabbily. His wrath softened as he +reflected; perhaps Constantia, agitated by his rudeness,—had he been +rude?—persuaded her family to follow him to Ischl. The sky cleared. +That was the solution—Marco Davos straightened himself—his pride was +no longer up in arms. Poor child—she was so easily wounded! How he +loved her!</p> + +<p>His body trembled. He could not believe he was awake. Incredible music +was issuing from behind the closed blinds of the villa. Music! And the +music he had overheard that first night. But Constantia had just gone +away; he had seen her. There must be some mistake, some joke. No, no, by +another path she had managed to get back to the house. Ay! but what +playing. Again came that purling rush of notes, those unison passages, +as if one gigantic hand grasped<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[Pg 306]</a></span> them—so perfect was the tonal accord. +He did not hesitate. At a bound he was in the corridor and pushed open +the door of the drawing-room....</p> + +<p>At first the twilighted room blinded him. Then to his disgust and terror +he saw the apelike features of the squat Japanese governess. She sat at +the piano, her bilious skin flushed by the exertion of playing.</p> + +<p>"You—you!" he barely managed to stammer. She did not reply, but +preserved the immobility of a carved idol.</p> + +<p>"You are a wonderful artiste," he blurted, going to her. She stolidly +answered:—</p> + +<p>"The Japanese have the finest sense of touch in the world. I was once a +pupil of Karl Tausig." Involuntarily he bowed his head to the revered +name of the one man he had longed to hear. Then his feelings almost +strangled him; his master passion asserted itself.</p> + +<p>"Your fingers, your fingers—let me see them," he hoarsely demanded. +With a malicious grin she extended her hands—he groaned enviously. Yes, +they were miracles of sculpture, miracles of colour and delicacy, the +slender tips well-nigh prehensile in their cunning power. And the +fingers of Constantia, of his love, of the woman who loved Chopin—that +Chopin whose first passion was for her grandmother, the opera singer +Constantia Gladowska!</p> + +<p>The knowledge of her cruel deception crept into his consciousness. He +was chilled for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[Pg 307]</a></span> several seconds. Grief at his lost love, implacable +anger at her trickery, crowded into his unhappy brain. But he only bowed +to Cilli, and summoning all his will he politely said:—</p> + +<p>"It is quite true that when the Japanese choose to play the piano, we +Europeans must shut up shop." He hurried out to the road and walked +desperately....</p> + +<p>The next morning, as he nervously paced the platform of the Ischl +railway station, he encountered his old friend Alfred Brünfeld, the +jovial Viennese pianist.</p> + +<p>"Hullo!"</p> + +<p>"Hullo!"</p> + +<p>"Not going back to Vienna?"</p> + +<p>"Yes—I'm tired of the country."</p> + +<p>"But, man, you are pale and tired. Have you been studying up here after +your doctor bade you rest?" The concern in Brünfeld's voice touched +Davos. He shook his head, then bethought himself of something.</p> + +<p>"Alfred, you are acquainted with everybody in Europe. How is it you +never told me about that strange Grabowski crowd—you know, the +granddaughter of Chopin's first love?" Brünfeld looked at him with +instant curiosity.</p> + +<p>"You also?" he said. The young man blushed. After <i>that</i> he could never +forgive! The other continued:—</p> + +<p>"Granddaughter, fiddlesticks! They are not Poles, those Grabowskis, but +impostors. Their real name is—is—" Davos started.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[Pg 308]</a></span></p> + +<p>"What, you have met them?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, the stupid father, the odious uncle, the fair Constantia—what a +meek saint!—and that diabolical Japanese, who plays the piano like a +house on fire." Tears came to the eyes of Marco Davos.</p> + +<p>"Did they—I mean, did <i>she</i> take you in, too?"</p> + +<p>"Here, at Ischl, last summer," was the grim reply.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[Pg 309]</a></span></p> +<h2>XVIII</h2> + +<h3>THE TUNE OF TIME</h3> + + +<p>Ferval returned to Rouen after a fatiguing trip down the Seine as far as +Croisset, the old home of Gustave Flaubert. Here he viewed, not without +a dismal sense of fame and its futility, the little garden-house in +which the masterpieces of the great Frenchman had been conceived in joy +and executed in sorrow. He met the faithful Colange, one-time attendant +of Flaubert, and from him learned exacerbating details of the novelist's +lonesome years; so he was in a mood of irritation as he went ashore near +the Boïeldieu Bridge and slowly paced toward his hotel. He loved this +Norman Rouen, loved the battered splendour of Nôtre-Dame Cathedral, +loved the church of Saint-Ouen—that miracle of the Gothic, with its +upspringing turrets, its portal as perfect as a Bach fugue. And in the +Solferino Garden he paid his tribute of flowers at the monuments of +Maupassant and Flaubert. Ferval was modern in his tastes; he believed +nothing in art was worth the while which did not date from the +nineteenth century.</p> + +<p>Deplorably bored, he passed his hotel on the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[Pg 310]</a></span> Quai and turned into the +Rue Jeanne d'Arc, which led by the façade of the Palais de Justice. He +had studied it carefully, and it did not, this dull afternoon in +September, hold his interest long; he sauntered on, not feeling strong +enough to light a cigarette. Decidedly, Rouen was become tiresome. He +would go back to Paris by the evening train—or to Dieppe, thence to +London, on the morning boat. Presently he found himself nearing the +Porte de la Grosse Horloge. Through its opening poured vivacious working +girls and men in blouse and cap, smoking, chattering, gesticulating. It +was all very animated, and the wanderer tried to enjoy the picture. Then +over against the crenellated wall, under the tablet bearing the quaint +inscription picked out in choice Latin, Ferval saw a tall girl. Her bare +head would not have marked her in a crowd where motley prevailed; it was +her pose that attracted him,—above all, her mediæval face, with its +long, drooping nose which recalled some graven image of Jean Goujon. Her +skin was tanned; her hair, flame-coloured, was confined by a classic +fillet; her eyes, Oriental in fulness, were light blue—Ferval had +crossed to the apparition and noted these things. She did not return his +stare, but continued to gaze at the archway as if expecting some one. +Young, robust, her very attitude suggested absolute health; yet her +expression was so despairing, her eyes so charged with misery, that +involuntarily he felt in his pocket<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[Pg 311]</a></span> for money. And then he saw that in +her hand she held a tambourine. She wore a faded uniform of the +Salvation Army.</p> + +<p>Suddenly an extraordinary noise was heard; music, but of such a peculiar +and excruciating quality that the young man forgot his neighbour and +wondered what new pain was in store for his already taut nerves. The +shops emptied, children stopped their games, and the Quarter suspended +its affairs to welcome the music. Ferval heard rapturous and mocking +remarks. "Baki, Baki, the human orchestra!" cried one gossip to another. +And the reverberating music swelled, multifarious and amazing as if a +military band from piccolo to drum were about to descend the highway. A +clatter and bang, a sweet droning and shrill scraping, and then an old +man proudly limped through the gateway of the Great Clock. This was the +conjurer, this white-haired fellow, who, with fife, cymbals, bells, +concertinas,—he wore two strapped under either arm,—at times fiddler, +made epileptic music as he quivered and danced, wriggled, and shook his +venerable skull. The big drum was fastened to his back, upon its top +were placed cymbals. On his head he wore a pavilion hung with bells that +pealed when he twisted or nodded his long, yellow neck. He carried a +weather-worn fiddle with a string or two missing, while a pipe that +might have been a clarinet years before, now emitted but cackling tones +from his thin lips, through which shone a few fang<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[Pg 312]</a></span>like teeth. By some +incomprehensible coördination of muscular movements he contrived to make +sound simultaneously his curious armoury of instruments, and the +whistling, screeching, scratching, drumming, wheezing, and tinkling of +metal were appalling. But it was rhythmic, and at intervals the edge of +a tune could be discerned, cutting sharply through the dense cloud of +vibrations, like the prow of a boat cleaving the fog. Baki, his face red +and swollen by his exertions, moved to the spot where waited the girl.</p> + +<p>"<i>Ai</i>, Debora!" cried a boy, "here's the old man. Pass the plate, pass +the plate!" To his amazement, though he could give no reason for the +feeling, Ferval saw the girl go from group to group, her tambourine +outstretched, begging for coppers. Once she struck an insulting youth +across the face, but when she reached Ferval and met his inquiring look, +she dropped her eyes and did not ask for alms. A red-headed Sibyl, he +thought discontentedly, a street beggar, the daughter of an old ruffian. +And as he walked away rapidly he remembered her glance, in which there +lurked some touch of antique pride and wrath.</p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<p>Rouen lay below him, a violet haze obscuring all but the pinnacles of +its churches. The sinking sun had no longer power to pierce this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[Pg 313]</a></span> misty +gulf, at the bottom of which hummed the busy city; but Ferval saw +through rents in the twirling, heat-laden atmosphere the dim shapes of +bridges mirrored by the water beneath him; and once the two islands +apparently swept toward him, a blur of green; while at the end of the +valley, framed by hills, he seemed to discern the odd-looking +Transbordeur spanning the Seine.</p> + +<p>For twenty-four hours he had not ceased thinking of the girl with the +tambourine, of her savage, sullen grace, her magnificent poise and +strange glance. He had learned at his hotel that she was called "<i>Debora +la folle</i>," and that she was the daughter of the still crazier Baki. Was +she some sort of a gypsy, or a Continental version of Salvation Army +lass? No one knew. Each year, at the beginning of autumn, the pair +wandered into Rouen, remained a few weeks, and disappeared. Where? +Paris, perhaps, or Italy or—<i>là bas!</i> The shoulder-shrugging proved +that Baki and his daughter were not highly regarded by reputable +citizens of Rouen, though the street people followed their music and +singing as long as it lasted. Singing? queried Ferval; does the woman +sing?</p> + +<p>He became more interested. His visits to the country where Pissarro +painted and Flaubert wrote revealed other possibilities besides those +purely artistic ones in which this amateur of fine shades and sensations +delighted. He did not deny, on the esplanade where behind him<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[Pg 314]</a></span> stood +Bonsecours and the monument of Jeanne d'Arc, that souvenirs of the girl +had kept his eyelids from closing during the major portion of the night. +To cool his brain after the midday breakfast he had climbed the white, +dusty, and winding road leading to the Monumental Cemetery wherein, true +Flaubertian, he had remained some moments uncovered at the tomb of the +master. Now he rested, and the shade of the trees mellowed the slow dusk +of a Rouen evening.</p> + +<p>A deep contralto voice boomed in his ears. As he had seen but a scant +half-dozen persons during the afternoon on the heights, Ferval was +startled from his dreams. He turned. Sitting on a bank of green was the +girl. Her hands were clasped and she spoke carelessly to her father, +who, unharnessed from his orchestra, appeared another man. Rapidly +Ferval observed his striking front, his massive head with the long, +white curls, the head of an Elijah disillusioned of his mission. He, +too, was sitting, but upright, and his arm was raised with a threatening +gesture as if in his desolating anger he were about to pronounce a +malediction upon the vanishing twilighted town. Ferval moved +immediately, as he did not care to be caught spying upon his queer +neighbours. He was halted by their speech. It was English. His surprise +was so unaffected that he turned back and went up to the two and bade +them good-day. At once he saw that the girl recognized him;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[Pg 315]</a></span> the father +dropped his air of grandeur and put on the beggar's mask. What an actor! +thought Ferval, at the transformation. "Would the good gentleman +please—?"</p> + +<p>The girl plucked at her father's arm imploringly. With her grave, cold +expression she answered the other's salutation and fixed him with her +wonderful eyes so inquiringly that Ferval began a hasty explanation. +"English was rarely spoken here ... and then the pleasure of the music!" +The old man burst into scornful laughter.</p> + +<p>"The music!" he exclaimed. "The music!" echoed his daughter. Ferval +wished himself down in Rouen. But he held his position.</p> + +<p>"Yes," he continued, "your music. It interested me. And now I find you +speaking my own tongue. I must confess that I am curious, that my +curiosity has warrant." Thus was he talking to beggars as if they were +his social equals. Unconsciously the tone he adopted had been forced +upon him by the bearing of his companions, above all by their accent, +that of cultivated folk. Who and what were they? The musician no longer +smiled.</p> + +<p>"You are a music-lover, monsieur?" he asked in a marked French <i>patois</i>.</p> + +<p>"I love music, and I am extremely engaged by your remarkable combination +of instruments," answered Ferval. Baki regarded his wretched orchestra +on the grass, then spoke to his daughter.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">[Pg 316]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Debora," he said in English, and his listener wondered if it were +Celtic or Scotch in its unusual intonations, "Debora, you must sing +something for the gentleman. He loves our art,"—there was indescribable +pathos in this phrase,—"so sing something from Purcell, Brahms, or +Richard Strauss."</p> + +<p>These words were like the sting of hail; they seemed to drop from the +sky, so out of key were they with the speaker's ragged clothes and the +outlandish garb of his daughter. Purcell! Brahms! Strauss! What could +these three composers mean to such outcasts? Believing that he was the +victim of a mystification, Ferval waited, his pulses beating as if he +had been running too hard. The girl slowly moved her glorious eyes in +his direction; light as they were in hue, their heavy, dark lashes gave +them a fantastic expression—bright flame seen through the shadow of +smoke. He felt his own dilating as she opened her throat and poured out +a broad, sonorous stream of sound that resolved into Von ewiger Liebe by +Brahms. He had always loved deep-voiced women. Had he not read in the +Talmud that Lilith, Adam's first wife, was low of voice? And this +beggar-maid? Maybe a masquerading singer with a crazy father! What else +could mean such art wasted on the roads, thrown in the faces of a +rabble! Ferval kindled with emotion. Here was romance. Brahms and his +dark song under the bowl of the troubled blue sky strongly affected him. +He took the lean,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">[Pg 317]</a></span> brown hand of the singer and kissed it fervently. She +drew back nervously, but her father struck her on the shoulder +chidingly.</p> + +<p>"A trifle too dreary," he rumbled in his heavy bass. "Now, Purcell for +the gentleman, and may he open his heart and his purse for the poor."</p> + +<p>"Father," she cried warningly, "we are not beggars, <i>now</i>!" She turned +supplicatingly to the young man and made a gesture of dismissal. He +gently shook his head and pretended that he was about to leave, though +he felt that his feet were rooted in the earth, his power of willing +gone.</p> + +<p>"Ay, ay, my girl!" continued the musician, "you can sing as well as the +best of them, only you love your sinful old father so much that you have +laid aside your ambitions, to follow him in his pilgrimage of expiation +about this wicked globe. Ah, sir, if you but knew—I <i>will</i> speak, +Debora, for he is a gentleman and a lover of music! If you but knew our +history, you would not be surprised at us. Have ye ever been in Wales?"</p> + +<p>Ferval stumbled in his answer. It was overlooked; the old man continued: +"If ye have, ye must have heard of the sin-eaters. I am one of them, I +am an eater of sin—"</p> + +<p>Again the girl exclaimed, this time piteously, "Oh, father, remember +your vow!"</p> + +<p>"Poor lass! Yes, I was a doer of evil, and I became an eater of sin. +Some day my sins will<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">[Pg 318]</a></span> be forgiven—this is my penance." He pointed to +his instruments. Ferval kept silence. He feared a word would blow away +the cobweb foundations of the narrative. The girl had turned and was +watching a young tilted moon which with a single star made silvery dents +low in the western horizon.</p> + +<p>"I am an eater of sin. We still have a few such in Wales. They put a +piece of bread and cheese on the breast of a dead man and when the +sin-eater eats it, the sins of the dead are passed into the bread and +cheese and the soul of the dead is shrived of them. Ay, ay, but it's a +grave duty, my friend, to take upon your own soul the crime of another. +If you are free from sin yourself, you may walk through life a brave +creature; but ... I took his sins, sins, the sins of the wickedest +composer of our century, God rest his soul. And for the wicked things he +put into his symphonies I must march through life playing on this +terrible collection of instruments the Tune of Time—" His daughter +faced him.</p> + +<p>"Father, we must go; you are only keeping the gentleman." Again she +signalled Ferval, but he disregarded her warning. He would not stir. The +story and the man who told it, a prophet shorn of his heaven-storming +powers, fascinated him.</p> + +<p>"I took his sins to myself and they were awful. Once every night I play +the Tune of Time in which the wickedness of the dead man<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">[Pg 319]</a></span> is spread out +like dry rot in a green field. This man kept his genius so long stagnant +that it decayed on his hands, and then into his pestilential music he +poured his poison, and would have made the world sick. Oh, for delivery +from the crushing transgressions of another! His name? Ah, but that is +my secret! I ate his sin, and truth, my son, is stranger than theology! +Listen!"</p> + +<p>Before his daughter could check him he had hastily donned his armament +of instruments and, tramping slowly the broad, smooth path, began +playing. Ferval, much disappointed, was about to disappear, for he +remembered the racking noises of the previous day. But this music, this +Tune of Time!...</p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<p>It was like the flare of lightning which illuminates strange regions +beyond the borders of the soul. Ferval no longer heard, he felt; he felt +no more, he saw. The white veil was torn asunder, and it showed him a +melodious thunder-pool wherein tapering tiny bodies swam, whose eyes +were the eyes of Debora. They split and coalesced into other creatures, +and to the drummings of spheric harmonies resolved themselves scaly and +monstrous. Never did they cease changing. As the music buzzed he saw the +great ladder of life, the lowermost rungs resting in lakes of melted +amber, the top threat<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">[Pg 320]</a></span>ening the remotest rims of the universe. And still +the Tune of Time whirred on, as facet after facet of the Infinite +wheeled toward creation. Numberless legions of crumpled nightmare shapes +modulated into new, familiar forms. Ferval saw plasmic dew become +anthropoidal apes, fiercely roaming primeval forests in search of prey. +The music mounted ever upward, for the Tune of Time is the Tune of +Love—love and its inseparable shadow, hate, fashion the firmament. The +solid, circular earth shivered like a mighty harp under this lyric +burden of love. The very stars sported in their orbits; and from the +fulgurating ovens of the Milky Way there shot forth streams of audible +light that touched the heart-strings of the hairy, erect primates and +set them chanting; thus were the souls born which crowned them men. This +space-bridging music ranged from sun to sun, and its supernatural +symphony had no beginning and never shall end.</p> + +<p>But the magician or devil who revealed this phantasmagoria of the +Cosmos—how had he wrested from the Inane the Tune of Time that in a +sequence of chromatic chords pictured the processes of the eternal +energy? Was this his sin, the true sin against the Holy Ghost? How had +he blundered upon the secret of the rhythmic engine which spun souls +through the ages? No man could live after this terrific peep at the +Ancient of Days. Debora's eyes peered into Ferval's, filled with the +music that enmeshes.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_321" id="Page_321">[Pg 321]</a></span> And now sounded the apocalyptic trumpets even unto +the glittering edges of eternity....</p> + +<p>Amid this vertiginous tempest of tones Debora danced the Dance of Space. +She revolved in lenten movement to the lilt of the music, her eyes +staring and full of broken lights. As her gaze collided with her +companion's he saw a disk of many-coloured fire; and then her languorous +gestures were transformed into shivering intensities. She danced like +the wine-steeped Noah; she danced as danced David before the Ark of the +Covenant. And she was Herodias pirouetting for the price of John's head, +and her brow was wreathed with serpents. Followed the convulsive +curvings of the Nautch and the opaque splendours of stately Moorish +slaves. Debora threw her watcher into a frenzy of fear. He crouched +under a sky that roofed him in with its menacing blackness; the orbs of +the girl were shot with crescent lightnings. Alien in his desolation, he +wondered if her solemn leaps, as the music dashed with frantic speed +upon his ear-drums, signified the incarnation of Devi, dread slayer of +men! The primal charmers affrighted his vision: Lilith, Ourania, +Astarté, Ashtaroth, Belkis, Ishtar, Mylitta, Cotytto, and many +immemorial figures from before the Flood streamed by and melted into the +woven paces of Debora—this new Jephtha's daughter dancing to her doom +as her father fingered the Tune of Time. In the whirling patterns of her +dance, Ferval discerned, though dimly, the Veil<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_322" id="Page_322">[Pg 322]</a></span> of Maya, the veil of +illusion called Space, on the thither side of which are embroidered the +fugacious symbols of Time....</p> + +<p>... As the delirious music faltered and fainted, he watched the tragic +eyes of Debora yellowing cat-like. His senses and imagination had been +hypnotized by all this fracas and by the beauty of the girl. With such a +mate and such formidable music, he could conquer the earth! His brain +was afire with the sweetness of the odour that enveloped them, an odour +as penetrating as the music of the nocturnal Chopin.</p> + +<p>"Debora," he whispered, "you must never go away from me." She hung her +head. The old man was not to be seen; the darkness had swallowed him. +Ferval quietly passed his arm about the waist of the silent woman and +slowly they walked in the tender night. She was the first to speak:—</p> + +<p>"You did not hear a madman's story," she asserted in her clear, candid +voice, which had for him the hue of a cleft pomegranate. "It is the +history of my father's soul. It is his own sin he expiates."</p> + +<p>"But you, you!" Ferval cried unsteadily. "Why must your life be +sacrificed to gratify the bizarre egotism of such a—" He cut short the +phrase, fearful of wounding her. He felt her body tremble and her arm +contract. They reached the marble staircase of the Jeanne d'Arc +memorial. She stopped him and burst forth:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_323" id="Page_323">[Pg 323]</a></span>—</p> + +<p>"Would you be willing to share his burden? Would you take upon your +shoulders his sin? He may have committed the one unpardonable sin, for +he discovered the true philosopher's stone, that can transmute metals, +make mountains nod, the stars to stop, and command the throne of +Jehovah—oh, what blasphemy has been his in his daring music! If he +could persuade one other soul besides mine to help him, he might be +released from his woe. Will you be that other?"</p> + +<p>She put this question as if she were proposing a commonplace human +undertaking. Ferval in his confusion fancied that she was provoking him +to a declaration. To grasp his receding reason he fatuously exclaimed:—</p> + +<p>"Is this a Salvation Army fantasy?"</p> + +<p>With that she called out, in harsh resentment:</p> + +<p>"Not salvation for you!"</p> + +<p>She then thrust him from her so violently that he tumbled backward down +the steps to the very bottom, where, unnerved by the ferocity of the +attack and his head bruised by the fall, he felt his consciousness +escape like gas from a punctured balloon. When found the next morning, +he was barely covered by the old sin-eater's rags, while near by was +scattered the entire orchestra of that eloquent wizard. Shudderingly he +realized that it had been no dream; shudderingly he wondered if upon his +soul had been shifted the unknown crime of the fanatic! The witching, +enigmatic Debora haunted his memory;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_324" id="Page_324">[Pg 324]</a></span> and with dismay he recalled the +blistering vision evoked by the music, through which she had glided like +some tremulous Lamia. Decidedly his imagination had carried him far. He +cursed his easy credulity, he reviled his love of the exotic....</p> + +<p>Ferval made inquiry of the authorities, but received little comfort. +Salvation Army people they were not, this father and daughter; the +tambourine, assumed garb, and prophet's beard had deceived him. +Impostors! But of what incredible caliber, of what illusion-creating +power! For years he could not see a Salvation Army girl without a sense +of cerebral exaltation. If he could have met Debora again, he would have +forgiven her sibylline deceptions, her father's chicanery. And how did +they spin their web? Ferval, student of the occult, greedy of +metaphysical problems, at first set it down to Indian Yogi magic. But +the machinery—the hideously discordant human orchestra, the corybantic +dancing! No, he rejected the theory. Music is sometimes hypnotic, but +not such music; dancing is the most alluring of the spatial arts, and +Debora's miming was a delight to the eye; but could it have so obscured +his judgments as to paint upon the canvas of his fancy those prodigious +frescoes of time and space?</p> + +<p>In the iron solitude of his soul he tortured himself with these +questions. His stupor lasted for days—was it the abrupt fall or was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_325" id="Page_325">[Pg 325]</a></span> it +the result of his absinthe-like dreams? He was haunted by an odour that +assailed his brain like one tune persistently played. The odour! Whence +did it come with its sickly sweetness? Perhaps therein lay the secret of +his hallucinating visions. Perhaps a drug had perverted his brain. But +within the week the dangerous perfume had become dissipated, and with it +vanished all hope of solving the riddle. Oh, to sense once more the +enchantments of its fragrance, once more revel in the sublimated +intoxication of mighty forces weaving at the loom of life! By the +cadences of what infernal art had he been vouchsafed a glimpse of the +profiles of the gods? Henceforth Ferval became a lover of shadows.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_326" id="Page_326">[Pg 326]</a></span></p> +<h2>XIX</h2> + +<h3>NADA</h3> + + +<p>The tenderness of the growing night disquieted the dying woman.</p> + +<p>"Aline!" she called. But it was only the name that reverberated within +the walls of her brain, harrowed by fever. A soft air rustled the drawn +curtains of lawn; and on the dressing table the two little lamps +fluttered in syncopated sympathy. One picture the room held. It was +after a painting by Goya, and depicted a sneering skeleton scrawling on +his dusty tomb, with a bony fore-finger, the sinister word, +<i>Nada</i>—nothing! The perturbation of the woman increased, though +physical power seemed denied her. "Aline, my child!" This time a +clucking sound issued from her throat.</p> + +<p>The girl went to the bedside and gently fanned. Her aunt wagged her head +negatively. "No, no!" she stuttered. Aline stopped, and kneeling, took +the sick hands in her own. Their eyes met and Aline, guided by the +glance, looked over at the picture with its sardonic motto.</p> + +<p>"Shall I take it away, Aunt Mary?" The elder woman closed her eyes as if +to shut out the ghoulish mockery. Then Aline saw the tabouret that stood +between the windows—it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_327" id="Page_327">[Pg 327]</a></span> was burdened with magnolias in a deep white +bowl.</p> + +<p>"Do you wish them nearer?"</p> + +<p>"No, no," murmured her aunt. Her eyes brightened. She pushed her chin +forward, and the young girl removed the flowers, knowing that their +odour had become oppressive. She was not absent more than a few seconds. +As she returned the maid touched her arm.</p> + +<p>"The gentlemen are waiting below, miss. They won't leave until they see +you."</p> + +<p>"How can I go now? Send them away, send them away!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, miss; but I told them what you said this afternoon about the +danger of Holiest Mother—"</p> + +<p>"Hush! she is calling." Aline slipped into the room on hurried feet, her +eyes dilated, her hair in anxious disorder. But the invalid made no +signal. She lay with closed eyelids, the contraction of her nostrils a +faint proclamation of life. Again the niece took her place at the +headboard, and with folded fingers watched the whispering indications of +speedy flight. The maid soon beckoned her from a narrowed door. Aline +joined her.</p> + +<p>"They say that if you don't go down, they will come up."</p> + +<p>"Who says?" was the stern query.</p> + +<p>"The Second Reader and the Secretary. I think you had better see them; +they both look worried. Really I do, Miss Allie."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_328" id="Page_328">[Pg 328]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Very well, Ellen; but you must stay here, and if Holiest Mother makes +the slightest move, touch the bell. I'll not be gone five minutes."</p> + +<p>Without arranging her hair or dress, Aline opened the folding doors of +the drawing-room. Only the centre lamp was lighted, but she recognized +the two men. They were sitting together, and arose as she entered. The +burly Second Reader wore a dismayed countenance. His cheeks were flabby, +his eyes red. The other was a timid little man who never had anything to +say.</p> + +<p>"How is Holiest Mother?" asked the Reader.</p> + +<p>"Dying."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Sister Aline! Why such a blunt way of putting it? <i>She</i> may be +exchanging her earthly garb for a celestial one—but die! We do not +acknowledge death in the Church of the New Faith." He paused and blandly +stroked his huge left hand, covered with red down.</p> + +<p>"Holiest Mother, my aunt, has not an hour to live," was the cool +response of the girl. "If you have no further question, I must ask you +to excuse me; I am needed above." She stepped to the door.</p> + +<p>"Wait a moment, sister! Not so fast. The situation is serious. Hundreds +of thousands of the faithful depend on our report of this—of this sad +event. We may tell them that the female pope of our great religion"—he +bent his big neck reverently—"was wafted to her heavenly abode by the +angels. But there are<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_329" id="Page_329">[Pg 329]</a></span> the officers of the law, the undertaker, the +cemetery people, to be considered. Shall we acknowledge that our founder +has died like any other human—in bed, of a fever? And who is to be her +successor? Has she left a will?"</p> + +<p>"Poor Aunt Mary!" muttered the girl.</p> + +<p>"It must be a woman, will or no will," continued the Second Reader, in +the tone of a conqueror making terms with a stricken foe. "Now Aline, +sister, you are the nearest of kin. You are a fervent healer. <i>You</i> are +the Woman."</p> + +<p>"How can you stand there heartlessly plotting such things and a dying +woman in the house?" Aline's voice was metallic with passion. "You care +only for the money and power in our church. I refuse to join with you in +any such scheme. Aunt Mary will die. She will name her successor. Then +it will be time to act. Have you forgotten her last words to the +faithful?" She pointed to a marble tablet above the fireplace, which +bore this astounding phrase: "My first and forever message is one and +eternal." Nothing more,—but the men cowered before the sublime wisdom +uttered by a frail woman, wisdom that had started the emotional +machinery of two continents.</p> + +<p>"But, great God! Miss Aline, you mustn't go off and leave us in this +fix." Drops of water stood on the forehead of the Second Reader. His +hands dropped to his side with a gesture of despair. His companion kept +to the corner, a scared being.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_330" id="Page_330">[Pg 330]</a></span></p> + +<p>"You know as well as I do that <i>somebody</i> has to take the throne seat +after—after your Aunt Mary dies—I mean, after Holiest Mother is +translated to eternity. Ask her, beg her, for some advice. We can't let +the great undertaking go to pieces—"</p> + +<p>"You have little faith, brother," replied Aline. "If that message means +anything, then the New Faith will take care of itself—"</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes, I know," was the testy interruption; "but the world is not so +easily led in matters of religion. The message, as you say, is divine; +but it may sound like meaningless twaddle to the world at large. If we +are to heal mankind and dispel the heresy of disease and death, why +can't Holiest Mother save herself? Mind you, I am looking at this thing +with the eyes of the sceptics—"</p> + +<p>"You are an unbeliever, a materialist, yourself," was the bold retort. +"Do as you please, but you can't drag me into your money calculations." +The swift slam of the door left them to their fears.</p> + +<p>Her aunt, sitting as upright as a candle, was conducting an invisible +orchestra when Aline returned. The frightened maid tried to hold the +lean, spasmodic arms as they traced in the air the pompous rhythm of a +march that moved on silent funereal pinions through the chamber. The +woman stared threateningly at the picture on the wall, the picture of +the skeleton which had come from nothingness to reveal nothingness to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_331" id="Page_331">[Pg 331]</a></span> +the living. The now distraught girl, her nerves crisped by her doubts, +threw herself upon the bed, her fears sorely knocking at her heart.</p> + +<p>"Aunt, Aunt Mary—Holiest Mother, in Christ's name, in the name of the +New Faith, tell me before you go—tell me what is to become of our holy +church after you die—after you pass over to the great white light. Is +it all real? Or is it only a dream, <i>your</i> beautiful dream?—What is the +secret truth? Or—or—is there no secret—no—" her voice was cracked by +sobs. The stately, soundless music was waved on by her aunt. Then +Holiest Mother fell back on her pillow, and with a last long glance at +the picture, she pointed, with smiling irony at the picture.</p> + +<p><i>Nada, Nada ...</i></p> + +<p>The night died away in tender complicity with the two little lamps on +the dressing table, and the sweet, thick perfume of magnolias modulated +into acrid decay as day dawned. Below, the two men anxiously awaited the +message from the dead. And they saw again upon the marble tablet above +the fireplace her cryptic wisdom:—</p> + +<p>"My first and forever message is one and eternal."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_332" id="Page_332">[Pg 332]</a></span></p> +<h2>XX</h2> + +<h3>PAN</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For the Great God Pan is alive again.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">—<span class="smcap">Dean Mansel</span>.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<h4>I</h4> + +<p>The handsome Hungarian kept his brilliant glance fixed upon Lora Crowne; +she sat with her Aunt Lucas and Mr. Steyle at a table facing the +orchestra. His eyes were not so large as black; the intensity of their +gaze further bewildered the young woman, whose appearance that evening +at the famous café on the East Side was her initial one. The heat, the +bristling lights, the terrific appealing clamour of the gypsy band, set +murmuring the nerves of this impressionable girl. And the agility of the +<i>cymbalom</i> player, his great height, clear skin, and piercing eyes, +quite enthralled her.</p> + +<p>"It is the gypsy dulcimer, Lora; I read all about it in Liszt's book on +gypsy music," said Aunt Lucas, in an airy soprano.</p> + +<p>Mr. Steyle was impressed. Lora paid no attention, but continued to gaze +curiously at the antics of the player, who hammered from his instrument +of wire shivering, percussive music. With flexible wrists he swung the +felt-covered<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_333" id="Page_333">[Pg 333]</a></span> mallets that brought up such resounding tones; at times +his long, apelike arms would reach far asunder and, rolling his eyes, he +touched the extremes of his <i>cymbalom</i>; then he described furious +arpeggios, punctuated with a shrill tattoo. And the crazy music defiled +by in a struggling squad of chords; but Aŕpad Vihary never lifted his +eyes from Lora Crowne....</p> + +<p>The vibration ceased. Its withdrawal left the ear-drums buzzing with a +minute, painful sensation, like that of moisture rapidly evaporating +upon the naked skin. A battalion of tongues began to chatter as the +red-faced waiters rushed between the tables, taking orders. It was after +eleven o'clock, and through the swinging doors passed a throng of motley +people, fanning, gossiping, bickering—all eager and thirsty. Clarence +Steyle pointed out the celebrities with conscious delight. Over +yonder—that man with the mixed gray hair—was a composer who came every +night for inspiration,—musical and otherwise, Clarence added, with a +laugh. And there was the young and well-known decadent playwright who +wore strangling high collars and transposed all his plays from French +sources; he lisped and was proud of his ability to dramatize the latest +mental disease. And a burglar who had written a famous book on the +management of children during hot weather sat meekly resting before a +solitary table.</p> + +<p>The leader of the Hungarian band was a gypsy who called himself Alfassy +Janos, though<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_334" id="Page_334">[Pg 334]</a></span> he lived on First Avenue, in a flat the door of which +bore this legend: <i>Jacob Aron</i>. The rest of the band seemed gypsy. Who +is the <i>cymbalom</i> player? That is not difficult to answer; the programme +gives it.</p> + +<p>"There you are, Miss Lora."</p> + +<p>She looked. "Oh, what a romantic name! He must be a count at least."</p> + +<p>"Lora, dear, gypsies never bear titles," remarked Aunt Lucas, +patronizingly.</p> + +<p>"How about the Abbé Liszt?" triumphantly asked her charge.</p> + +<p>Aunt Lucas laughed coldly. "Liszt was Hungarian, not Romany. But your +artist with the drumsticks certainly is distinguished-looking. If he +only would not wear that odious scarlet uniform. I wonder why he does +not sit down, like the rest of his colleagues."</p> + +<p>Aŕpad Vihary leaned against the panelled wall, his brow puckered in +boredom, his long black mustaches drooping from sheer discouragement. +His was a figure for sculpture—a frame powerfully modelled, a bisque +complexion. Thin as a cedar sapling, he preserved such an immovable +attitude that in the haze of the creamy atmosphere he seemed a carved, +marmoreal image rather than a young man with devouring eyes.</p> + +<p>The three visitors ate sandwiches and pretended to relish Munich beer +served in tall stone mugs. Aunt Lucas, who was shaped like a 'cello, +made more than a pretence of sipping;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_335" id="Page_335">[Pg 335]</a></span> she drank one entirely, +regretting the exigencies of chaperonage: to ask for more might shock +the proper young man.</p> + +<p>"It's horrid here, after all," she remarked discontentedly. "So many +people—<i>such</i> people—and very few nice ones. The Batsons are over +there, Lora; but then you don't care for them. O dear, I wish the band +would strike up again."</p> + +<p>It did. A vicious swirl of colour and dizzy, dislocated rhythms prefaced +the incantations of the Czardas. Instantly the eating, gabbling crowd +became silent. Alfassy Janos magnetized his hearers with cradling, +caressing movements of his fiddle. He waved like tall grass in the wind; +he twisted snakewise his lithe body as he lashed his bow upon the +screaming strings; the resilient tones darted fulgurantly from +instrument to instrument. After chasing in circles of quicksilver, they +all met with a crash; and the whole tonal battery, reënforced by the +throbbing of Aŕpad Vihary's dulcimer, swept through the suite of rooms +from ceiling to sanded floor. It was no longer enchanting music, but +sheer madness of the blood; sensual and warlike, it gripped the +imagination as these tunes of old Egypt, filtered through savage +centuries, reached the ears. Lora trembled in the gale that blew across +the Puzta. She imagined a determined Hungarian prairie, over which +dashed disordered centaurs brandishing clubs, driving before them a band +of satyrs and leaping fauns. The hoofed men struggled. At their front +was a monster with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_336" id="Page_336">[Pg 336]</a></span> a black goat-face and huge horns; he fought fiercely +the half-human horses. The sun, a thin scarf of light, was eclipsed by +earnest clouds; the curving thunder closed over the battle; the air was +flame-sprinkled and enlaced by music; and most melancholy were the eyes +of the defeated Pan—the melancholy eyes of Aŕpad Vihary....</p> + +<p>Aunt Lucas was scandalized. "Do you know, Lora, that the impudent +dulcimer virtuoso"—she prided herself on her musical terms—"actually +stared you out of countenance during the entire Czardas?" And she could +have added that her niece had returned the glance unflinchingly.</p> + +<p>Mr. Steyle noticed Lora's vacant regard when he addressed her and +insisted on getting her away from the dangerous undertow of this "table +d'hôte music," as he contemptuously called it. He summoned the waiter.</p> + +<p>Lora shed her disappointment. "Oh, let's wait for the <i>cymbalom</i> solo," +she frankly begged.</p> + +<p>Her aunt was unmoved. "Yes, Mr. Steyle, we had better go; the air is +positively depressing. These slumming parties are delightful if you +don't overdo them—but the people!" Up went her lorgnon.</p> + +<p>They soon departed. Lora did not dare to look back until she reached the +door that opened on the avenue; as she did so her vibrant gaze collided +with the Hungarian's. She determined to see him again.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_337" id="Page_337">[Pg 337]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<p>Nice Brooklyn girls always attend church and symphony concerts. This +dual custom is considered respectable and cultured. Lora's parents +during their lifetime never missed the Theodore Thomas concerts and the +sermons of a certain famous local preacher; but there were times when +the young woman longed for Carmen and the delights of fashionable +Bohemia. Carefully reared by her Aunt Lucas, she had nevertheless a +taste for gypsy bands and "Gyp's" novels. She read the latter +translated, much to the disedification of her guardian, who was a +linguist and a patron of the fine arts. This latter clause included +subscriptions to the Institute Course and several scientific journals. +If Lora were less romantic, all would be well. Once the careful chaperon +had feared music and its disturbing influences; but after she had read +an article about its healing effect upon the insane she felt that it +could work no evil in Lora; indeed, it was an elevating art. She was +fond of music herself, and, as dancing was strictly tabooed, there +seemed little likelihood of the noble art of "sweet concordance"—Aunt +Lucas had picked this quotation up somewhere—doing mischief to her +impressionable niece.</p> + +<p>Nearly all dwelling-houses look alike in Brooklyn, even at midday. The +street in which the Crownes lived was composed of conven<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_338" id="Page_338">[Pg 338]</a></span>tional +brown-stone buildings and English basements. Nielje, the Dutch maid, +stood at the half-opened door, regarding with suspicion the big, dark +man who had pulled the bell so violently. Aunt Lucas was in New York at +the meeting of a society devoted to Ethical Enjoyment. Though Nielje had +been warned secretly of an expected visitor, this wild-looking young man +with long black hair, wearing a flaring coat of many colours and baggy +Turkish trousers, gave her a shock. Why did he come to the basement as +if he were one of the cook's callers? She paused. Then the door was +shoved in by a muscular arm, and she was pushed against the wall.</p> + +<p>"Don't try that again, man," she protested.</p> + +<p>He answered her in gibberish. "Mees, Mees Lora," he repeated.</p> + +<p>"Ach!" she exclaimed.</p> + +<p>Aŕpad Vihary gloomily followed her into the dining-room, where Lora +stood trembling. This was the third time she had met the Hungarian, and +fearing Prospect Park,—after two timid walks there, under the +fiery-fingered leaves of early autumn,—she had been prevailed upon to +invite Aŕpad to her home. She regretted her imprudence the moment he +entered. All his footlight picturesqueness vanished in the cold, hard +light of an unromantic Brooklyn breakfast-room. He seemed like a clumsy +circus hero as he scraped his feet over the parquetry and attempted to +kiss her hand. She drew away<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_339" id="Page_339">[Pg 339]</a></span> instantly and pointed to a chair. He +refused to sit down; his pride seemed hurt.</p> + +<p>Then he gave the girl an intense look, and she drew nearer.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Aŕpad Vihary," she began.</p> + +<p>He interrupted. "You do not love me now. Why? You told me you loved me, +in the park, yesterday. I am a poor artist, that is the reason."</p> + +<p>This speech he uttered glibly, and, despite the extraordinary +pronunciation, she understood it. She took his long hand, the fingers +amazed her. He bent them back until they touched his wrist, and was +proud of their flexibility. He walked to the dining-table and tossed its +cover-cloth on a chair. Upon his two thumbs he went around it like an +acrobat. "Shall I hold you out with one arm?" he softly asked. Lora was +vastly amused; this was indeed a courtship out of the ordinary—it +pleased her exotic taste.</p> + +<p>"Hungarian gypsies are very strong, are they not?" she innocently asked.</p> + +<p>"I am not gypsy nor am I Hungarian; I am an East Indian. My family is +royal. We are of the Rajpoot tribes called Ranas. My father once ruled +Roorbunder."</p> + +<p>Lora was amazed. A king's son, a Rana of Roorbunder! She became very +sympathetic. Again she urged him to sit down.</p> + +<p>"My nation never sits before a woman," he proudly answered.</p> + +<p>"But I will sit beside you," she coaxed, push<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_340" id="Page_340">[Pg 340]</a></span>ing him to a corner. He +resisted her and went to the window. Lora again joined him. The man +piqued her. He was mysterious and very unlike Mr. Steyle—poor, +sentimental Clarence, who melted with sighs if she but glanced at him; +and then, Clarence was too stout. She adored slender men, believing that +when fat came in at the door love fled out of the window.</p> + +<p>"They put me in a circus at Buda-Pesth," remarked Aŕpad Vihary, as if he +were making a commonplace statement about the weather.</p> + +<p>She gave a little scream; he regarded her with Oriental composure. "In a +circus! You! Did you ride?"</p> + +<p>"I cannot ride," he said. "I played in a cage all day."</p> + +<p>"Because you were wild?" She then went into a fit of laughter. He was +such a funny fellow, though his ardent gaze made her blush. So blond and +pink was Lora that her friends called her Strawberry—a delicate +compliment in which she delighted. It was this golden head and radiant +face, with implacably blue eyes, that set the blood pumping into Aŕpad's +brain. When he looked at her, he saw sunlight.</p> + +<p>"Do you know, you absurd prince, that when you played the Czardas the +other night I seemed to see a vision of a Hungarian prairie, covered +with fighting centaurs and satyrs! I longed to be a <i>vivandière</i> among +all those fauns. You were there—in the music, I mean—and you were big +Pan—oh, so ugly and terrible!"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_341" id="Page_341">[Pg 341]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Pan! That is a Polish title," he answered quite simply.</p> + +<p>"Stupid! The great god Pan—don't you know your mythology? Haven't you +read Mrs. Browning? He was the god of nature, of the woods. Even now, I +believe you have ears with furry tips and hoofs like a faun."</p> + +<p>He turned a sickly yellow.</p> + +<p>"Anyhow, why did they put you in a cage? Were you a wild boy?"</p> + +<p>"They thought so in Hungary."</p> + +<p>"But why?"</p> + +<p>He stared at her sorrowfully, and was about to empty his soul; but she +turned away with a shudder.</p> + +<p>"I know, I know," she whispered; "your hands—they are like the hands +of—"</p> + +<p>Aŕpad threw out his chest, and Lora heard with a curiosity that became +nervous a rhythmic wagging sound, like velvet bruised by some dull +implement. It frightened her.</p> + +<p>"Do not be afraid of me," he begged. "You cannot say anything I do not +know already." He walked to the door, and the girl followed him.</p> + +<p>"Don't go, Aŕpad," she said with pretty remorse.</p> + +<p>The fire blazed in his eyes and with a single swift grasp he seized her, +holding her aloft like a torch. Lora almost lost consciousness. She had +not counted upon such barbarous wooing, and, frightened, cried out, +"Nielje, Nielje!"</p> + +<p>Nielje burst into the room as if she had been<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_342" id="Page_342">[Pg 342]</a></span> very near the keyhole. +She was a powerful woman from Holland, who did not fear an army.</p> + +<p>"Put her down!" she insisted, in her deepest gutturals. "Put her down, +you brute, or I'll hurt you."</p> + +<p>Lora jumped to the floor as Nielje struck with her broomstick at Aŕpad's +retreating back. To the surprise of the women he gave a shriek of agony +and ran to the door, Nielje following close behind. Lora, her eyes +strained with excitement, did not stir; she heard a struggle in the +little hall as the man fumbled at the basement entrance. Again he +yelled, and then Lora rushed to the window. Nielje, on her knees, was +being dragged across the grassy space in front of the house. She held +on, seemingly, to the coat-tail of the frantic musician; only by a +vigorous shove did he evade her persistent grasp and disappear.</p> + +<p>A policeman with official aptness went leisurely by. Nielje flew into +the house, locking and bolting the door. Her face was red as she rolled +on the floor, her hands at her sides. Lora, alarmed, thought she was +seriously hurt or hysterical from fright; but the laughter was too +hearty and appealing.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Meeslora! Oh, Meeslora!" she gasped. "He must be monkey-man—he has +monkey tail!"</p> + +<p>Lora could have fainted from chagrin and horror.</p> + +<p>Had the great god Pan passed her way?</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>BOOKS BY JAMES HUNEKER</h2> + + +<p>What Maeterlinck wrote:</p> + +<p>Maurice Maeterlinck wrote thus of James Huneker: "Do you know that +'Iconoclasts' is the only book of high and universal critical worth that +we have had for years—to be precise, since Georg Brandes. It is at once +strong and fine, supple and firm, indulgent and sure."</p> + +<p>The <i>Evening Post</i> of June 10, 1915, wrote of Mr. Huneker's "The New +Cosmopolis":</p> + +<p>"The region of Bohemia, Mr. James Huneker found long ago, is within us. +At twenty, he says, he discovered that there is no such enchanted spot +as the Latin Quarter, but that every generation sets back the mythical +land into the golden age of the Commune, or of 1848, or the days of +'Hernani.' It is the same with New York's East Side, 'the fabulous East +Side,' as Mr. Huneker calls it in his collection of international urban +studies, 'The New Cosmopolis.' If one judged externals by grime, by +poverty, by sanded back-rooms, with long-haired visionaries assailing +the social order, then the East Side of the early eighties has gone down +before the mad rush of settlement workers, impertinent reformers, +sociological cranks, self-advertising politicians, billionaire +socialists, and the reporters. To-day the sentimental traveller 'feels a +heart-pang to see the order, the cleanliness, the wide streets, the +playgrounds, the big boulevards, the absence of indigence that have +spoiled the most interesting part of New York City.' But apparently this +is only a first impression; for Mr. Huneker had no trouble in +discovering in one café a patriarchal figure quite of the type beloved +of the local-color hunters of twenty years ago, a prophet, though +speaking a modern language and concerned with things of the day. So that +we owe to Mr. Huneker the discovery of a notable truth, namely, that +Bohemia is not only a creation of the sentimental memory, but, being +psychological, may be located in clean and prosperous quarters. The +tendency has always been to place it in a golden age, but a tattered and +unswept age. Bohemia is now shown to exist amidst model tenements and +sanitary drinking-cups."</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3>IVORY APES AND PEACOCKS</h3> + +<h4><i>WITH FRONTISPIECE PORTRAIT OF DOSTOÏEVSKY</i></h4> + +<p class="center">12mo. $1.50 net</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3>NEW COSMOPOLIS</h3> + +<p class="center">12mo. $1.50 net</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3>THE PATHOS <i>of</i> DISTANCE</h3> + +<h4>A Book of a Thousand and One Moments</h4> + +<p class="center">12mo. $2.00 net</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3>PROMENADES <i>of an</i> IMPRESSIONIST</h3> + +<p class="center">12mo. $1.50 net</p> + +<p>"We like best such sober essays as those which analyze for us the +technical contributions of Cézanne and Rodin. Here Mr. Huneker is a real +interpreter, and here his long experience of men and ways in art counts +for much. Charming, in the lighter vein, are such appreciations as the +Monticelli, and Chardin."—<span class="smcap">Frank Jewett Mather, Jr.</span>, in <i>New +York Nation</i> and <i>Evening Post</i>.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3>EGOISTS</h3> + +<h4>A Book of Supermen</h4> + +<h3>STENDHAL, BAUDELAIRE, FLAUBERT, ANATOLE FRANCE, HUYSMANS, BARRÈS, HELLO, +BLAKE, NIETZSCHE, IBSEN, AND MAX STIRNER</h3> + +<h4><i>With Portrait and Facsimile Reproductions</i></h4> + +<p class="center">12mo. $1.50 net</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3>ICONOCLASTS:</h3> + +<h4>A Book of Dramatists</h4> + +<p class="center">12mo. $1.50 net</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">Contents</span>: Henrik Ibsen—August Strindberg—Henry +Becque—Gerhart Hauptmann—Paul Hervieu—The Quintessence of Shaw—Maxim +Gorky's Nachtasyl—Hermann Sudermann—Princess Mathilde's Play—Duse and +D'Annunzio—Villiers de l'Isle Adam—Maurice Maeterlinck.</p> + +<p>"His style is a little jerky, but it is one of those rare styles in +which we are led to expect some significance, if not wit, in every +sentence."—<span class="smcap">G.K. Chesterton</span>, in <i>London Daily News</i>.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3>OVERTONES:</h3> + +<h4>A Book of Temperaments</h4> + +<h4><i>WITH FRONTISPIECE PORTRAIT OF RICHARD STRAUSS</i></h4> + +<p class="center">12mo. $1.50 net</p> + +<p>"In some respects Mr. Huneker must be reckoned the most brilliant of all +living writers on matters musical."—<i>Academy, London</i>.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3>MEZZOTINTS IN MODERN MUSIC</h3> + +<h4>BRAHMS, TSCHAÏKOWSKY, CHOPIN, RICHARD STRAUSS, LISZT, AND WAGNER</h4> + +<p class="center">12mo. $1.50 net</p> + +<p>"Mr. Huneker is, in the best sense, a critic; he listens to the music +and gives you his impressions as rapidly and in as few words as +possible; or he sketches the composers in fine, broad, sweeping strokes +with a magnificent disregard for unimportant details.... A distinctly +original and very valuable contribution to the world's tiny musical +literature."—J.F. <span class="smcap">Runciman</span>, in <i>London Saturday Review</i>.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3>FRANZ LISZT</h3> + +<h4><i>WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS</i></h4> + +<p class="center">12mo. $2.00 net</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3>CHOPIN:</h3> + +<h4>The Man and His Music</h4> + +<h4><i>WITH ETCHED PORTRAIT</i></h4> + +<p class="center">12mo. $2.00 net</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3>VISIONARIES</h3> + +<p class="center">12mo. $1.50 net</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">Contents</span>: A Master of Cobwebs—The Eighth Deadly Sin—The Purse +of Aholibah—Rebels of the Moon—The Spiral Road—A Mock +Sun—Antichrist—The Eternal Duel—The Enchanted Yodler—The Third +Kingdom—The Haunted Harpsichord—The Tragic Wall—A Sentimental +Rebellion—Hall of the Missing Footsteps—The Cursory Light—An Iron +Fan—The Woman Who Loved Chopin—The Tune of Time—Nada—Pan.</p> + +<p>"In 'The Spiral Road' and in some of the other stories both fantasy and +narrative may be compared with Hawthorne in his most unearthly moods. +The younger man has read his Nietzsche and has cast off his heritage of +simple morals. Hawthorne's Puritanism finds no echo in these modern +souls, all sceptical, wavering and unblessed. But Hawthorne's splendor +of vision and his power of sympathy with a tormented mind do live again +in the best of Mr. Huneker's stories."—<i>London Academy</i> (Feb. 3, 1906).</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h3>MELOMANIACS</h3> + +<p class="center">12mo. $1.50 net</p> + +<p>"It would be difficult to sum up 'Melomaniacs' in a phrase. Never did a +book, in my opinion at any rate, exhibit greater contrasts, not, +perhaps, of strength and weakness, but of clearness and +obscurity."—<span class="smcap">Harold E. Gorst</span>, in <i>London Saturday Review</i>.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h4>CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS, NEW YORK</h4> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Visionaries, by James Huneker + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VISIONARIES *** + +***** This file should be named 17922-h.htm or 17922-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/7/9/2/17922/ + +Produced by Ted Garvin, Taavi Kalju, and the Online +Distributed Proofreaders Europe at http://dp.rastko.net + + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +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 + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + +*** END: FULL LICENSE *** + + + +</pre> + +</body> +</html> diff --git a/17922.txt b/17922.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a581c12 --- /dev/null +++ b/17922.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9047 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Visionaries, by James Huneker + +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: Visionaries + +Author: James Huneker + +Release Date: March 4, 2006 [EBook #17922] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VISIONARIES *** + + + + +Produced by Ted Garvin, Taavi Kalju, and the Online +Distributed Proofreaders Europe at http://dp.rastko.net + + + + + + + +VISIONARIES + +BY + +JAMES HUNEKER + + + J'aime les nuages ... la bas...! + + BAUDELAIRE + + +NEW YORK +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS +1916 + + +COPYRIGHT, 1905, +BY CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS + +Published October, 1905. + + + + +A +MON CHER MAITRE + +REMY DE GOURMONT +PARIS + + + + +CONTENTS + + PAGE + + I. A MASTER OF COBWEBS 1 + + II. THE EIGHTH DEADLY SIN 23 + + III. THE PURSE OF AHOLIBAH 44 + + IV. REBELS OF THE MOON 64 + + V. THE SPIRAL ROAD 80 + + VI. A MOCK SUN 110 + + VII. ANTICHRIST 135 + + VIII. THE ETERNAL DUEL 145 + + IX. THE ENCHANTED YODLER 149 + + X. THE THIRD KINGDOM 168 + + XI. THE HAUNTED HARPSICHORD 188 + + XII. THE TRAGIC WALL 203 + + XIII. A SENTIMENTAL REBELLION 227 + + XIV. HALL OF THE MISSING FOOTSTEPS 249 + + XV. THE CURSORY LIGHT 266 + + XVI. AN IRON FAN 278 + + XVII. THE WOMAN WHO LOVED CHOPIN 289 + +XVIII. THE TUNE OF TIME 309 + + XIX. NADA 326 + + XX. PAN 332 + + + + +VISIONARIES + + + + +I + +A MASTER OF COBWEBS + + +I + +Alixe Van Kuyp sat in the first-tier box presented to her husband with +the accustomed heavy courtesy of the Societe Harmonique. She went early +to the hall that she might hear the entire music-making of the +evening--Van Kuyp's tone-poem, Sordello, was on the programme between a +Weber overture and a Beethoven symphony, an unusual honour for a young +American composer. If she had gone late, it would have seemed an +affectation, she reasoned. Her husband kept within doors; she could tell +him all. And then, was there not Elvard Rentgen? + +She regretted that she had invited the Parisian critic to her box. It +happened at a _soiree_, where he showed his savage profile among +admiring musical lambs. But he was never punctual at musical affairs. +This consoled Alixe. + +Perhaps he would forget her impulsive, foolish speech,--"without him the +music would fall upon unheeding ears,--he, who interpreted art for the +multitude, the holder of the critical key that unlocked masterpieces." +She had felt the banality of her compliment as she uttered it, and she +knew the man who listened, his glance incredulous, his mouth smiling, +could not be deceived. Rentgen had been too many years in the candy shop +to care for sweets. She recalled her mean little blush as he twisted his +pointed, piebald beard with long, fat fingers and leisurely +traversed--his were the measuring eyes of an architect--her face, her +hair, her neck, and finally, stared at her ears until they burned like a +child's cheek in frost time. + +Alixe Van Kuyp was a large woman, with a conscientious head and gray +eyes. As she waited, she realized that it was one of her timid nights, +when colour came easily and temper ran at its lowest ebb. She had begged +Van Kuyp to cancel the habit of not listening to his own music except at +rehearsal, and, annoyed by his stubbornness, neglected to tell him of +the other invitation. The house was quite full when the music began. +Uneasiness overtook her as the Oberon slowly stole upon her +consciousness. She forgot Rentgen; a more disquieting problem presented +itself. Richard's music--how would it sound in the company of the old +masters, those masters who were newer than Wagner, newer than Strauss +and the "moderns"! She envisaged her husband--small, slim, with his +bushy red hair, big student's head--familiarly locking arms with Weber +and Beethoven in the hall of fame. No, the picture did not convince her. +She was his severest censor. Not one of the professional critics could +put their fingers on Van Kuyp's weak spots--"his sore music," as he +jestingly called it--so surely as his wife. She had studied; she had +even played the violin in public; but she gave up her virtuosa ambitions +for the man she had married during their student years in Germany. Now +the old doubts came to life as the chivalric tones of Weber rose to her +sharpened senses. Why couldn't Richard-- + +The door in the anteroom opened, her guest entered. Alixe was not +dismayed. She left her seat and, closing the curtains, greeted him. + +The overture was ending as Rentgen sat down beside her in the intimate +little chamber, lighted by a solitary electric bulb. + +"You are always thoughtful," she murmured. + +"My dear lady, mine is the honour. And if you do not care, can't we hear +the music of your young man--" he smiled, she thought, acidly--"here? If +I sit outside, the world will say--we have to be careful of our +unsmirched reputations--we poor critics and slave-drivers of the deaf." + +She drew her hand gently away. He had held it, playfully tapping it as +he slowly delivered himself in short sentences. He was a Dane, but his +French and English were without trace of accent; certain intonations +alone betrayed his Scandinavian origin. + +Alixe could not refuse, for the moment he finished speaking she heard a +too familiar motive, the ponderous phrase in the brass choir which Van +Kuyp intended as the thematic label for his hero, "Sordello." + +"Ah, there's your Browning in tone for you," whispered the critic. She +wished him miles away. The draperies were now slightly parted and into +the room filtered the grave, languorous accents of the new tone-poem. +Her eyes were fixed by Rentgen's. His expression changed; with nostrils +dilated like a hunter scenting prey, his rather inert, cold features +became transfigured; he was the man who listened, the cruel judge who +sentenced. And she hoped, also the kind friend who would consider the +youth and inexperience of the culprit. To the morbidly acute hearing of +the woman, the music had a ring of hollow sonority after the denser +packed phrases of Weber. + +She had read Sordello with her husband until she thought its meaning was +as clear as high noon. By the critic's advice the subject had been +selected for musical treatment. Sordello's overweening spiritual +pride--"gate-vein of this heart's blood of Lombardy"--appealed to Van +Kuyp. The stress of souls, the welter of cross-purposes which begirt the +youthful dreamer, his love for Palma, and his swift death when all the +world thrust upon him its joys--here were motives, indeed, for any +musician of lofty aim and sympathetic imagination. + +Alixe recalled the interminable arguments, the snatches of poetry, the +hasty rushes to the keyboard; a composer was in travail. At the end of a +year, Rentgen professed his satisfaction; Van Kuyp stood on the highroad +to fame. Of that there could be no doubt; Elvard Rentgen would say so in +print. Alixe had been reassured-- + +Yet sitting now within the loop of her husband's music it suddenly +became insipid, futile, and lacking in those enchantments for which she +yearned. Her eyes dropped to the shapely hands meekly folded in her lap, +dropped because the bold, interrogative expression on Rentgen's face +disturbed her. She knew, as any woman would have known, that he admired +her--but was he not Richard's friend? His glance enveloped her with +piteous mockery. + +The din was tremendous. After passages of dark music, in which the +formless ugly reigned, occurred the poetic duel between Sordello and +Eglamor at Palma's Court of Love. But why all this stress and fury? On +the pianoforte the delicate episode sounded gratefully; with the thick +riotous orchestration came a disillusioning transformation. There was +noise without power, there was sensuality that strove to imitate the +tenderness of passion; and she had fancied it a cloudy garden of love. +Alixe raised an involuntary hand to her ear. + +"Yes," whispered the critic, "I warned him not to use his colours with a +trowel. His theme is not big enough to stand it." He lifted thin +eyebrows and to her overheated brain was an unexpected Mephisto. Then +the music whirled her away to Italy; the love scene of Palma and +Sordello. It should have been the apex of the work. + +"Sounds too much like Tschaikowsky's Francesca da Rimini," interrupted +Rentgen. She was annoyed. + +"Why didn't you tell Van Kuyp before he scored the work?" she demanded, +her long gray eyes beginning to blacken. + +"I did, my dear lady, I did. But you know what musicians are--" He +shrugged a conclusion with his narrow shoulders. Alixe coldly regarded +him. There was something new and dangerous in his attitude to her +husband's music this evening. + +Her heart began to beat heavily. What if her suspicions were but the +advance guard of a painful truth! What if this keen analyst of other +men's ideas--she dared not finish the thought. With a sluggish movement +the music uncoiled itself like a huge boa about to engulf a tiny rabbit. +The simile forced itself against her volition; all this monstrous +preparation for a--rabbit! In a concert-hall the poetic idea of the +tone-poem was petty. And the churning of the orchestra, foaming hysteria +of the strings, bellowing of the brass--would they never cease! Such an +insane chase after a rabbit! Yes, she said the word to herself and found +her lips carved into a hard smile, which she saw reflected as in a trick +mirror upon the face of Elvard Rentgen. _He_ understood. + +Of little avail Sordello's frantic impotencies. She saw through the +rhetorical trickeries of the music, weighed its cheap splendours, +realized the mediocrity of this second-rate poet turned symphonist. +Image after image pressed upon her brain, each more pessimistic, more +depressing than its predecessor. Alixe could have wept. Her companion +placed his hand on her arm. His fingers burned; she moved, but she felt +his will controlling her mood. With high relief she heard the music end. +There was conventional applause. Alixe restlessly peered into the +auditorium. Again she saw opera-glasses turned toward the box. "Our good +friends," she rather bitterly thought. Rentgen recognized her mental +turmoil. + +"Don't worry," he said soothingly. "It will be all right to-morrow +morning. What I write will make the fortune of the composition." He did +not utter this vaingloriously, but as a man who stated simple truth. She +gazed at him, her timidity and nervousness returning in full tide. + +"I know I am overwrought. I should be thankful. But--but, isn't it +deception--I mean, will it be fair to conceal from Richard the real +condition of affairs?" He took her hand. + +"Spoken like a true wife," he gayly exclaimed. "My dear friend, there +will be no deception. Only encouragement, a little encouragement. As for +deceiving a composer, telling him that he may not be so wonderful as he +thinks--that's impossible. I know these star-shouldering souls, these +farmers of phantasms who exist in a world by themselves. It would be a +pity to let in the cold air of reality--anyhow Van Kuyp has some +talent." + +Like lifting mists revealing the treacherous borders of a masked pool, +she felt this speech with its ironic innuendo. She flushed, her vanity +irritated. Rentgen saw her eyes contract. + +"Let us go when the symphony begins," she begged, "I can't talk to any +one in my present bad humour; and to hear Beethoven would drive me +mad--now." + +"I don't wonder," remarked her companion, consolingly. Alixe winced. + +The silver-cold fire of an undecided moon was abroad in the sky and +rumours of spring filled the air. They parted at a fiacre. He told her +he would call the next afternoon, and she nodded an unforgiving head. It +was her turn to be disagreeable. + +In his music room, Van Kuyp read a volume of verse. He did not hear his +wife enter. It pained her when she saw his serious face with its +undistinguished features and dogged expression. No genius this, was her +hasty verdict, as she quickly went to him and put a hand on his head. +It was her hand now that was hot. He raised eyes, dolent with dreams. + +"Well?" he queried. + +"You are a curious man!" she said wonderingly. "Aren't you interested in +the news about your symphonic poem?" He smiled the smile of the fatuous +elect. "I imagine it went all right," he languidly replied. "I heard it +at rehearsal yesterday--I suppose Theleme took the _tempi_ too slow!" + +She sighed and asked:-- + +"What are you reading a night like this?" His expression became +animated. + +"A volume of Celtic poetry--I've found a stunning idea for music. What a +tone-poem it will make! Here it is. What colour, what rhythms. It is +called The Shadowy Horses. 'I hear the shadowy horses, their long manes +a-shake'--" + +"Who gave you the poem?" + +"Oh, Rentgen, of course. Did you see him to-night?" + +"You dear boy! You must be tired to death. Better rest. The critics will +get you up early enough." + +Through interminable hours the mind of Alixe revolved about a phrase she +had picked up from Elvard Rentgen: "Music is a trap for weak souls; for +the strong as the spinning of cobwebs...." + + +II + +It was pompous July and the Van Kuyps were still in Paris. They lived +near Passy--from her windows high in the air Alixe caught the green at +dawn as the sun lifted level rays. Richard was writing his new +tone-poem, which the Societe Harmonique accepted provisionally for the +season following. Sordello had set the town agog because of the +exhaustive articles by Rentgen it brought in its wake. He was a critic +who wrote brilliantly of music in the terms of painting, of plastic arts +in the technical phraseology of music, and by him the drama was +discussed purely as literature. This deliberate and delicate confusion +of aesthetics clouded the public mind. He described Sordello as a vast +mural fresco, a Puvis de Chavannes in tone, a symphonic drama wherein +agonized the shadowy AEschylean protagonist. Even sculpture was rifled +for analogies, and Van Kuyp to his bewilderment found himself called +"The Rodin of Music"; at other times, "Richard Strauss II," or a "Tonal +Browning"; finally, he was adjured to swerve not from the path he had so +wonderfully hewn for himself in the virgin jungle of modern art, and +begged to resist the temptations of the music-drama. + +Rentgen loathed the music of Wagner. Wagner had abused Meyerbeer for +doing what he did himself--writing operas stuffed with spectacular +effects. This man of the foot-lights destroyed all musical imagination +with his puppet shows, magic lanterns, Turkish bazaars, where, to the +booming of mystic bells, the listener was drugged into opium-fed +visions. + +Under a tent, as at a fair, he assembled the mangled masterpieces of +Bach, Gluck, Beethoven, Weber, Schubert, Schumann, Chopin, and to a +gullible public sold the songs of these music-lords--songs that should +swim on high like great swan-clouds cleaving skies blue and +inaccessible. And his music was operatic, after all, grand opera +saccharine with commonplace melodies gorgeously attired--nothing more. +Wagner, declared the indignant critic, was not original. He popularized +the noble ideas of the masters, vulgarized and debased their dreams. He +never conceived a single new melody, but substituted instead, sadly +mauled and pinched thematic fragments of Liszt, Berlioz, and Beethoven, +combined with exaggerated fairy-tales, clothed in showy tinsel and +theatrical gauds, the illusion being aided by panoramic scenery; scenery +that acted in company with toads, dragons, horses, snakes, crazy +valkyrs, mermaids, half-mad humans, gods, demons, dwarfs, and giants. +What else is all this but old-fashioned Italian opera with a new name? +What else but an inartistic mixture of Scribe libretto and Northern +mythology? Music-drama--fudge! Making music that one can _see_ is a +death-blow to a lofty idealization of the art. + +Puzzled by the richness of Rentgen's vocabulary, by his want of logic, +Alixe asked herself many times whether she was wrong and her husband +right. She wished to be loyal. His devotion to his work, his inspiration +springing as it did from poetic sources, counted for something. Why not? +All composers should read the poets. It is a starting-point. Modern +music leans heavily on drama and fiction. Richard Strauss embroiders +philosophical ideas, so why should not Richard Van Kuyp go to Ireland, +to the one land where there is hope of a spiritual, a poetic renascence? +Ireland! The very name evoked dreams! + +When Rentgen called at the Van Kuyps' it was near the close of a warm +afternoon. The composer would not stir, despite the invitation of the +critic or the pleading of his wife. He knew that the angel wings of +inspiration had been brushing his brow all the morning, and such visits +were too rare to be flouted. He sat at his piano and in a composer's +raucous varied voice, imitated the imaginary _timbres_ of orchestral +instruments. Sent forth, Mrs. Van Kuyp and Rentgen slowly walked into +the little Parc of Auteuil, once the joy of the Goncourts. + +"Musicians are as selfish as the sea," he asserted, as they sat upon a +bench of tepid iron. She did not demur. The weather had exhausted her +patience; she was young and fond of the open air--the woods made an +irresistible picture this day. The critic watched her changing, +dissatisfied face. + +"Shall we ride?" he suddenly asked. Before she could shake a negative +head, he quickly uttered the words that had been hovering in her mind +for hours. + +"Or, shall we go to the Bois?" She started. "What an idea! Go to the +Bois without Richard, without my husband?" + +"Why not?" he inquired, "it's not far away. Send him a wire asking him +to join us; it will do him good after his labours. Come, Madame Van +Kuyp, come Alixe, my child." He paused. Her eyes expanded. "I'll go," +she quietly announced--"that is, if you grant me a favour." + +"A hundred!" he triumphantly cried. + + +III + +To soothe her conscience, which began to ring faint alarm-bells at +sundown, Alixe sent several despatches to her husband, and then tried a +telephone; but she was not successful. Her mood shifted chilly, and they +bored each other immeasurably on the long promenade vibrating with gypsy +music and frivolous folk. + +It was after seven o'clock as the sun slowly swam down the sky-line. +Decidedly their little flight from the prison of stone was not offering +rich recompense to Alixe Van Kuyp and her elderly companion. + +"And now for the favour!" he demanded, his eyes contentedly resting upon +the graceful expanse of his guest's figure. + +She moved restlessly: "My dear Rentgen, I am about to ask you a +question, only a plain question. _That_ is the favour." He bowed +incredulously. + +"I must know the truth about Richard. It is a serious matter, this +composing of his. He neglects his pupils--most of them Americans who +come to Paris to study with him. Yet with the reputation he has +attained, due to you entirely"--she waved away an interruption--"he +refuses to write songs or piano music that will sell. He is an +incorrigible idealist and I confess I am discouraged. What can be our +future?" She drew the deep breath of one in peril; this plain talk +devoid of all sham mortified her exceedingly. + +She was thankful that he did not attempt to play the role of fatherly +adviser. His eyes were quite sincere when he answered her:-- + +"What you say, Alixe--" the familiarity brought with it no condescending +reverberations--"has bothered me more than once. I shall be just as +frank on my side. No, your husband has but little talent; original +talent, none. He is mediocre--wait!" She started, her cheeks red with +the blood that fled her heart when she heard this doleful news. "Wait! +There are qualifications. In the first place, what do you expect from an +American?" + +"But you always write so glowingly of our composers," she interjected. + +"And," he went on as if she had not spoken, "Van Kuyp is your typical +countryman. He has studied in Germany. He has muddled his brain with +the music of a dozen different nations; if he had had any individuality +it would have been submerged. His memory has killed his imagination. He +borrows his inspiration from the poets, from Liszt, Wagner, Berlioz, +Richard Strauss. Anyhow, like all musicians of his country, he is too +painfully self-conscious of his nationality." + +"You, alone, are responsible for his present ambitions," retorted the +unhappy woman. + +"Quite true, my dear friend. I acknowledge it." + +"And you say this to my face?" + +"Do you wish me to lie?" She did not reply. After a grim pause she burst +forth:-- + +"Oh, why doesn't he compose an opera, and make a popular name?" + +"Richard Wagner Number II!" There were implications of sarcasm in this +which greatly displeased Mrs. Van Kuyp. They strolled on slowly. It was +a melodious summer night; mauve haze screened all but the exquisite +large stars. Soothed despite rebellion, Alixe told herself sharply that +in every duel with this man she was worsted. He said things that +scratched her nerves; yet she forgave. He had not the slightest +attraction for her; nevertheless, when he spoke, she listened, when he +wrote, she read. He ruled the husband through his music; he ruled her +through her husband. And what did he expect? + +They retraced their way. A fantastic bridge spanning the brief +marshland, frozen by the moonlight, appealed to them. They crossed. A +coachman driving an open carriage hailed confidentially. Alixe entered +and with a dexterous play of draperies usurped the back seat. Rentgen +made no sign. He had her in full view, the moon streaking her disturbed +features with its unflattering pencil. + +They started bravely, the horses running for home; but the rapid gait +soon subsided into a rhythmic trot. Rentgen spoke. She hardly recognized +his voice, so gently monotonous were his phrases. + +"Dear Alixe. It is a night for confessions. You care for your husband, +you are wrapped up in his art work, you are solicitous of his future, of +his fame. It is admirable. You are a model wife for an artist. But tell +me frankly, doesn't it bore you to death? Doesn't all this talk of +music, themes, orchestration, of the public, critics, musicians, +conductors, get on your nerves? Is it any consolation for you to know +that Van Kuyp will be famous? What is his fame or his failure to you? +Where do you, Alixe Van Kuyp, come in? Why must your charming woman's +soul be sacrificed, warped to this stunted tree of another's talent? You +are silent. You say he is trying to make me deny Richard! You were never +more mistaken. I am interested in you both; interested in you as a noble +woman--stop! I mean it. And interested in Richard--well--because he is +my own creation...." + +She watched him now with her heart in her eyes; he frightened her more +with these low, purring words, than if he declared open love. + +"He is my own handiwork. I have created him. I have fashioned his +outlines, have wound up the mechanism that moves him to compose. Did you +ever read that terrifying thought of Yeats, the Irish poet? I've +forgotten the story, but remember the idea: 'The beautiful arts were +sent into the world to overthrow nations, and, finally, life itself, +sowing everywhere unlimited desires, like torches thrown into a burning +city.' There--'like torches thrown into a burning city!' Richard Van +Kuyp is one of my burning torches. In the spectacle of his impuissance I +find relief from my own suffering." + +The booming of the Tzigane band was no longer heard--only the horses' +muffled footfalls and the intermittent chromatic drone of hidden distant +tram-cars. She shivered and shaded her face with her fan. There was +something remote from humanity in his speech. He continued with +increasing vivacity:-- + +"Music is a burning torch. And music, like ideas, can slay the brain. +Wagner borrowed his harmonic fire from the torch of Chopin--" She broke +in:-- + +"Don't talk of Chopin! Tell me more of Van Kuyp. Why do you call him +_yours_?" Her curiosity was become pain. It mastered her prudence. + +"In far-away Celtic legends there may be found a lovely belief that our +thoughts are independent realities, that they go about in the void +seeking creatures to control. They are as bodiless souls. When they +descend into a human being they possess his moods, in very existence--" + +"And Richard!" she muttered. His words swayed her like strange music; +the country through which they were passing was a blank; she could see +but two luminous points--the nocturnal eyes of Elvard Rentgen, as he +spun his cobwebs in the moonshine. She did not fear him; nothing could +frighten her now. One desire held her. If it were unslaked, she felt she +would collapse. It was to know the truth, to be told everything! He put +restraining fingers on her ungloved hand; they seemed like cold, fat +spiders. Yet she was only curious, with a curiosity that murdered the +spirit within her. + +"To transfuse these shadows, my dear Alixe, has been one of my delights, +for I can project my futile desires into another's soul. I am denied the +gift of music-making, so this is my revenge on nature for bungling its +job. If Richard had genius, my intervention would be superfluous. He has +none. He is dull. You must realize it. But since he has known me, has +felt my influence, has been subject to my volition, my sorcery, you may +call it,--" his laugh was disagreeably conscious,--"he has developed the +shadow of a great man. He will seem a great composer. I shall make him +think he is one. I shall make the world believe it, also. It is my +fashion of squaring a life I hate. But if I chose to withdraw--" + +The road they entered was black and full of the buzzing shadows of hot +night, but she was oblivious to everything but his hallucinating +voice:-- + +"And if you withdraw?" Her mouth echoed phrases without the complicity +of her brain. + +"If I do--ah, these cobweb spinners! Good-by to Richard Van Kuyp and +dreams of glory." This note of harsh triumph snapped his weaving words. + +"I don't believe you or your boasts," remarked Alixe, in her most +conventionally amused manner. "You are trying to scare me, and with this +hypnotic joke about Richard you have only hypnotized yourself. I mean to +tell Mr. Van Kuyp every bit of our conversation. I'm not frightened by +your vampire tales. You critics are only shadows of composers." + +"Yes, but we make ordinary composers believe they are great," he replied +acridly. + +"I'll tell this to Richard." + +"He won't believe you." + +"He shall--he won't believe _you_! Oh, Rentgen, how can you invent such +cruel things? Are you always so malicious? What do you mean? Come--what +do you expect?" She closed her eyes, anticipating an avowal. Why should +a man seek to destroy her faith in her husband, in love itself, if not +for some selfish purpose of his own? But she was wrong, and became +vaguely alarmed--at least if he had offered his service and sympathy in +exchange for her friendship, she might have understood his fantastic +talk. Rentgen sourly reflected--despite epigrams, women never vary. For +him her sentiment was suburban. It strangled poetry. But he said +nothing, though she imagined he looked depressed; nor did he open his +mouth as the carriage traversed avenues of processional poplars before +arriving at her door. She turned to him imploringly:-- + +"You must come with me. I shall never be able to go in alone, without an +excuse. Don't--don't repeat to Richard what you said to me, in joke, I +am sure, about his music. Heavens! What will my husband think?" There +was despair in her voice, but hopefulness in her gait and gesture, when +they reached the ill-lighted hall. + +A night-lamp stood on the composer's study table. The piano was open. He +sat at the keyboard, though not playing, as they hurriedly entered the +room. + +"You poor fellow! You look worn out. Did you think we had run away from +you? Did you get the wires, the telephone messages? Oh, why did you keep +us expecting you, Richard! We have had a wonderful time and missed you +so much! Such a talk with Rentgen! And all about _you_. _Nicht wahr_, +Rentgen? He says you are the only man in the world with a musical +future. Isn't that so, Rentgen? Didn't you say that Richard was the only +man in whom you took any interest? Say what you said to me! I _dare_ +you!" + +The musician, aroused by this wordy assault, looked from one to the +other with his heavy eyes, the eyes of an owl rudely disturbed. Alixe +almost danced her excitement. She hummed shrilly and grasped Van Kuyp's +arm in the gayest rebounding humour. + +"Why don't you speak, Maestro?" + +"I didn't join you because I was too busy at my score. Listen, children! +I have sketched the beginning of The Shadowy Horses. You remember the +Yeats poem, Rentgen? Listen!" + +Furiously he attacked the instrument, from which escaped accents of +veritable torture; a delirium of tone followed, meagre melodies fighting +for existence in the boiling madness of it all; it was the parody of a +parody, the music of yesterday masquerading as the music of to-morrow. +Alixe nervously watched the critic. He stood at the end of the piano and +morosely fumbled his beard. Again a wave of anxious hatred, followed by +forebodings, crowded her alert brain. She desperately clutched her +husband's shoulder; he finished in a burst of sheer pounding and brutal +roaring. Then she threw her arms about him in an ecstasy of pride--her +confidence was her only anchorage. + +"There, Elvard Rentgen! What did you tell me? I dare you to say that +this music is not marvellous, not original!" Her victorious gaze, in +which floated indomitable faith, challenged him, as she drew the head of +her husband to her protecting bosom. The warring of exasperated eyes +endured a moment; to Alixe it seemed eternity. Rentgen bowed and went +away from this castle of cobwebs, deeply stirred by the wife's tender +untruths.... She was the last dawn illuminating his empty, sordid +life,--now a burnt city of defaced dreams and blackened torches. + + + + +II + +THE EIGHTH DEADLY SIN + + Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field which + the Lord God had made.--_Genesis._ + + +I + +THE SERMON + +"And the Seven Deadly Sins, beloved brethren, are: Pride, Covetousness, +Lust, Anger, Gluttony, Envy, Sloth. To these our wise Mother, the +Church, opposes the contrary virtues: Humility, Chastity, Meekness, +Temperance, Brotherly Love, Diligence." The voice of the preacher was +clear and well modulated. It penetrated to the remotest corner of the +church. Baldur, sitting near the pulpit, with its elaborate traceries of +marble, idly wondered why the sins were, with few exceptions, words of +one syllable, while those of the virtues were all longer. Perhaps +because it was easier to sin than to repent! The voice of the speaker +deepened as he continued:-- + +"Now the Seven Deadly Arts are: Music, Literature, Painting, Sculpture, +Architecture, Dancing, Acting. The mercy of God has luckily purified +these once pagan inventions, and transformed them into saving +instruments of grace. Yet it behooves us to examine with the utmost +diligence the possible sources of evil latent in each and every one of +those arts. Then we shall consider some of the special forms of sin that +may develop from them. St. Chrysostom warned the faithful against the +danger of the Eighth Deadly Art--Perfume...." + +His phrases, which began to fall into the rhythmic drone of a Sunday +sermon, lulled Baldur to dreaming. Perfume--that delicious vocable! And +the contrast with what his own nostrils reported to his consciousness +made him slightly shiver. It was on a Friday night in Lent that, weary +in flesh and spirit, his conscience out of tune, he had entered the +church and taken the first vacant seat. Without, the air was sluggish; +after leaving his club the idea of theatres or calls had set his teeth +on edge. He longed to be alone, to weigh in the silence of his heart the +utter futility of life. Religion had never been a part of his training +as the only son of a millionnaire, and if he preferred the Roman +Catholic ritual above all others, it was because the appeal was to his +aesthetic sense; a Turkish mosque, he assured his friends, produced the +same soothing impression--gauze veils gently waving and slowly obscuring +the dulling realities of everyday existence. This _morbidezza_ of the +spirit the Mahometans call _Kef_; the Christians, pious ecstasy. + +But now he could not plunge himself, despite the faint odour of incense +lingering in the atmosphere, into the deepest pit of his personality. At +first he ascribed his restlessness to the sultry weather, then to his +abuse of tea and cigarettes,--perhaps it was the sharp odour of the +average congregation, that collective odour of humanity encountered in +church, theatre, or court-rooms. The smell of poverty was mingled with +the heavy scents of fashionable women, who, in the minority, made their +presence felt by their showy gowns, rustling movements, and attitudes of +superior boredom. In a vast building like this extremes touch with +eagerness on the part of the poor, to whom these furtive views of the +rich and indolent brought with them a bitter consolation. + +Baldur remarked these things as he leaned back in his hard seat and +barely listened to the sermon, which poured forth as though the tap +would never be turned off again. And then a delicate note of iris, most +episcopal of perfumes, emerged from the mass of odours--musk, garlic, +damp shoes, alcohol, shabby clothing, rubber, pomade, cologne, +rice-powder, tobacco, patchouli, sachet, and a hundred other tintings of +the earthly symphony. The finely specialized olfactory sense of the +young man told him that it was either a bishop or a beautiful woman who +imparted to the air the subtle, penetrating aroma of iris. But it was +neither ecclesiastic nor maid. At his side was a short, rather thick-set +woman of vague age; she might have been twenty-five or forty. Her hair +was cut in masculine fashion, her attire unattractive. As clearly as he +could distinguish her features he saw that she was not good-looking. A +stern mask it was, though not hardened. He would not have looked at such +an ordinary physiognomy twice if the iris had not signalled his peculiar +sense. There was no doubt that to her it was due. Susceptible as he was +to odours, Baldur was not a ladies' man. He went into society because it +was his world; and he attended in a perfunctory manner to the enormous +estate left him by his father, bound up in a single trust company. But +his thoughts were always three thousand miles away, in that delectable +city of cities, Paris. For Paris he suffered a painful nostalgia. There +he met his true brethren, while in New York he felt an alien. He was +one. The city, with its high, narrow streets--granite tunnels; its rude +reverberations; its colourless, toiling barbarians, with their +undistinguished physiognomies, their uncouth indifference to art,--he +did not deny that he loathed this nation, vibrating only in the presence +of money, sports, grimy ward politics, while exhibiting a depressing +snobbery to things British. There was no _nuance_ in its life or its +literature, he asserted. France was his _patrie psychique_; he would +return there some day and forever.... + +The iris crept under his nostrils, and again he regarded the woman. This +time she faced him, and he no longer wondered, for he saw her eyes. +With such eyes only a great soul could be imprisoned in her brain. They +were smoke-gray, with long, dark lashes, and they did not seem to focus +perfectly--at least there was enough deflection to make their expression +odd, withal interesting, like the slow droop of Eleonora Duse's magic +eye. Though her features were rigid, the woman's glance spoke to Baldur, +spoke eloquently. Her eyes were--or was it the iris?--symbols of a +soul-state, of a rare emotion, not of sex, nor yet sexless. The pupils +seemed powdered with a strange iridescence. He became more troubled than +before. What did the curious creature want of him! She was neither +coquette nor cocotte, flirtation was not hinted by her intense +expression. He resumed his former position, but her eyes made his +shoulders burn, as if they had sufficient power to bore through them. He +no longer paid any attention to his surroundings. The sermon was like +the sound of far-away falling waters, the worshippers were so many black +marks. Of two things was he aware--the odour of iris and her eyes. + +He knew that he was in an overwrought mood. For some weeks this mood had +been descending upon his spirit, like a pall. He had avoided music, +pictures, the opera--which he never regarded as an art; even his +favourite poets he could not read. Nor did he degustate, as was his +daily wont, the supreme prose of the French masters. The pleasures of +robust stomachs, gourmandizing and drinking, were denied him by nature. +He could not sip a glass of wine, and for meat he entertained distaste. +His physique proved him to be of the neurotic temperament--he was very +tall, very slim, of an exceeding elegance, in dress a finical dandy; +while his trim pointed blue-black beard and dark, foreign eyes were the +cause of his being mistaken often for a Frenchman or a Spaniard--which +illusion was not dissipated when he chose to speak their several +tongues. + +Involuntarily, and to the ire of his neighbours, he arose and indolently +made his way down the side aisle. When he reached the baize swinging +doors, he saw the woman approaching him. As if she had been an +acquaintance of years, she saluted him carelessly, and, accompanied by +the scandalized looks of many in the congregation, the pair left the +church, though not before the preacher had sonorously quoted from the +Psalm, _Domine ne in Furore_, "For my loins are filled with illusions; +and there is no health in my flesh." + + +II + +THE SEANCE + + Je cherche des parfums nouveaux, des fleurs plus larges, des + plaisirs ineprouves.--FLAUBERT. + +"It may be all a magnificent illusion, but--" he began. + +"Everything is an illusion in this life, though seldom magnificent," she +answered. They slowly walked up the avenue. The night was tepid; motor +cars, looking like magnified beetles, with bulging eyes of fire, went +swiftly by. The pavements were almost deserted when they reached the +park. He felt as if hypnotized, and once, rather meanly, was glad that +no one saw him in company of his dowdy companion. + +"I wonder if you realize that we do not know each other's name," he +said. + +"Oh, yes. You are Mr. Baldur. My name is Mrs. Lilith Whistler." + +"Mrs. Whistler. Not the medium?" + +"The medium--as you call it. In reality I am only a woman, happy, or +unhappy, in the possession of super-normal powers." + +"Not supernatural, then?" he interposed. He was a sceptic who called +himself agnostic. The mystery of earth and heaven might be interpreted, +but always in terms of science; yet he did not fancy the superior manner +in which this charlatan flouted the supernatural. He had heard of her +miracles--and doubted them. She gave a little laugh at his correction. + +"What phrase-jugglers you men are! You want all the splendours of the +Infinite thrown in with the price of admission! I said super-normal, +because we know of nothing greater than nature. Things that are off the +beaten track of the normal, across the frontiers, some call +supernatural; but it is their ignorance of the vast, unexplored +territory of the spirit--which is only the material masquerading in a +different guise." + +"But you go to church, to a Lenten service--?" It was as if he had known +her for years, and their unconventional behaviour never crossed his +mind. He did not even ask himself where they were moving. + +"I go to church to rest my nerves--as do many other people," she +replied; "I was interested in the parallel of the Seven Deadly Sins and +the Seven Deadly Arts." + +"You believe the arts are sinful?" He was curious. + +"I don't believe in sin at all. A bad conscience is the result of poor +digestion. Sins are created so that we pay the poll-tax to eternity--pay +it on this side of the ferry. Yet the arts may become dangerous engines +of destruction if wrongfully employed. The Fathers of the early Church, +Ambrose and the rest, were right in viewing them suspiciously."--He +spoke:-- + +"The arts diabolic! Then what of the particular form of wizardry +practised so successfully by the celebrated Mrs. Whistler, one of whose +names is, according to the Talmud, that of Adam's first wife?" + +"What do you know, my dear young man, of diabolic arts?" + +"Only that I am walking with you near the park on a dark night of April +and I never saw you before a half-hour ago. Isn't that magic--white, not +black?" + +"Pray do not mock magic, either white or black. Remember the fate of the +serpents manufactured by Pharaoh's magicians. They were, need I tell +you, speedily devoured by the serpents of Moses and Aaron. Both parties +did not play fair in the game. If it was black magic to transform a rod +into a snake on the part of Pharaoh's conjurers, was it any less +reprehensible for the Hebrew magicians to play the same trick? It was +prestidigitation for all concerned--only the side of the children of +Israel was espoused in the recital. Therefore, do not talk of black or +white magic. There is only one true magic. And it is not slate-writing, +toe-joint snapping, fortune-telling, or the vending of charms. Magic, +too, is an art--like other arts. This is forgotten by the majority of +its practitioners. Hence the sordid vulgarity of the average mind-reader +and humbugging spiritualist of the dark-chamber seance. Besides, the +study of the super-normal mind tells us of the mind in health--nature is +shy in revealing her secrets." + +They passed the lake and were turning toward the east driveway. Suddenly +she stopped and under the faint starlight regarded her companion +earnestly. He had not been without adventures in his career--Paris +always provided them in plenty; but this encounter with a homely woman +piqued him. Her eye he felt was upon him and her voice soothing. + +"Mr. Baldur--listen! Since Milton wrote his great poem the +English-speaking people are all devil-worshippers, for Satan is the hero +of Paradise Lost. But I am no table-tipping medium eager for your +applause or your money. I don't care for money. I think you know enough +of me through the newspapers to vouchsafe that. You are rich, and it is +your chief misery. Listen! Whether you believe it or not, you are very +unhappy. Let me read your horoscope. Your club life bores you; you are +tired of our silly theatres; no longer do you care for Wagner's music. +You are deracinated; you are unpatriotic. For that there is no excuse. +The arts are for you deadly. I am sure you are a lover of literature. +Yet what a curse it has been for you! When you see one of your friends +drinking wine, you call him a fool because he is poisoning himself. But +you--you--poison your spirit with the honey of France, of Scandinavia, +of Russia. As for the society of women--" + +"The Eternal Womanly!" he sneered. + +"The Eternal Simpleton, you mean. In _that_ swamp of pettiness, idiocy, +and materialism, a man of your nature could not long abide. Religion--it +has not yet responded to your need. And without faith your sins lose +their savour. The arts--you don't know them all, the Seven Deadly Arts +and the One Beautiful Art!" She paused. Her voice had been as the sound +of delicate flutes. He was aflame. + +"Is there, then, an eighth art?" he quickly asked. + +"Would you know it if you saw it?" + +"Of course. Where is it, what is it?" + +She laughed and took his arm. + +"Why did you look at me in church?" + +"Because--it was mere chance--no, it may have been the odour of iris. I +am mad over perfume. I think it a neglected art, degraded to the +function of anointment. I have often dreamed of an art by which a +dazzling and novel synthesis of fragrant perfumes would be invented by +some genius, some latter-day Rimmel or Lubin whom we could hail as a +peer of Chopin or Richard Strauss--two composers who have expressed +perfume in tone. Roinard in his Cantiques des Cantiques attempted a +concordance of tone, light, and odours. Yes--it was the iris that +attracted me." + +"But I have no iris about me. I have none now," she simply replied. He +faced her. + +"No iris? What--?" + +"I _thought_ iris," she added triumphantly, as she guided him into one +of the side streets off Madison Avenue. He was astounded. She must be a +hypnotist, he said to himself. No suggestion of iris clung to her now. +And he remembered that the odour disappeared after they left the church. +He held his peace until they arrived before a brown-stone house of the +ordinary kind with an English basement. She took a key from her pocket +and, going down several steps, beckoned to him. Baldur followed. His +interest in this modern Cassandra and her bizarre words was too great +for him to hesitate or to realize that he would get himself into some +dangerous scrape. And was this truly the Mrs. Whistler whose tricks of +telepathy and other extraordinary antics had puzzled and angered the +wise men of two continents? He did not have much time for reflection. A +grilled door opened, and presently he was in a room furnished very much +like a physician's office. Electric bulbs, an open grate, and two +bookcases gave the apartment a familiar, cheerful appearance. Baldur sat +down on a low chair, and Mrs. Whistler removed her commonplace headgear. +In the bright light she was younger than he had imagined, and her head a +beautifully modelled one--broad brows, very full at the back, and the +mask that of an emotional actress. Her smoke-coloured eyes were most +remarkable and her helmet of hair blue black. + +"And now that you are my guest at last, Mr. Baldur, let me apologize for +the exercise of my art upon your responsive nerves;" she made this +witch-burning admission as if she were accounting for the absence of +tea. To his relief she offered him nothing. He had a cigarette between +his fingers, but he did not care to smoke. She continued:-- + +"For some time I have known you--never mind how! For some time I have +wished to meet you. I am not an impostor, nor do I desire to pose as the +goddess of a new creed. But you, Irving Baldur, are a man among men who +will appreciate what I may show you. You love, you understand, perfumes. +You have even wished for a new art--don't forget that there are others +in the world to whom the seven arts have become a thrice-told tale, to +whom the arts have become too useful. All great art should be useless. +Yet architecture houses us; sculpture flatters us; painting imitates us; +dancing is pure vanity; literature and the drama, mere vehicles for +bread-earning; while music--music, the most useless art as it should +have been--is in the hands of the speculators. Moreover music is too +sexual--it reports in a more intense style the stories of our loves. +Music is the memory of love. What Prophet will enter the temple of the +modern arts and drive away with his divine scourge the vile +money-changers who fatten therein?" Her voice was shrill as she paced +the room. A very sibyl this, her crest of hair agitated, her eyes +sparkling with wrath. He missed the Cumaean tripod. + +"There is an art, Baldur, an art that was one of the lost arts of +Babylon until now, one based, as are all the arts, on the senses. +Perfume--the poor, neglected nose must have its revenge. It has outlived +the other senses in the aesthetic field." + +"What of the palate--you have forgotten that. Cookery, too, is a fine +art," he ventured. His smile irritated her. + +"Yes, Frenchmen have invented symphonic sauces, they say. But again, +eating is a useful art; primarily it serves to nourish the body. When +man was wholly wild--he is a mere barbarian to-day--his sense of smell +guarded him from his foes, from the beasts, from a thousand dangers. +Civilization, with its charming odours of decay,--have you ever ventured +to savour New York?--cast into abeyance the keenest of all the senses. +Little wonder, then, that there was no art of perfume like the arts of +vision and sound. I firmly believe the Hindoos, Egyptians, and the +Chinese knew of such an art. How account for the power of theocracies? +How else credit the tales of the saints who scattered perfumes--St. +Francis de Paul, St. Joseph of Cupertino, Venturini of Bergamo?" + +"But," he interrupted, "all this is interesting, fascinating. What I +wish to know is what form your art may take. How marshal odours as +melodies in a symphony, as colours on a canvas?" She made an impatient +gesture. + +"And how like an amateur you talk. Melody! When harmony is infinitely +greater in music! Form! When colour is infinitely greater than line! The +most profound music gives only the timbre--melodies are for infantile +people without imagination, who believe in patterns. Tone is the quality +_I_ wish on a canvas, not anxious drawing. So it is with perfumes. I can +blend them into groups of lovely harmony; I can give you single notes of +delicious timbre--in a word, I can evoke an odour symphony which will +transport you. Memory is a supreme factor in this art. Do not forget how +the vaguest scent will carry you back to your youthful dreamland. It is +also the secret of spiritual correspondences--it plays the great role of +bridging space between human beings." + +"I sniff the air promise-crammed," he gayly misquoted. "But when will +you rewrite this Apocalypse? and how am I to know whether I shall really +enjoy this feast of perfume, if you can simulate the odour of iris as +you did an hour ago?" + +"I propose to show you an artificial paradise," she firmly asserted. In +the middle of the room there was a round table, the top inlaid with +agate. On it a large blue bowl stood, and it was empty. Mrs. Whistler +went to a swinging cabinet and took from it a dozen small phials. "Now +for the incantation," he jokingly said. In her matter-of-fact manner she +placed the bottles on the table, and uncorking them, she poured them +slowly into the bowl. He broke the silence:-- + +"Isn't there any special form of hair-raising invocation that goes with +this dangerous operation?" + +"Listen to this." Her eyes swimming with fire, she intoned:-- + + As I came through the desert thus it was, + As I came through the desert: Lo you there, + That hillock burning with a brazen glare; + Those myriad dusky flames with points aglow + Which writhed and hissed and darted to and fro; + A Sabbath of the serpents, heaped pell-mell + For Devil's roll-call and some fete in Hell: + Yet I strode on austere; + No hope could have no fear. + +He did not seem to hear. From out the bowl there was stealing a perfume +which overmastered his will and led him captive to the lugubrious glade +of the Druids.... + + +III + +THE CIRCUS OF CANDLES + + Comme d'autres esprits voguent sur la musique, + Le mien, o mon amour! nage sur ton parfum. + + --BAUDELAIRE. + +He was not dreaming, for he saw the woman at the bowl, saw her +apartment. But the interior of his brain was as melancholy as a lighted +cathedral. A mortal sadness encompassed him, and his nerves were like +taut violin strings. It was within the walls of his skull, that he +saw--his mundane surroundings did not disturb his visions. And the waves +of dolour swept over his consciousness. A mingling of tuberoses, +narcissus, attar of roses, and ambergris he detected in the air--as +_triste_ as a morbid nocturne of Chopin. This was followed by a blending +of heliotrope, moss-rose, and hyacinth, together with dainty touches of +geranium. He dreamed of Beethoven's manly music when whiffs of +apple-blossom, white rose, cedar, and balsam reached him. Mozart passed +roguishly by in strains of scarlet pimpernel, mignonette, syringa, and +violets. Then the sky was darkened with Schumann's perverse harmonies as +jasmine, lavender, and lime were sprayed over him. Music, surely, was +the art nearest akin to odour. A superb and subtle chord floated about +him; it was composed of vervain, opoponax, and frangipane. He could not +conceive of a more unearthly triad. It was music from Parsifal. Through +the mists that were gathering he savoured a fulminating bouquet of +patchouli, musk, bergamot, and he recalled the music of Mascagni. Brahms +strode stolidly on in company with new-mown hay, cologne, and sweet +peas. Liszt was interpreted as ylang-ylang, myrrh, and marechale; +Richard Strauss, by wistaria, oil of cloves, chypre, poppy, and +crab-apple. + +Suddenly there developed a terrific orchestration of chromatic odours: +ambrosia, cassia, orange, peach-blossoms, and musk of Tonkin, magnolia, +eglantine, hortensia, lilac, saffron, begonia, peau d'Espagne, acacia, +carnation, liban, fleur de Takeoka, cypress, oil of almonds, benzoin, +jacinth, rue, shrub, olea, clematis, the hediosma of Jamaica, olive, +vanilla, cinnamon, petunia, lotus, frankincense, sorrel, neroli from +Japan, jonquil, verbena, spikenard, thyme, hyssop, and decaying orchids. +This quintessential medley was as the sonorous blasts of Berlioz, +repugnant and exquisite; it swayed the soul of Baldur as the wind sways +the flame. There were odours like winged dreams; odours as the plucked +sounds of celestial harps; odours mystic and evil, corrupt and opulent; +odours recalling the sweet, dense smell of chloroform; odours evil, +angelic, and anonymous. They painted--painted by Satan!--upon his +cerebellum more than music--music that merged into picture; and he was +again in the glade of the Druids. The huge scent-symphony dissolved in a +shower of black roses which covered the ground ankle-deep. An antique +temple of exotic architecture had thrown open its bronze doors, and out +there surged and rustled a throng of Bacchanalian beings who sported and +shouted around a terminal god, which, with smiling, ironic lips, +accepted their delirious homage. White nymphs and brown displayed in +choric rhythms the dance of the Seven Deadly Sins, and their goat-hoofed +mates gave vertiginous pursuit. At first the pagan gayety of the scene +fired the fancy of the solitary spectator; but soon his nerves, +disordered by the rout and fatigued by the spoor of so many odours, +warned him that something disquieting was at hand. He felt a nameless +horror as the sinister bitter odour of honeysuckle, sandalwood, and +aloes echoed from the sacred grove. A score of seductive young witches +pranced in upon their broomsticks, and without dismounting surrounded +the garden god. A battalion of centaurs charged upon them. The +vespertine hour was nigh, and over this iron landscape there floated the +moon, an opal button in the sky. Then to his shame and fear he saw that +the Satyr had vanished and in its place there reared the Black Venus, +the vile shape of ancient Africa, and her face was the face of Lilith. +The screaming lovely witches capered in fantastic spirals, each sporting +a lighted candle. It was the diabolic Circus of the Candles, the +infernal circus of the Witches' Sabbath. Rooted to the ground, Baldur +realized with fresh amazement and vivid pain the fair beauty of Adam's +prehistoric wife, her luxurious blond hair, her shapely shoulders, her +stature of a goddess--he trembled, for she had turned her mordant gaze +in his direction. And he strove in vain to bring back the comforting +vision of the chamber. She smiled, and the odours of sandal, coreopsis, +and aloes encircled his soul like the plaited strands of her glorious +hair. She was that other Lilith, the only offspring of the old Serpent. +On what storied fresco, limned by what worshipper of Satan, had these +accursed lineaments, this lithe, seductive figure, been shown! Names of +Satanic painters, from Hell-fire Breughel to Arnold Boecklin, from +Felicien Rops to Franz Stuck, passed through the halls of Irving +Baldur's memory. + +The clangour of the feast was become maddening. He heard the Venus +ballet music from Tannhaeuser entwined with the acridities of aloes, +sandal, and honeysuckle. Then the aroma of pitch, sulphur, and +assafoetida cruelly strangled the other melodic emanations. Lilith, +disdaining the shelter of her nymphs and their clowneries, stood forth +in all the hideous majesty of AEnothea, the undulating priestess of the +Abominable Shape. His nerves macerated by this sinful apparition, Baldur +struggled to resist her mute command. What was it? He saw her wish +streaming from her eyes. Despair! Despair! Despair! There is no hope for +thee, wretched earthworm! No abode but the abysmal House of Satan! +Despair, and you will be welcomed! By a violent act of volition, set in +motion by his fingers fumbling a small gold cross he wore as a +watch-guard, the heady fumes of the orgy dissipated.... + +He was sitting facing the bowl, and over it with her calm, confidential +gaze was the figure of Lilith Whistler. + +"Have I proved to you that perfume is the art of arts?" she demanded. He +rushed from the room and was shaking the grilled gate in the hallway +like a caged maniac, when with a pitying smile she released him. He +reached the street at a bound.... + + * * * * * + +... "the evil of perfume, I repeat, was one against which the venerable +Fathers of the Church warned the faithful." The preacher's voice had +sagged to a monotone. Baldur lifted his eyes in dismay. Near him sat the +same woman, and she still stared at him as if to rebuke him for his +abstraction. About her hovered the odour of iris. Had it been only a +disturbing dream? Intoxicated by his escape from damnation, from the +last of the Deadly Arts, he bowed his head in grateful prayer. What +ecstasy to be once more in the arms of Mother Church! There, dipped in +her lustral waters, and there alone would he find solace for his barren +heart, pardon for his insane pride of intellect, and protection from the +demons that waylaid his sluggish soul. The sermon ended as it began:-- + +"And the Seven Deadly Sins, beloved brethren, are: Pride, Covetousness, +Lust, Anger, Gluttony, Envy, Sloth. _Oremus!_" + +"Amen," fervently responded Baldur the Immoralist. + + + + +III + +THE PURSE OF AHOLIBAH + + Lo, this is that Aholibah + Whose name was blown among strange seas.... + + --SWINBURNE. + + +I + +THE AVIARY + +When the last breakfast guests had gone the waiters of the cafe began +their most disagreeable daily task. All the silver was assembled on one +of the long tables in an inner room, where, as at a solemn conclave, the +servants took their seats, and, presided over by the major-domo of the +establishment, they polished the knives and forks, spoons, and +sugar-tongs, filled the salt-cellars, replenished the pepper-boxes and +other paraphernalia of the dining art. The gabble in this close +apartment was terrific. Joseph, the maitre d'hotel, rapped in vain a +dozen times for silence. The chef poked his head of a truculent Gascon +through the door and indulged in a war of wit with a long fellow from +Marseilles,--called the "mast" because he was very tall and thin, and +had cooked in the galley of a Mediterranean trading brig. From time to +time one of the piccolos, a fat little boy from the South, carried in +pitchers of flat beer, brewed in the suburbs. As it was a hot day, he +was kept busy. The waiters had gone through a trying morning; there were +many strangers in Paris. Outside, the Boulevard des Italiens, despite +its shade trees, broiled under a torrid July sun that swam in a +mercilessly blue sky. + +The majority of the men were listening to gossip about their colleagues +in the Cafe Cardinal across the way. Ambroise alone sat apart and patted +and smoothed the salt in its receptacles. He was a young man from some +little town in Alsace, a furious patriot, and the butt of his +companions--for he was the latest comer in the Cafe Riche. Though he +told his family name, Nettier, and declared that his father and mother +were of French blood, he was called "the German." He was good-looking, +very blond, with big, innocent blue eyes; and while he was never +molested personally,--a short, sharp tussle with a cook had proved him +to be a man of muscle,--behind his back his walk was mimicked, his +precise attitudes were openly bantered. But Ambroise stood this torture +gantlet equably. He had lived long enough among Germans to copy their +impassive manner and, coupled with a natural contempt for his +fellow-monkeys in the cage, he knew that perhaps in a day a new man +would receive all these unwelcome attentions. Moreover, his work, +clear-cut, unobtrusive, and capable, pleased M. Joseph. And when the +patron himself dined at the cafe, Ambroise was the garcon selected to +wait upon him. Hence the jealousy of his colleagues. Couple to this the +fact that he was reported miserly, and had saved a large sum--which were +all sufficient reasons for his unpopularity. + +As the afternoon wore on little airs began to play in the tree-tops; the +street watering carts had been assiduous, and before the terrace water +had been sprinkled by the piccolos so effectively that at five o'clock, +when the jaded stock-brokers, journalists, and business men began to +flock in, each for his aperitif, the cafe was comparatively cool. + +A few women's frocks relieved the picture with discreet or joyous shades +of white and pink. Ambroise was diligent and served his regular +customers, the men who grumbled if any one occupied their favourite +corners. Absinthe nicely iced, dominoes, the evening papers--these he +brought as he welcomed familiar faces. But his thoughts were not his +own, and his pose when not in service was listless, even bored. Would +_she_ return that evening with the same crowd--was the idea that had +taken possession of his brain. He was very timid in the presence of +women, and it diverted the waiters to see him blush when he waited upon +the gorgeous birds that thronged the aviary at night, making its walls +echo with their chattering, quarrels, laughter. This provincial, modest, +sensitive, the only child of old-fashioned parents, was stupefied and +shocked in the presence of the over-decorated and under-dressed +creatures, daubed like idols, who began to flock in the cafe, with or +without escorts, after eleven o'clock every night in the year. He knew +them all by name. He knew their histories. He could detect at a glance +whether they were unhappy or merely depressed by the rain, whether they +drank champagne from happiness or desperation. Notwithstanding his +dreamy disposition his temperament was ardent; his was an unspoiled +soul; he felt himself a sort of moral barometer for the magnificent and +feline women who treated him as if he were a wooden post when they were +gossiping, harried him like an animal when they were thirsty. He noted +that they were always thirsty. They smoked more than they ate, and +whispered more, if no men were present, than they smoked. But then, men +were seldom absent. + +The night previous, Ambroise recalled the fact, she had not come in with +a different set. This was not her custom, and he worried over it. +Protected by princes and financiers, she nevertheless loved her liberty +so much that one seldom caught her in the same company twice in +succession. For this singular caprice Aholibah, oftener called the Woman +from Morocco,--because she had lived in Algiers,--was the despair of her +circle. Why, argued the other birds, why fly in the face of luck? To be +sure, she was still young, still beautiful, with that sort of metallic +beauty which reminded Ambroise of some priceless bronze blackened in the +sun. She was meagre, diabolically graceful, dark, with huge saucer-like +eyes that greedily drank in her surroundings. But her lashes were long, +and she could veil her glance so that her brilliant face looked as if +the shutters had been closed on her soul. Across her brows a bar of +blue-black marked the passage of her eyebrows--which sable line was +matched by her abundant hair, worn in overshadowing clusters. She +dressed winter and summer in scarlet, and her stage name was +Aholibah--bestowed upon her by some fantastic poet who had not read +Ezekiel, but Swinburne. It was rumoured by her intimates that her real +name was Clotilde Durval, that her mother had been a seamstress.... + +With a sinking at the heart Ambroise saw her enter in the company of the +same gentleman she had brought the previous evening. The garcon did not +analyze this strange, jealous feeling, for he was too busily employed in +seating his guests and relieving the man of his hat and walking-stick. +An insolent chap it was, with his air of an assured conqueror and the +easy bearing of wealth. There was little discussion as to the order--a +certain brand of wine, iced beyond recognition for any normal palate, +was always served to Aholibah. She loved "needles on her tongue," she +asseverated if any one offered her weaker stuff. That July night she +looked like a piratical craft that had captured a sleek merchantman for +prize. She was all smoothness; Ambroise alone detected the retracted +claws of the leopardess. She blazed in the electric illumination, and +her large hat, with its swelling plumes, threw her dusky features into +shadow--her eyes seemed far away under its brim and glowed with unholy +phosphorescence. + +While he arranged the details of the silver wine-pail in the other room, +the chef asked him if the Princess Comet had arrived. Ambroise almost +snarled--much to the astonishment of the Gascon. And when the sommelier +attempted to help him with the wine, he was elbowed vigorously. Ambroise +must have been drinking too much, said the boys. Joseph rather curiously +inspected his waiter as he made his accustomed round in the cafe. But, +pale as usual, Ambroise stood near his table, his whole bearing an +intent and thoroughly professional one. Joseph was satisfied and drove +the chef back to the kitchen. + +The young Alsatian had never seen Aholibah look so radiant. She was in +high spirits, and her pungent talk aroused her companion from incipient +moroseness. After midnight the party grew--some actresses from a near-by +theatre came in with their male friends, and another waiter was detailed +to the aid of Ambroise. But he stuck to the first-comers and served so +much wine to them that he had the satisfaction of seeing Aholibah's +disagreeable protector collapse. She hardly noticed it, for she was +talking vivaciously to Madeleine about the premiere of Donnay's comedy. +Thrice Ambroise sought to fill her glass; but she repulsed him. He was +sad. Something told him that Aholibah was farther away from him than +ever; was she on the eve of forming one of those alliances that would +rob him finally of her presence? He eyed the sleeping man--surely a +monster, a millionnaire, with the tastes of a brute. It was all very +trying to a man with fine nerves. Several times he caught Aholibah's eye +upon him, and he vaguely wondered if he had omitted anything--or, had he +betrayed his feelings? In Paris the waiter who shows that he has ears, +or eyes, or a heart, except in the exercise of his functions, is lost. +He is bound to be caught and his telltale humanity scourged by instant +dismissal. So when those fathomless eyes glittered in his direction, his +knees trembled, and a ball of copper invaded his throat. He could barely +drag himself to her side and ask if he could help her. A burst of +impertinent laughter greeted him, and Madeleine cried:-- + +"Your blond garcon seems smitten, Aholibah!" When Ambroise heard this +awful phrase, his courage quite forsook him, and he withdrew into the +obscurity of the hall. So white was he that the kindly Joseph asked +solicitously if he were ill. Ambroise shook his head. The heat, he +feebly explained, had made his head giddy. Better drink some iced +mineral water, was suggested--the other man could look after the party! +But Ambroise would not hear of this, and feeling once more the beckoning +gaze of Aholibah he marched bravely to her and was rewarded by a tap on +the wrist. + +"There, loiterer! Go call a carriage. The Prince is sleepy--dear sheep!" +This last was a tender apostrophe to her snoring friend. Ambroise helped +them into a fiacre. When it drove away it was past two o'clock; the +house had to be closed. He walked slowly home to his little chamber on +the Rue Puteaux, just off the Batignolles. But he could not sleep until +the street-cleaners began the work of another day.... The Woman from +Morocco was the scarlet colour of his troubled dreams.... + + * * * * * + +August had almost spent itself, and Aholibah remained in the arid and +flavourless town. Her intimate friends had weeks earlier gone to +Trouville, to Dinard, to Ostende, to Hombourg, even as far as Brighton; +but she lingered, seemingly from perversity. She came regularly to the +cafe about eleven, always in company with her Prince, and was untiringly +served by Ambroise. He was rewarded for his fidelity with many valuable +tips and latterly with gifts--for on being questioned he was forced to +admit that gratuities had to be shared with the other waiters. He was so +amiable, his smile so winning, his admiration so virginal, that +Aholibah kept him near her. Her Prince drank, sulked, or grumbled as +much as ever. He was bored by the general heat and the dulness, yet made +no effort to escape either. One night they entered after twelve o'clock. +Aholibah was in vicious humour and snapped at her garcon. Dog-like he +waited upon her, an humble, devoted helot. He overheard her say to her +companion that she must have lost the purse at the Folies-Bergeres. + +"Well, go to the Rue de la Paix to-morrow and buy another," was the +reply. + +"I can't replace that purse. Besides, it was a prized gift--" + +"From your sainted mother in heaven!" he sneered. + +Ambroise saw the windows of her eyes close with a snap, and he moved +away, fearing to be present in the surely impending quarrel. He +remembered the purse. It was a long gold affair, its tiny links crusted +with precious pearls--emeralds, rubies, diamonds. And the top he saw +before him with ease, for its pattern was odd--a snake's head with jaws +distended by a large amethyst. Yes, it was unique, that purse. And its +value must have been bewildering for any but the idle rich. Ah! how he +hated all this money, coming from nowhere, pouring in golden streams +nowhere. He was not a revolutionist,--not even a socialist,--but there +were times when he could have taken the neck of the Prince between his +strong fingers and choked out his worthless life. These attacks of envy +were short-lived--he could not ascribe them to the reading of the little +hornet-like anarchist sheet, _Pere Peinard_, which the other waiters +lent him; rather was it an excess of bile provoked by the coveted beauty +of Aholibah. + +She usurped his day dreams, his night reveries. He never took a step +without keeping her memory in the foreground. When he closed his eyes, +he saw scarlet. When he opened them, he felt her magnetic glance upon +him, though she was far from the cafe. His one idea was to speak with +her. His maddest wish assumed the shape of a couple walking slowly arm +in arm through the Bois--_she_ was the woman! But this particular vision +bordered on delirium, and he rarely indulged in it.... He stooped to +look under the chairs, under the table, for the missing treasure. It was +not to be seen. Indolently the Prince watched him as he peered all over +the cafe, out on the terrace. Aholibah was deeply preoccupied. She +sipped her wine without pleasure. Her brows were thunderous. The +cart-wheel hat was tipped low over them. Several times Ambroise sought +her glance. He could have sworn that she was regarding him steadily. So +painful became the intensity of her eyes that he withdrew in confusion. +His mind was made up at last. + +The next day was for him a free one. He wandered up and down the Rue de +la Paix staring moodily into the jewellers' windows. That night, though +he could have stayed away from the cafe, he returned at ten o'clock, and +luckily enough was needed. Joseph greeted him effusively. The "mast," +the thin fellow from Marseilles, had gone home with a splitting +headache. Would Ambroise stay and serve his usual table? To his immense +astonishment and joy he saw her enter alone. He took her wraps and +seated her on her favourite divan near an electric fan. Then he stared +expectantly at the door. But her carriage had driven away. Was a part of +his dream coming true? He closed his eyes, and straightway saw scarlet. +Then he went for wine, without taking her order. + +Aholibah was preoccupied. She played with the bracelet on her tawny left +wrist. Occasionally she lifted her glass, or else tossed her hair from +her eyes. If any stranger ventured near her, she began to hum +insolently, or spoke earnestly with Ambroise. He was in the eleventh +heaven of the Persians. Two Ambroises appeared to be in him: one served +his lady, spoke with her; the other from afar contemplated with the +ecstasy of a hasheesh eater his counterfeit brother. It was an exquisite +sensation. + +"The purse--has Mademoiselle--" He stammered. + +"No," she crisply answered. + +"Can it never be duplicated? Perhaps--" + +"Never. It is impossible. It was made in Africa." + +"But--but--" he persisted. His bearing was so peculiar that she bent +upon him her dynamic gaze. + +"What's the matter with you this evening, Ambroise? Have you come into a +successful lottery ticket? Or--" She was suspiciously looking at him. +"Or--you haven't found _it_?" + +He nodded his head, his face beatific with joy. He resembled the +youthful Saint George after slaying the dragon. She was startled. Her +eyes positively lightened; he listened for the attendant peal of +thunder. + +"Speak out, you booby. Cornichon! Where did you find it? Let me see +it--at once." All fire and imperiousness, she held out grasping fingers. +He shook. And then carefully he drew from the inside pocket of his coat, +the purse. She snatched it. Yes--it was her purse. And yet there was +something strange about it. Had the stones been tampered with? She +examined it searchingly. She boasted a jeweller's knowledge of diamonds +and rubies. One of the stones had been transposed, that she could have +sworn. And how different the expression of the serpent's eyes--small +carbuncles. No--it was not her purse! She looked at Ambroise. He was +paling and reddening in rapid succession. + +"It is _not_ my purse! How did this come into your possession? It is +very valuable, quite as valuable as mine. But the eyes of my serpent +were not so large--I mean the carbuncles. Ambroise--look at me! I +command you! Where did you find this treasure--cher ami!" Her seductive +voice lingered on the last words as if they were a morsel of delicious +fruit. He leaned heavily on the table and closed his eyes to shut out +her face--but he only saw scarlet. He heard scarlet. + +"I--I--bought the thing because--you missed the other--" He could get no +further. She smiled, showing her celebrated teeth. + +"You bought the thing--_hein_? You must be a prince in +disguise--Ambroise! And I have just lost _my_ Prince! Perhaps--you +thought--you audacious boy--" + +He kept his eyes closed. She was in a corner of the room--quite +empty--the other waiters were on the terrace. She weighed his appearance +and smiled mysteriously; her smile, her glance, and her scarlet gowns +were her dramatic assets. Then she spoke in a low voice--a contralto +like the darker tones of an English horn:-- + +"I fancy I'll keep your thoughtful _gift_--Ambroise. And now, like a +good boy, get a fiacre for me!" She went away, leaving him standing in +the middle of the room, a pillar of burning ice. When Joseph spoke to +him he did not answer. Then they took him by the arm, and he fell over +in a seizure which, asserted the practical head waiter, was caused by +indigestion. + + +II + +ACROSS THE STYX + +It was raining on the Left Bank. The chill of a November afternoon cut +its way through the doors of the Cafe La Source in the Boul' Mich' and +made shiver the groups of young medical students who were reading or +playing dominos. Ambroise Nettier, older, thinner, paler, waited +carefully on his patrons. He had been in the hospital with brain fever, +and after he was cured, one of the students secured him a position at +this cafe in the Quartier. He had been afraid to go back to the Cafe +Riche; Joseph had harshly discharged him on that terrible night; alone, +without a home, without a penny, his savings gone, his life insurance +hypothecated,--it had been intended for the benefit of his parents,--his +clothes, his very trunk gone, and plunged in debt to his fellow-waiters, +his brain had succumbed to the shock. But Ambroise was young and strong; +when he left the hospital he was relieved to find that he no longer saw +scarlet. He was a healed man. He had intended to seek for a place at the +Cafe Cardinal, but it was too near the Cafe Riche--he might meet old +acquaintances, might be asked embarrassing questions. So he gladly +accepted his present opportunity. + +The dulness of the day waxed with its waning. It was nearly six o'clock +when the door slowly opened and Aholibah entered. She was alone. Her +scarlet plumage was wet, and she was painted like a Peruvian war-god. +She did not appear so brilliant a bird of paradise--or elsewhere--as at +the aviary across the water. Yet her gaze was as forthright as ever. She +sat on a divan between two domino parties, and was hardly noticed by the +fanatics of that bony diversion. Recognizing Ambroise, she made a sign +to him. It was some minutes before he could reach her table; he had +other orders. When he did, she said she wanted some absinthe. He stared +at her. Yes, absinthe--she had discarded iced wines. The doctor told her +that cold wine was dangerous. He still stared. Then she held up the +purse. It was a mere shell; all the stones save the amethyst in the +mouth of the serpent were gone. She laughed shrilly. He went for the +drink. She lighted a cigarette.... + +Every night for six months she haunted the cafe. She was always +unattended, always in excellent humour. She made few friends among the +students. Her scarlet dress grew shabbier. Her gloves and boots were +pitiful to Ambroise, who recalled her former splendours, her outrageous +extravagances. Why had fortune flouted her! Why had she let it, like +water, escape through her jewelled, indifferent fingers! He made no +inquiries. She vouchsafed none. They were now on a different footing. +Tantalizingly she dangled the purse under his nose as he brought her +absinthe--always this opalescent absinthe. She drank it in the morning, +in the afternoon, at night. She seldom spoke save to Ambroise. And +he--he no longer saw scarlet, for the glorious tone of her hat and gown +had vanished. They were rusty red, a carroty tint. Her face was like the +mask of La Buveuse d'Absinthe, by Felicien Rops; her eyes, black wells +of regard; her hair without lustre, and coarse as the mane of a horse. +Aholibah no longer manifested interest in the life of Paris. She did not +read or gossip. But she still had money to spend. + +The night he quarrelled with his new patron, Ambroise was not well. All +the day his head had pained him. When he reached La Source, the dame at +the cashier's desk told him that he was in for a scolding. He shrugged +his thin shoulders. He didn't care very much. Later the prophesied event +occurred. He had been much too attentive to the solitary woman who drank +absinthe day and night. The patron did not propose to see his +establishment, patronized as it was by the shining lights of medicine--! + +Ambroise changed his clothes and went away without a word. He was weary +of his existence, and a friend who shared his wretched room in the Rue +Mouffetard had apprised him of a vacant job at a livelier resort, the +Cafe Vachette, commonly known as the Cafe Rasta. There he would earn +more tips, though the work would be more fatiguing. And--the Morocco +Woman might not follow him. He hurried away. + + +III + +AVERNUS + +She sat on a divan in the corner when he entered the Vachette for the +first time. He said nothing, nor did he experience either a thrill of +pleasure or disgust. The other waiters assured him that she was an old +customer, sometimes better dressed, yet never without money. And she was +liberal. He took her usual order, but did not speak to her, though she +played with the purse as if to tempt him--it had become for him a symbol +of their lives. A quick glance assured him that the amethyst had +disappeared. She was literally drinking _his_ gift away in absinthe. The +spring passed, and Ambroise did not regain his former health. His limbs +were leaden, his head always heavy. The alert waiter was transformed. He +took his orders soberly, executed them soberly,--he was still a good +routinier; but his early enthusiasm was absent. Something had gone from +him that night; as she went to her carriage with her scornful, snapping, +petulant _Ca_!--he felt that his life was over. Aholibah watched like a +cat every night; he was not on for day duty. She never came to the Rasta +before dark. The story of her infatuation for the well-bred, melancholy +garcon was noised about; but it did not endanger his position, as at La +Source. He paid little attention to the jesting, and was scrupulously +exact in his work. But the sense of his double personality began to +worry him again. He did not see scarlet as of old; he noticed when his +eyes were closed that the apparition of a second Ambroise swam into the +field of his vision. And he was positively certain that this spectre of +himself saw scarlet--the attitude of his double assured him of the fact. +Simple-minded, ignorant of cerebral disorders, loyal, and laborious, +Ambroise could not speak of these disquieting things--indeed, he only +worked the more.... + +At last, one night in late summer, she did not appear. It was after a +day when she had sung more insolently than ever, drunk more than her +accustomed allowance, and had shown Ambroise the purse--the sockets of +the serpent's eyes untenanted by the beautiful carbuncles. Apathetic as +he had become, he was surprised at her absence. It was either caprice or +serious illness. She had dwindled to a skeleton, with a maleficent +smile. Her teeth were yellow, her hands become claws, the scarlet of her +clothes a drab hue, the plumes on her hat gone. Ambroise wondered. About +midnight a mean-looking fellow entered and asked for him. A lady, a very +ill lady, was in a coupe at the door. He hurried out. It was Aholibah. +Her eyes were glazed and her lips black and cracked. She tried to croon, +in a hoarse voice:-- + +"I am the Woman of Morocco!" But her head fell on the window-sill of the +carriage. Ambroise lifted the weary head on his shoulder. His eyes were +so dry that they seemed thirsty. The old glamour gripped him. The cabman +held the reins and waited; it was an every-night occurrence for him. The +starlight could not penetrate to the Boulevard through the harsh +electric glare; and the whirring of wheels and laughter of the cafe's +guests entered the soul of Ambroise like steel nails. She opened her +eyes. + +"I am that Aholibah ... a witness through waste Asia ... that the strong +men and the Captains knew ..." This line of Swinburne's was pronounced +in the purest English. Ambroise did not understand. Then followed some +rapidly uttered jargon that might have been Moorish. He soothed her, and +softly passed his hand over her rough and dishevelled hair. His heart +was bursting. She was after all his Aholibah, his first love. A crowd +gathered. He asked for a doctor. A dozen students ran in a dozen +different directions. The tired horse stamped its feet impatiently, and +once it whinnied. The coachman lighted his pipe and watched his dying +fare. Some wag sang a drunken lyric, and Ambroise repeated at +intervals:-- + +"Please not so close, Messieurs. She needs air." Then she moved her head +and murmured: + +"Where's--my Prince? My--Prince Ambroise--I have something--" Her head +fell back on his shoulder with a rigid jerk. In her clenched fingers he +recognized his purse--smudged, torn, the serpent mouth gaping, the eyes +empty.... And for the last time Ambroise saw scarlet--saw scarlet +double. His two personalities had separated, never to merge again. + + + + +IV + +REBELS OF THE MOON + + "On my honour, friend," Zarathustra answered, "what thou speakest + of doth not exist: there is no devil nor hell. Thy soul will be + dead even sooner than thy body: henceforth fear naught." + + +The moon, a spiritual gray wafer, fainted in the red wind of a summer +morning as the two men leaped a ditch soft with mud. The wall was not +high, the escape an easy one. Crouching, their clothes the colour of +clay, they trod cautiously the trench, until opposite a wood whose trees +blackened the slow dawn. Then, without a word, they ran across the road, +and, in a few minutes, were lost in the thick underbrush of the little +forest. It was past four o'clock and the dawn began to trill over the +rim of night; the east burst into stinging sun rays, while the moving +air awoke the birds and sent scurrying around the smooth green park a +cloud of golden powdery dust.... + +Arved and Quell stood in a secret glade and looked at each other +solemnly--but only for a moment. Laughter, unrestrained laughter, +frightened the squirrels and warned them that they were still in +danger. + +"Well, we've escaped this time," said the poet. + +"Yes; but how long?" was the sardonic rejoinder of the painter. + +"See here, Quell, you're a pessimist. You are never satisfied; which, I +take it, is a neat definition of pessimism." + +"I don't propose to chop logic so early in the morning," was the surly +reply. "I'm cold and nervous. Say, did you lift anything before we got +away?" Arved smiled the significant smile of a drinking man. + +"Yes, I did. I waited until Doc McKracken left his office, and then I +sneaked _this_." The severe lines in Quell's face began to swim +together. He reached out his hand, took the flask, and then threw back +his head. Arved watched him with patient resignation. + +"Hold on there! Leave a dozen drops for a poor maker of rhymes," he +chuckled, and soon was himself gurgling the liquor. + +They arose, and after despairing glances at their bespattered garments, +trudged on. In an hour, the pair had reached the edge of the forest, +and, as the sun sat high and warm, a rest was agreed upon. But this time +they did not easily find a hiding-place. Fearing to venture nearer the +turnpike, hearing human sounds, they finally retired from the clearing, +and behind a moss-etched rock discovered a cool resting-place on the +leafy floor. + +At full length, hands under heads, brains mellowed by brandy, the men +summed up the situation. Arved was the first to speak. He was tall, +blond, heavy of figure, and his beard hung upon his chest. His +dissatisfied eyes were cynical when he rallied his companion. A man of +brains this, but careless as the grass. + +"Quell, let us think this thing out carefully. It is nearly six o'clock. +At six o'clock the cells will be unlocked, and then,--well, McKracken +will damn our bones, for he gets a fat board fee from my people, and the +table is not so cursed good at the Hermitage that he misses a margin of +profit! What will he do? Set the dogs after us? No, he daren't; we're +not convicts--we're only mad folk." He smiled good-humouredly, though +his white brow was dented as if by harsh thoughts. + +Quell's little bloodshot eyes stared up into a narrow channel of +foliage, at the end of which was a splash of blue sky. He was +mean-appearing, with a horselike head, his mustache twisted into a +savage curl. His forehead was abnormal in breadth and the irritable +flashes of fire in his eyes told the story of a restless soul. The +nostrils expanded as he spoke:-- + +"We're only mad folk, as you say; nevertheless, the Lord High Keeper +will send his police patrol wagon after us in a jiffy. He went to bed +dead full last night, so his humour won't be any too sweet when he hears +that several of his boarders have vanished. He'll miss you more than me; +I'm not at the first table with you swells." + +Quell ended his speech with so disagreeable an inflection that Arved was +astonished. He looked around and spat at a beetle. + +"What's wrong with you, my hearty? I believe you miss your soft iron +couch. Or did you leave it this morning left foot foremost? Anyhow, +Quell, don't get on your ear. We'll push to town as soon as it's +twilight, and I know a little crib near the river where we can have all +we want to eat and drink. Do you hear--drink!" Quell made no answer. The +other continued:-- + +"Besides, I don't see why you've turned sulky simply because your family +sent you up to the Hermitage. It's no disgrace. In fact, it steadies the +nerves, and you can get plenty of booze." + +"If you have the price," snapped his friend. + +"Money or no money, McKracken's asylum--no, it's bad taste to call it +that; his retreat, ah, there's the word!--is not so awful. I've a theory +that our keepers are crazy as loons; though you can't blame them, +watching us, as they must, from six o'clock in the morning until +midnight. Say, why were you put away?" + +"Crazy, like yourself, I suppose." Quell grinned. + +"And now we're cured. We cured ourselves by flight. How can they call us +crazy when we planned the job so neatly?" + +Arved began to be interested in the sound of his own voice. He searched +his pockets and after some vain fumbling found a half package of +cigarettes. + +"Take some and be happy, my boy. They are boon-sticks indeed." Quell +suddenly arose. + +"Arved, what were you sent up for, may I ask?" + +The poet stretched his big legs, rolled over on his back again, and +scratching his tangled beard, smoked the cigarette he had just lighted. +In the hot hum of the woods there was heard the occasional dropping of +pine cones as the wind fanned lazy music from the leaves. They could not +see the sun; its power was felt. Perspiration beaded their shiny faces +and presently they removed collars and coats, sitting at ease in +shirt-sleeves.... Arved's tongue began to speed:-- + +"Though I've only known you twenty-four hours, my son, I feel impelled +to tell you the history of my happy life--for happiness has its +histories, no matter what the poets say. But the day is hot, our time +limited. Wait until we are recaptured, then I'll spin you a yarn." + +"You expect to get caught for sure?" + +"I do. So do you. No need to argue--your face tells me that. But we'll +have the time of our life before they gather us in. Anyhow, we'll want +to go back. The whole world is crazy, but ashamed to acknowledge it. We +are not. Pascal said men are so mad that he who would not be is a madman +of a new kind. To escape ineffable dulness is the privilege of the +lunatic; the lunatic, who is the true aristocrat of nature--the unique +man in a tower of ivory, the elect, who, in samite robes, traverses +moody gardens. Really, I shudder at the idea of ever living again in +yonder stewpot of humanity, with all its bad smells. To struggle with +the fools for their idiotic prizes is beyond me. The lunatic asylum--" + +"Can't you find some other word?" asked Quell, dryly. + +"--is the best modern equivalent for the tub of Diogenes--he who was the +first Solitary, the first Individualist. To dream one's dreams, to be +alone--" + +"How about McKracken and the keepers?" + +"From the volatile intellects of madmen are fashioned the truths of +humanity. Mental repose is death. All our modern theocrats, +politicians,--whose minds are sewers for the people,--and lawyers are +corpses, their brains dead from feeding on dead ideas. Motion is +life--mad minds are always in motion." + +"Let up there! You talk like the doctor chaps over at the crazy crib," +interrupted Quell. + +"Ah, if we could only arrange our dreams in chapters--as in a novel. +Sometimes Nature does it for us. There is really a beginning, a +development, a denouement. But, for the most of us, life is a crooked +road with weeds so high that we can't see the turn of the path. Now, my +case--I'm telling you my story after all--my case is a typical one of +the artistic sort. I wrote prose, verse, and dissipated with true +poetic regularity. It was after reading Nietzsche that I decided to quit +my stupid, sinful ways. Yes, you may smile! It was Nietzsche who +converted me. I left the old crowd, the old life in Paris, went to +Brittany, studied new rhythms, new forms, studied the moon; and then +people began to touch their foreheads knowingly. I was suspected simply +because I did not want to turn out sweet sonnets about the pretty stars. +Why, man, I have a star in my stomach! Every poet has. We are of the +same stuff as the stars. It was Marlowe who said, 'A sound magician is a +mighty god.' He was wrong. Only the mentally unsound are really wise. +This the ancients knew. Even if Gerard de Nerval did walk the boulevards +trolling a lobster by a blue ribbon--that is no reason for judging him +crazy. As he truly said, 'Lobsters neither bark nor bite; and they know +the secrets of the sea!' His dreams simply overflowed into his daily +existence. He had the courage of his dreams. Do you remember his +declaring that the sun never appears in dreams? How true! But the moon +does, 'sexton of the planets,' as the crazy poet Lenau called it--the +moon which is the patron sky-saint of men with brains. Ah, brains! What +unhappiness they cause in this brainless world, a world rotten with +hypocrisy. A poet polishes words until they glitter with beauty, +charging them with fulminating meaning--straightway he is called mad by +men who sweat and toil on the stock exchange. Have you ever, my dear +Quell, watched those little, grotesque brokers on a busy day? No? Well, +you will say that no lunatic grimacing beneath the horns of the moon +ever made such ludicrous, such useless, gestures. And for what? Money! +Money to spend as idiotically as it is garnered. The world is crazy, I +tell you, crazy, to toil as it does. How much cleverer are the apes who +won't talk, because, if they did, they would be forced to abandon their +lovely free life, put on ugly garments, and work for a living. These +animals, for which we have such contempt, are freer than men; they are +the Supermen of Nietzsche--Nietzsche whose brain mirrored both a +Prometheus and a Napoleon." Quell listened to this speech with +indifference. Arved continued:-- + +"Nor was Nietzsche insane when he went to the asylum. His sanity was +blinding in its brilliancy; he voluntarily renounced the world of +foolish faces and had himself locked away where he would not hear its +foolish clacking. O Silence! gift of the gods, deified by Carlyle in +many volumes and praised by me in many silly words! My good fellow, +society, which is always hypocritical, has to build lunatic asylums in +self-defence. These polite jails keep the world in countenance; they +give it a standard. If _you_ are behind the bars--" + +"Speak for yourself," growled Quell. + +"Then the world knows that you are crazy and that _it_ is not. There is +no other way of telling the difference. So a conspiracy of fools, +lawyers, and doctors is formed. If you do not live the life of the +stupid: cheat, lie, steal, smirk, eat, dance, and drink--then you are +crazy! That fact agreed upon, the hypocrites, who are quite mad, but +cunning enough to dissemble, lock behind bolted doors those free souls, +the poets, painters, musicians--artistic folk in general. They brand our +gifts with fancy scientific names, such as Megalomania, Paranoia, _Folie +des grandeurs_. Show me a genius and I'll show you a madman--according +to the world's notion." + +"There you go again," cried Quell, arising to his knees. "Genius, _I_ +believe, is a disease of the nerves; and I don't mind telling you that I +consider poets and musicians quite crazy." + +Arved's eyes were blazing blue signals. + +"But, my dear Quell, are not all men mad at some time or another? Madly +in love, religiously mad, patriotically insane, and idiotic on the +subject of clothes, blood, social precedence, handsome persons, money? +And is it not a sign of insanity when one man claims sanity for his own +particular art? Painting, I admit, is--" + +"What the devil do you know about painting?" Quell roughly interposed; +"you are a poet and, pretending to love all creation,--altruism, I think +your sentimental philosophers call it,--have the conceit to believe you +bear a star in your stomach when it is only a craving for rum. I've +been through the game." + +He began to pace the sward, chewing a blade of grass. He spoke in +hurried, staccato phrases:-- + +"Why was I put away? Listen: I tried to paint the sun,--for I hate your +moon and its misty madness. To put this glorious furnace on canvas is, +as you will acknowledge, the task of a god. It never came to me in my +dreams, so I wooed it by day. Above all, I wished to express truth; the +sun is black. Think of an ebon sun fringed with its dazzling +photosphere! I tried to paint sun-rhythms, the rhythms of the quivering +sky, which is never still even when it seems most immobile; I tried to +paint the rhythms of the atmosphere, shivering as it is with chords of +sunlight and chromatic scales as yet unpainted. Like Oswald Alving in +Ibsen's Ghosts, my last cry will be for 'the sun.' How did my friends +act? What did the critics say? A black sun was too much for the world, +though astronomers have proven my theory correct. The doctors swore I +drank too much absinthe; the critics said a species of optical madness +had set in; that I saw only the peripheral tints--I was yellow and blue +crazy. Perhaps I was, perhaps I am. So is the fellow crazy who invented +wireless telegraphy; so is the man off his base who invents a folding +bird cage. We are all crazy, and the craziest gang are our doctors at +the Hermitage." He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. Arved rolled his +handsome head acquiescingly. + +"You poets and musicians are trying to compass the inane. You are trying +to duplicate your dreams, dreams without a hint of the sun. The painter +at least copies or interprets real life; while the composer dips his +finger in the air, making endless sound-scrolls--noises with long tails +and whirligig decorations like foolish fireworks--though I think the art +of the future will be pyrotechnics. Mad, mad, I tell you! But whether +mad or not matters little in our land of freedom, where all men are born +unequal, where only the artists are sad. They are useless beings, openly +derided, and when one is caught napping, doing something that offends +church or State or society, he is imprisoned. Mad, you know! No wonder +anarchy is thriving, no wonder every true artist is an anarch, unavowed +perhaps, yet an anarch, and an atheist." + +"Not so fast!" interrupted Arved. "I'm an anarchist, but I don't believe +in blowing up innocent policemen. Neither do you, Quell. You wouldn't +hurt a bartender! Give an anarchist plenty to drink, and he sheds his +anarchy like a shirt. There are, I have noticed, three stages in the +career of a revolutionist: destruction, instruction, construction. He +begins the first at twenty, at forty he is teaching, at sixty he +believes in society--especially if he has money in the bank." Quell +regarded the speaker sourly. + +"You are a wonder, Arved. You fly off on a wild tangent stimulated by +the mere sound of a word. Who said anything about dynamite-anarchy? +There's another sort that men of brains--madmen if you will--believe and +indirectly teach. Emerson was one, though he hardly knew it. Thoreau +realized it for him, however. Don't you remember his stern rebuke when +Emerson visited him in Concord jail: 'Henry, why art thou here?' meekly +inquired the mystic man. 'Ralph, why art thou _not_ here?' was the +counter-question. Thoreau had brave nerves. To live in peace in this +malicious swamp of a world we must all wear iron masks until we are +carted off to the _domino-park_; pious people call it the cemetery. Now, +I'm going to sleep. I'm tired of all this jabbering. We are crazy for +sure, or else we wouldn't talk so much." + +Arved grumbled, "Yes, I've noticed that when a man in an asylum begins +to suspect his keepers of madness he's mighty near lunacy himself." + +"You have crazy blue eyes, Arved! Where's that flask--I'm dry again! +Let's sleep." + +They drained the bottle and were soon dozing, while about them buzzed +the noon in all its torrid splendour. + +When they awoke it was solid night. They yawned and damned the darkness, +which smelt like stale india-rubber, so Quell said. They cursed life and +the bitter taste in their mouths. Quell spoke of his thirst in words +that startled the easy-going Arved, who confessed that if he could rid +himself of the wool in his throat, he would be comparatively happy. Then +they stumbled along, bumping into trees, feeling with outstretched arms, +but finding nothing to guide them save the few thin stars in the torn +foliage overhead. Without watches, they could catch no idea of the hour. +The night was far spent, declared Arved; he discovered that he was very +hungry. Suddenly, from the top of a steep, slippery bank they pitched +forward into the highroad. + +Arved put out his hand, searching for his comrade. "Quell, Quell!" he +whispered. Quell rose darkly beside him, a narrow lath of humanity. +Locking arms, both walked briskly until, turning a sharp, short corner, +they beheld, all smiling in the night, a summer garden, well lighted and +full of gay people, chattering, singing, eating, drinking--happy! The +two fugitives were stunned for a moment by such a joyful prospect. Tears +came slowly to their eyes, yet they never relaxed their gait. Arriving +at an outlying table and seats, they bethought themselves of their +appearance, of money, of other disquieting prospects; but, sitting down, +they boldly called a waiter. + +Luckily it was a country girl who timidly took their order for beer and +sandwiches. And they drank eagerly, gobbling the food as soon as it +came, ordering more so noisily that they attracted attention. The beer +made them brave. As they poured down glass after glass, reckless of the +reckoning, insolent to the servant, they began wrangling over the +subject that had possessed their waking hours. + +"Look here, Quell!" Arved exclaimed crustily, "you said I had crazy blue +eyes. What about your own red ones? Crazy! Why, they glow now like a +rat's. Poets may be music-mad, drunk with tone--" + +"And other things," sneered the painter. + +"--but at least their work is great when it endures; it does not fade +away on rotten canvas." + +"Now, I know you ought to be in the Brain-College, Arved, where your +friends could take the little green car that goes by the grounds and see +you on Sunday afternoons if weather permits." + +His accent seemed deliberately insulting to Arved, who, however, let it +pass because of their mutual plight. If they fell to fighting, detection +would ensue. So he answered in placatory phrases:-- + +"Yes, my friend, we both belong to the same establishment, for we are +men of genius. As the cat said to Alice, 'We must be mad or else we +shouldn't be here.' I started to tell you why my people thought I had +better take the cure. I loved the moon too much and loathed sunlight. If +I had never tried to write lunar poetry--the tone quality of music +combined with the pictorial evocation of painting--I might be in the +bosom of my family now instead of--" + +"Drinking with a crazy painter, eh?" Quell was very angry. He shouted +for drinks so rapidly that he alarmed the more prudent Arved; and as +they were now the last guests, the head waiter approached and curtly +bade them leave. In an instant he was dripping with beer thrown at +him--glass and all--by the irate Quell. A whistle sounded, two other +waiters rushed out, and the battle began. Arved, aroused by the sight of +his friend on the ground with three men hammering his head, gave a roar +like the trumpeting of an elephant. A chair was smashed over a table, +and, swinging one-half of it, he made a formidable onslaught. Two of the +waiters were knocked senseless and the leader's nose and teeth crushed +in by the rude cudgel. The morose moon started up, a tragic hieroglyph +in the passionless sky. Quell, seeing its hated disk, howled, his face +aflame with exaltation. Then he leaped like a hoarsely panting animal +upon the poet; a moment and they were in the grass clawing each other. +And the moon foamed down upon them its magnetic beams until darkness, +caused by a coarse blanket, enveloped, pinioned, smothered them. When +the light shone again, they were sitting in a wagon, their legs tightly +bound.... + +They began singing. The attendant interrupted:-- + +"Will you fellows keep quiet? How can a man drive straight, listening to +your cackle?" + +Arved touched his temple significantly and nudged Quell. + +"Another one of us. Another rebel of the moon!" + +"Shut up or I'll gag you both!" imperiously commanded the doctor, as the +wheels of the ambulance cut the pebbly road. They were entering the +asylum; now they passed the porter's lodge. In the jewelled light of a +senescent moon, his wife and little daughter gazed at them curiously, +without semblance of pity or fear. Then, as if shot from the same vocal +spring-board, the voices of poet and painter merged into crazy +rhythmatic chanting:-- + +"Rebels of the moon, rebels of the moon! We are, we are, the rebels of +the moon!" + +And the great gates closed behind them with a brazen clangour--metal +gates of the moon-rebels. + + + + +V + +THE SPIRAL ROAD + + There can be nothing good, as we know it, nor anything evil, as we + know it, in the eye of the Omnipresent and the + Omniscient.--_Oriental Proverb._ + + +I + +THE STRAND OF DREAMS + +"I must see him if only for a minute. I can't go back to the city after +coming so far. Please--" but the girl's face disappeared and the rickety +door, which had been opened on a chain, was slammed after this +imperative speech, and Gerald Shannon found himself staring +exasperatedly at its rusty exterior. To have travelled on foot such a +distance only to be turned away like a beggar enraged him. Nor was the +prospect of returning over the path which had brought him to Karospina's +house a cheering one. He turned and saw that a low, creeping mist had +obliterated every vestige of the trail across the swamp lands. There was +no sun, and the twilight of a slow yellow day in late September would +soon, in complicity with the fog, leave him totally adrift on this +remote strand--he could hear the curving fall and hiss of the breakers, +the monotonous rumour of the sea. So he was determined to face +Karospina, even if he had to force his way into the house. + +Two hours earlier, at the little railway station, they had informed him +that the road was easy flatland for the greater part of the way. He had +offered money for a horse or even a wheel; but these were luxuries on +this bleak, poverty-ridden coast. As there was no alternative, Gerald +had walked rapidly since three o'clock. And he had not been told the +truth about the road; where the oozing, green, unwholesome waters were +not he stepped, sometimes sinking over his ankles in the soft mud. Not a +sign of humanity served him for comfort or compass. He had been assured +that if he kept his back to the sun he would reach his destination. And +he did, but not without many misgivings. It was the vision of a squat +tower-like building, almost hemmed in by a monster gas reservoir, +fantastic wooden galleries, and the gigantic silhouettes of strange +machinery, that relieved his mind. But this house and its surroundings +soon repelled him. His reception was the final disenchantment. + +He played a lively tattoo with his blackthorn stick on the panels of the +door. For five minutes this continued, interspersed with occasional loud +calls for Karospina. At last the siege was raised. After preliminary +unboltings, unbarrings, and the rattling of the chain, Gerald saw before +him a middle-aged man with a smooth face and closely shaven head, who +quietly asked his name and business. + +"I have a letter for you, Mr. Karospina--if you are that gentleman--and +as I have put myself to much trouble in getting to you, I think I +deserve a little consideration." + +"A letter, my worthy sir! And for me? Who told you to come here? How do +you know my name?" This angered the young man. + +"It is from Prince K. _The_ Prince. Now are you satisfied?" he added, as +his questioner turned red and then paled as if the news were too +startling for his nerves. + +"Come in, come in!" he cried. "Mila, Mila, here is a guest. Fetch tea to +the laboratory." He literally dragged Shannon within doors and led him +across a stone corridor to a large room, but not before he had bolted +and barred the entrance to his mysterious fortress. Seeing the other's +look of quiet amusement, he laughed himself:-- + +"Wolves, my dear sir, wolves, _human_ wolves, prowl on the beach at +night, and while I have no treasures, it is well to be on the safe side. +Mila, Mila, the tea, the tea." There was a passionate intensity in his +utterance that attracted Gerald from his survey of the chamber. He saw +that in the light Karospina was a much older man than he had at first +supposed. But the broad shoulders, the thick chest, and short, powerful +figure and bullet head belied his years. Incredulously his visitor asked +himself if this were the wonderful, the celebrated Karospina, chemist, +revolutionary, mystic, nobleman, and millionnaire. A Russian, he knew +that--yet he looked more like the monk one sees depicted on the canvases +of the early Flemish painters. His high, wide brow and deep-set, dark +eyes proclaimed the thinker; and because of his physique, he might have +posed as a prize-fighter. + +He took the letter and read it as the door opened and the girl came in +with the tea. She wore her hair braided in two big plaits which hung +between her shoulders, and her bold, careless glance from eyes sea-blue +made the Irishman forget his host and the rigours of the afternoon. A +Russian beauty, with bare, plump arms, and dressed in peasant costume; +but--a patrician! Her fair skin and blond hair filled him with +admiration. What the devil!--he thought, and came near saying it aloud. + +"My niece, Princess Mila Georgovics, Mr. Shannon." Gerald acknowledged +the introduction with his deepest bow. He was dazzled. He had come to +this dreary place to talk politics. But now this was out of the +question. And he began explaining to the Princess; Mila he had fancied +was some slattern waiting on the old fanatic of a prince. He told Mila +this in a few words, and soon the pair laughed and chatted. In the +meantime Karospina, who had finished the letter, began to pace the +apartment. Apparently he had forgotten the others. + +"Tea, tea, where's the tea?" he presently shouted. As they drank, he +said: "The prince asks an impossibility, Mr. Shannon. Say to him, _no_, +simply no; he will understand, and so will you, I hope. I'm done with +all militant movements. I'm converted to the peace party. What's the use +of liberty to people who won't know what to do with it when they get it? +Tolstoy is right. Let the peasant be shown how to save his soul--that +and a little to eat and drink and a roof are all he needs in this life." + +Gerald was startled. He had expected to find an "advanced" leader of the +Bakounine type. Instead, a man of the "vegetarian" order,--as he had +heard them called,--who talked religion instead of dynamite;--and after +all the bother of bringing the letter down to this remote country! +Decidedly the princess was more enjoyable than a reformed anarchist. She +was gazing at him seriously now, her society manner gone. Her nose, +rather large for the harmony of her face, palpitated with eagerness. +Evidently, thought Gerald, the young lady is the real revolutionist in +this curious household. He also ventured to say so to her, but she did +not meet his smiling declaration. Her uncle, irritated by his +interrupted discourse, exclaimed:-- + +"Never mind what the Princess Mila thinks, Mr. Shannon. Women change +their minds. The chief matter just now is that you cannot go away +to-night. You would lose your way, perhaps be drowned. Can you sleep on +a hard bed?" He was assured by Gerald that, if he had been turned away, +he would have slept in an outhouse, even under one of those windmills he +saw in such number on the strand. Karospina smiled. + +"Hardly there--that is, if you expected to awaken." Then he left the +room, saying that some one must see to the supper. His niece burst into +laughter. Gerald joined in. + +"He's always like that, fussy, nervous, but with a heart of gold, +Mr.--Mr. Shannon. Thank you. It's an Irish name, is it not? And you look +like an Irishman; a soldier, too, I fancy!" + +Gerald blushed. "A soldier in the cause of humanity," he answered, "but +no longer a hireling in the uniform of kings." He felt so foolish after +this brave bit of rhetoric that he kept his eyes on the floor. In an +instant she was at his side. + +"Give me your hand--_comrade_!" she said, with a peculiar intonation. +"Oh! if you only knew how I longed to meet the right men. Uncle is a +convert--no, hardly a backslider; but he swears by the regenerating +process instead of violence. Formerly the cleverest living chemist, he +now--oh! I shame to say it--he now indulges in firework displays instead +of manufacturing bombs with which to execute tyrants." She slowly +dropped his hand and her eyes wore a clairvoyant expression. He was +astounded. + +"Fireworks! Doesn't the prince hold by his old faith--he, a pupil of +Bakounine, Netschajew, and Kropotkin?" Just then the prince came in, +bearing a tray. He seemed happy. + +"Here, sit down, dear sir, and partake of a few things. We live so far +from civilization that we seldom get a good chicken. But eggs I can +offer you, eggs and ham, cooked by me on an electric machine." + +"You have no servants?" Gerald ventured. + +"Not one. I can't trust them near my--toys. The princess plays Chopin +mazourkas after she makes the beds in the morning, and in the afternoon +she is my assistant in the laboratory." Again the young man looked about +him. If the room was a laboratory, where were the retorts, the oven, the +phials, the jars, the usual apparatus of a modern chemist? He saw +nothing, except an old-fashioned electric fan and a few dusty books. The +fireworks--were those overgrown wheels and gaunt windmills and gas-house +the secret of the prince's self-banishment to this dreary coast? What +dreams did he seek to incarnate on this strand, in this queer tower, +locked away from the world with a charming princess--a fairy princess +whose heart beat with love for the oppressed, in whose hand he might +some time see the blazing torch of freedom? He, himself, was enveloped +by the hypnotism of the place. Mila spoke:-- + +"I fear I must leave you. I am studying to-night and--I go early to +rest. Pray dine as well as you can, with such a chef." She smiled +mischievously at her uncle, courtesied in peasant fashion to the +bewildered Gerald, who put out his hand, fain to touch hers, and +disappeared. The prince gazed inquiringly at the young man. + +"Revolutionists soon become friends, do they not? The Princess Mila is +part Russian, part Roumanian,--my sister married a Roumanian,--hence her +implacable political attitude. I can't lead her back to civilized +thinking. She sees war in the moon, sun, and stars. And I--I have +forsworn violence. Ah! if I could only make the prince change. +Bakounine's death had no effect; Netschajew's fate did not move him; nor +was Illowski's mad attempt to burn down Paris with his incendiary +symphony an example to our prince that those who take up the sword +perish by the sword. Ah, Tolstoy, dear Leon Nikolaievitch, you showed me +the true way to master the world by love and not by hate! Until I +read--but there, it's late. Come with me to your room. You may smoke and +sleep when you will. In the morning I will show you my--toys." They +shook hands formally and parted. + +His bed was hard, and his room cheerless, but anything, even a haymow, +rather than walking back to the station. After he went to his bed, he +rehearsed the day's doings from the three hours' ride in the train to +the tower. How weary he was! Hark--some one played the piano! A Chopin +mazourka! It was the princess. Mila! How lovely her touch!... Mila! What +a lovely name! A sleeping princess. A prince with such a sleepy head. +How the girl could play ... along the spiral road he saw the music glow +in enigmatic figures of fire.... + + +II + +THE PANACEA OF CORUSCATION + +He seemed to be uttering her name when he awoke. It was daylight; the +sun poured its rays over his face, and he asked himself how he could +have fallen asleep leaving the lamp burning on the table near his bed. +He must have slept long, for he felt rested, cheerful--happy. As he +dressed he speculated whether it was the sunshine, or the prospect of +going back to life, or--or--Did he wish to return so soon? He wondered +what Mila was doing. Then he went into the stone corridor and coughed as +a hint that he was up. Not a sound but the persistent fall at a distance +of some heavy metallic substance. It must be Karospina in his workshop, +at his rockets, pinwheels, torpedoes, and firecrackers. What a singular +change in a bloodthirsty revolutionist. And how childish! Had he +squandered his millions on futile experimentings? What his object, what +his scheme, for the amelioration of mankind's woes? Gerald's stomach +warned him that coffee and rolls were far dearer to him than the +downfall of tyranny's bastions, and impatiently he began whistling. The +rhythmic thud never ceased. He noticed an open door at the back of the +house, and he went out, his long legs carrying him about the yard, +toward the beach. The air was glorious, a soft breeze blowing landward +from the ocean. He almost forgot his hunger in the face of such a +spectacle. The breakers were racing in, and after crumbling, they +scudded, a film of green, crested by cottony white, across the hard sand +to the young man's feet. He felt exhilarated. And his hunger returned. +Then Mila's voice sounded near him. She carried a basket and fairly ran +in her eagerness. + +"Mr. Shannon, Mr. Shannon, good Prince Gerald--" he was amazed; where +could she have heard his Christian name?--"your breakfast. Wait--don't +swim the seas to New York for it. Here it is." She opened the basket and +handed him a jug of coffee and showed him the rolls inside. Without the +slightest embarrassment he thanked her and drank his coffee, walking; he +ate the bread, and felt, as he expressed it, like leading a forlorn +hope. They went on, the cutting sunshine and sparkling breeze alluring +them to vague distances. It was long after midday when they marched back +at a slower pace, Gerald swinging the basket like a light-hearted boy, +instead of the desperado he fancied himself. + +Entering the house, Mila hunted up some cold meat, and with fresh tea +and stale bread they were contented. The formidable pyrotechnist did not +appear, and so the young people enjoyed the day in each other's company. +She conducted him like a river through the lands of sociology, +Dostoiewsky, and Chopin. She played, but made him sit in the hall, for +the piano was in her private room. And then they began to exchange +confidences. It was dusk before the prince returned, in the attire of a +workingman, his face and hands covered with soot and grease. A hard +day's labour, he said, and did not seem surprised to see Shannon. + +After supper he asked Gerald if he would smoke a pipe with him in his +laboratory. Mila must have bored him enough by this time! They lighted +their pipes; but Mila refused to be sent away. She sat down beside her +uncle and put her elbows on the table--white, strong arms she had, and +Gerald only took his eyes from their pleasing contemplation to lift them +to hers. He was fast losing what little prudence he had; he was a Celt, +and he felt that he had known Mila for a century. + +"Young man," said Prince Karospina, sharply, "you have the message I +gave you last night! Well--and you will say _no_, to my beloved friend +K., without knowing why. And you will think that you have been dealing +with a man whose hard head has turned to the mush of human kindness,--an +altruist. Ah! I know how you fellows despise the word. But what have +Kropotkin, Elisee Reclus, Jean Grave, or the rest accomplished? To +build up, not to tear down, should be the object of the scientific +anarch. Stop! You need not say the earth has to be levelled and ploughed +before sowing the seed. That suits turnip fields, not the garden of +humanity. Educate the downtrodden into liberty, is my message, not the +slaughtering of monarchs. How am I going to go about it? Ah! that's my +affair, my dear sir. After I read a certain book by Tolstoy, I realized +that art was as potent an agent for mischief as the knout. Music--music +is rooted in sex; it works miracles of evil--" + +"Now, uncle, I won't hear a word against Chopin," said Mila, looking +toward Gerald for approval. + +"Music, Mila, in the hands of evil men is an instrument dangerous to +religion, to civilization. What of Illowski and his crazy attack on +Paris and St. Petersburg? You remember, Shannon! Leave Wagner out of the +question--there is no fusion of the arts in his music drama--only bad +verse, foolish librettos, dealing with monsters and gods, and +indifferent scene-painting. Moreover, this new music is not understood +by the world. Even if the whole of mankind could be assembled on the +roof of the world and at a preconcerted signal made to howl the +Marseillaise, it would not be educated to the heights I imagine. Stage +plays--Shakespeare has no message for our days; Ibsen is an +anarchist--he believes in placing the torpedo under the social ark. +Painting--it is an affair for state galleries and the cabinets of +wealthy amateurs. Literature is a dead art--every one writes and reads +and no one understands. Religion! Ah! Yes, religion; the world will be a +blackened cinder or cometary gas before the love of God is stamped from +its heart. But religion and art must go hand in hand. Divorced, art has +fallen into the Slough of Despond; else has been transformed into an +acrid poison wherewith men's souls are destroyed as if by a virulent +absinthe. United with religion, art is purified. All art sprang from +religion. All great art, from a Greek statue to a Gothic cathedral, from +a Bach fugue to Michael Angelo, was religious. Therefore, if we are to +reach the hearts of the people, we must make art the handmaid of +religion." He stopped for breath. Gerald interposed:-- + +"But, dear prince, you say 'art.' What art--painting, sculpture, +architecture, music, poetry, drama--?" + +"One art," harshly cried the now excited man, as he pounded the table +with his hard fist. "One art, _my_ art, the fusion of all the arts. I, +Prince Igorovitch Karospina, tell you that I have discovered the secret +of the arts never dreamed of by Wagner and his futile, painted music on +a painted stage; I have gone, not to art, but to nature--colour, fire, +the elements. The eye is keener than the ear, vision is easier +comprehended than tone. Ah! I have you interested at last." + +He began walking as if to overtake a missing idea. His niece watched him +cynically. + +"I fear you are boring Mr. Shannon," she said in her most birdlike +accents. Her uncle turned on her. + +"I don't care if I am. Go to bed! I am nearing the climax of a lifetime, +and I feel that I must talk to a sympathetic ear. You are not bored, +dear friend. I have pondered this matter for more than thirty years. I +have studied all the arts--painting particularly; and with colour, with +colourful design I mean to teach mankind the great lessons of the +masters and of religion." + +"Ah, you will exhibit in large halls, panoramic pictures, I suppose," +interrupted Shannon. + +"Nothing of the sort," was the testy reply. "For thousands of years the +world has been gazing upon dead stones and canvases, reading dead words. +Dead--all, I tell you, all of these arts. And painting is only in two +dimensions--a poor copy of nature. The theatre has its possibilities, +but is too restricted in space. Music is alive. It moves; but its +message is not articulate to _all_. I want an art that will be +understood and admired at a glance by the world from pole to pole. I +want an art that will live and move and tell a noble tale. I want an art +that will appeal to the eye by its colouring and the soul by its +beautiful designs. Where is that legend-laden art? Hitherto it has not +existed. I have found it. I have tracked it down until I am the master +who by a touch can liberate elemental forces, which will not destroy, +like those of Illowski's, but will elevate the soul and make mankind one +great nation, one loving brotherhood. Ah! to open once more those doors +of faith closed by the imperious dogmas of science--open them upon a +lovely land of mystery. Mankind must have mystery. And beyond each +mystery lies another. This will be our new religion." + +Gerald had caught the enthusiasm of this swelling prologue and rose, his +face alight with curiosity. + +"And that art is--is--?" he stammered. + +"That art is--pyrotechny." It was too much for the young man's nerves, +and he fell back in his chair, purple with suppressed laughter. Angrily +darting at him and catching his left shoulder in a vicelike grip, +Karospina growled: + +"You fool, how dare you mock something you know nothing of?" He shook +his guest roughly. + +"Uncle, uncle, be patient! Tell Mr. Shannon, and he, too, will become a +believer. I believe in you. I believe in him, Mr. Shannon. Don't sneer! +Tell him, uncle." Mila's words, almost imploring in their tone, calmed +the infuriated inventor, who left the room. He reentered in a moment, +his head dripping, and he was grinning broadly. + +"Whenever I encounter a refractory pattern in my fireworks--as you call +them--I am compelled to throw a bucket of water over it to quench its +too ardent spirits. I have just done the same to my own head, dear Mr. +Shannon, and I ask your pardon for my rudeness. Get some fresh tea, +Mila, strong tea, Mila." Pipes were relighted and the conversation +resumed. + +"I forgot in my obsession, in what Jacob Boehme calls 'the shudder of +divine excitement,' that I was talking to one of the uninitiated. I +suppose you think by pyrotechny I mean the old-fashioned methods of set +pieces, ghastly portraits in fire, big, spouting wheels, rockets, war +scenes from contemporary history, seaside stuff, badly done--and flowery +squibs. My boy, all that, still admired by our country cousins, is the +very infancy of my art. In China, where nearly everything was invented +ages ago, in China I learned the first principles, also the +possibilities of the art of fireworks; yes, call it by its humble title. +In China I have seen surprising things at night. Pagodas blown across +the sky, an army of elephants in pursuit, and all bathed in the most +divine hues imaginable. But their art suffers from convention. They +accomplish miracles considering the medium they work in--largely +gunpowder. And their art has no meaning, no message, no moral principle, +no soul. Years ago I discovered all the aids necessary to the +pyrotechnist. I am not a chemist for nothing. If I can paint a fair +imitation of a Claude Monet on canvas, I can also produce for you a +colourless gas which, when handled by a virtuoso, produces astonishing +illusions. In the open air, against the dark background of the horizon, +I can show you the luminous dots planewise of the Impressionists; or I +can give you the broad, sabrelike brushwork of Velasquez, or the +imperial tintings of Titian. I can paint pictures on the sky. I can +produce blazing symphonies. I will prove to you that colour is also +music. This sounds as if I were a victim to that lesion of the brain +called 'coloured-audition.' Perhaps! Not Helmholtz or Chevreul can tell +me anything new in the science of optics. I am the possessor of the +rainbow secrets--for somewhere in Iceland, a runic legend runs, there is +a region vast as night, where all the rainbows--worn out or to be +used--drift about in their vapoury limbo. I have the key to this land of +dreams. Over the earth I shall float my rainbows of art like a flock of +angels. With them I propose to dazzle the eyes of mankind, to arouse +sleeping souls. From the chords of the combined arts I shall extort +nobler cadences, nobler rhythms, for men to live by, for men to die +for!" + +Shannon was impressed. Through the smoke of his host's discourse he +discovered genuine fire. The philosopher took his hand and led him to +the window. + +"Stand there a moment!" he adjured. Mila joined him and after turning +the lamp to a pin-head of light, their shoulders touching--for the +window was narrow--they peered into the night. They were on the side of +the water. Suddenly Gerald exclaimed:-- + +"What's that light out at sea--far out? It looks like the moon!" + +"It is the sun," coolly replied his companion. They saw arise from the +waters a majestic, glowing sphere of light, apparently the size of the +sun. It flooded the country with its glare, and after sailing nearly in +front of the house it shrank into a scarlet cross not larger than a +man's hand. Then in a shower of sparks it ceased, its absence making the +blackness almost corporeal. Instinctively the hands of the two indulged +in a long pressure, and Mila quickly adjusted the lamp. But Gerald still +stood at the window a prey to astonishment, terror, stupefaction. + +Karospina entered. His face was slightly flushed and in his eyes there +burned the sombre fire of the fanatic. Triumphantly he regarded his +young friend. + +"That was only a little superfluous gas--nothing I cared to show you. +Read the newspapers to-morrow, and you will learn that a big meteor +burst off the north coast the night before, and fell into the sea." Then +he moved closer and whispered:-- + +"The time is at hand. Within three weeks--not later than the middle of +October--I shall make my first public test. 'Thus saith the Lord God to +the mountains and to the hills, to the rivers and to the valleys: +Behold, I, _even_ I, will bring a sword upon you, and I will destroy +your high places.'" + +His voice rose in passion, his face worked in anger, and he shook his +clenched fists at an imaginary universe. So this man of peace was a +destroyer, after all! Gerald aroused him. Again he asked pardon. Mila +was nowhere to be seen, and with a sinking at the heart new to his +buoyant temperament, Gerald bade the magician good night. It was +arranged that he would leave the next day, for, like Milton, he was +haunted by "the ghost of a linen decency." But that night he did not +sleep, and no sound of music came to his ears from Mila's chamber. Once +he tried to open his window. It was nailed down. + +A gray day greeted his tired eyes. In an hour he was bidding his friends +good-by and thanking them for their hospitality. He had hoped that Mila +would accompany him a few steps on his long journey, but she made no +sign beyond a despairing look at her uncle, who was surly, as if he had +felt the reaction from too prolonged a debauch of the spirit. Gerald lit +his pipe, kissed the hand of Mila with emphasis, and parted from them. +He had not gone a hundred yards before he heard soft footsteps tracking +him. He turned and was disappointed to see that it was only Karospina, +who came up to him, breathing heavily, and in his catlike eyes the fixed +expression of monomania. He stuttered, waving his arms aloft. + +"The time is at hand and the end of all things shall be accomplished. +You shall return for the great night. You shall hear of it in the world. +Tell K. that I said _no!_ He must be with us at the transfiguration of +all things, when mankind shall go up the spiral road of perfection." + +Gerald Shannon fairly ran to escape knowing more about the universal +panacea. And when he turned for the last time the sea and tower and man +were blotted out by wavering mists of silver. + + +III + +THE FIERY CHARIOT + +The young man soon heard of Karospina's project. A week before the event +the newspapers began describing the experiments of the new Russian +wonder-worker, but treated the matter with calm journalistic +obliviousness to any but its most superficial aspects. A scientific +pyrotechnist was a novelty, particularly as the experimentings were to +be given with the aid of a newly discovered gas. Strange rumours of +human levitations, of flying machines seen after dark at unearthly +heights, were printed. This millionnaire, who had expended fortunes in +trying to accomplish what Maxim and Langley had failed in achieving, +was a good peg upon which to hang thrilling gossip. He promised to +convince the doubting ones that at last man would come into the empire +of the air, and by means of fireworks. In searching carefully all the +published reports Gerald was relieved not to encounter the name of Mila. + +That celebrated afternoon he found himself, after the distressingly +crowded cars, in company with many thousands, all clamouring and +jostling on the road to the tower. This time there were vehicles and +horses, though not in any degree commensurate with the crowd; but the +high tax imposed by the speculators gave him an opportunity of securing +a seat with a few others in a carriage drawn by four horses. Gingerly +they made their way down the narrow road--time was not gained, for the +packed mass of humans refused to separate. Fuming at the delay, he was +forced to console himself with smoking and listening to the stories told +of Karospina and his miracles. They were exaggerated. Karospina here, +Karospina there--the name of this modern magician was hummed everywhere +in the brisk October air. A little man who occupied the seat with +Shannon informed him that he knew some one who had worked for Karospina. +He declared that it was no uncommon sight for the conjurer--he was +usually called by that name--to float like a furled flag over his house +when the sun had set. Also he had been seen driving in the sky a span +of three fiery horses in a fiery chariot across the waters of the bay, +while sitting by his side was the star-crowned Woman of the Apocalypse +clothed with the sun and the moon under her feet. Gerald held his +counsel; but the grandeur of the spectacle he had witnessed still shook +his soul--if he had not been the victim of a hallucination! The journey +seemed endless. + +At last the strand came into view with the squat tower, the rusting +machinery, and the reservoir back of the house. There were, however, +changes in the scene. Within a quarter of a mile of the beach tents were +set and booths erected. Seemingly all the city had rushed to this place, +and the plain, with its swampy surfaces, was dotted by masses of noisy +men and women. Gerald, finding that approach to the house was impossible +from the land side, made a wide detour, and on reaching the shore he was +gratified to find it empty. The local constabulary, powerless to fight +off the mob near the house, had devoted their energies to clearing the +space about the gas retorts. After much bother, and only by telling his +name, did he pass the police cordon. Once inside, he rushed to the back +door and found, oh! great luck--Mila. Dressed in white, to his taste she +was angelic. He had great difficulty in keeping his arms pinioned to his +side; but his eyes shone with the truth beating at the bars of his +bosom, and Mila knew it. He felt this and was light-headed in his +happiness. + +They greeted. Mila's face wore a serious expression. + +"I'm very glad you have come down. I think uncle will be glad also. I am +_happy_ to see you again; I have missed you these past weeks. But my +happiness is nothing just now, Gerald! [He started.] My uncle, you must +speak with him. From brooding so much over the Holy Scriptures, and the +natural excitement of his discoveries--they are so extraordinary, dear +friend, that he means always to keep them to himself, for he rightly +believes that the governments of the world would employ them for wicked +purposes, war, the destruction of weaker nations--he has become +overwrought. You may not know it, he has a very strong, sane head on his +shoulders; but this scheme for lifting up the masses, I suspect, may +upset his own equilibrium. And his constant study of the Apocalypse and +the Hebraic revelations--it has filled him with strange notions. +Understand me: a man who can swim in the air like a fish in the sea is +apt to become unstrung. He has begun to identify himself with the +prophets. He insists on showing biblical pictures,--worse still, +appearing in them himself." + +"How 'appearing in them'?" asked Gerald, wonderingly. + +"In actual person. I, too, have promised to go with him." + +"In a transparency of fire, you mean? Isn't it dangerous?" She hung her +head. + +"No, in mid air, in a fiery chariot," she murmured. + +"The Woman of the Apocalypse!" he cried. "Oh! Princess Mila, dearest +Mila Georgovics, promise me that you will not risk such a crazy +experiment." Gerald pressed his fingers to his throbbing temples. + +"It is no experiment at all," she said, in almost inaudible tones; +_"last night we flew over the house."_ He stared at her, his hands +trembling, and no longer able to play the incredulous. + +"But, dear friend, I fear one other thing; the gas which uncle has +discovered is so tenuous that it is a million times lighter than air; +but it is ever at a terrible tension--I mean it is dangerous if not +carefully treated. Last summer, one afternoon, a valve broke and a large +quantity escaped from the reservoir, luckily on the ocean side. It +caused a storm and water-spouts, and destroyed a few vessels. The +coruscating gas creates a vacuum into which the air rushes with +incredible velocity. So promise me that while we are flying you will +stay with the police at the gas machines and keep off the crowd. +Promise!" + +"But I shan't permit you to go up with this renegade to the +revolutionary cause--" he began impetuously. She put warning fingers to +her lips. In the white flowing robes of an antique priest, Karospina +came out to them and took Gerald by the hand. He was abstracted and +haggard, and his eyes glared about him. He chanted in a monotone:-- + +"The time is at hand. Soon you will see the Angels of the Seals. I shall +show the multitude Death on the Pale Horse and the vision of Ezekiel. +And you shall behold the star called Wormwood, the great star of the +third angel, which shall fall like a burning lamp upon the waters and +turn them bitter. And at the last you will see the chariot of Elijah +caught up to heaven in a fiery whirlwind. In it will be seated the +Princess Mila--we, the conquerors of the wicked world." + +"Yes, but only as an image, an illusion," ejaculated the unhappy lover, +"not in reality." + +"As she is," imperiously answered Karospina, and seizing Mila by the +arm, said, "Come!" She threw a kiss to Gerald and in her eyes were +tears. He saw them and could have wept himself. He followed the +sacrificial pair as far as the reservoir, muttering warnings in which +were mixed the fates of Phaethon and Simon Magus--that heretic who +mimicked the miracles of the apostles. + + * * * * * + +It was now dark; the order to extinguish all lights on the moor had been +obeyed. Only a panting sound as if from a wilderness of frightened +animals betrayed the presence of thousands. As long as the sun shone +there had been a babel of sound; at the disappearance of our parent +planet, a hushed awe had fallen with the night. Gone the rude joking and +wrangling, the crying of children, and the shrill laughter of the women. +A bitter breeze swept across from the waters, and the stars were mere +twinkling points. + +Then from the vault of heaven darted a ribbon of emerald fire. It became +a luminous spiral when it touched the sea of glass, which was like unto +a floor of crystal. This was the sign of Karospina's undertaking, his +symbol of the road to moral perfection. Gerald recalled Whistler's +pyrotechnical extravaganzas. Following this came a pale moon which +emerged from the north; a second, a third, a fourth, started up from the +points of the compass, and after wabbling in the wind like gigantic +balloons, merged overhead in an indescribable disk which assumed the +features of Michael Angelo's Moses. Here is a new technique, indeed, +thought Gerald; yet he could not detect its moral values. + +A golden landscape was projected on land and sea. A central aisle of +waters, paved by the golden rays of a lyric sun high overhead, was +embellished on either side by the marmoreal splendours of stately +palaces. An ilex inclined its graceful head to its liquid image; men +moved the blocks that made famous in the mouth of the world Queen Dido's +Carthage. Clouds of pearl-coloured smoke encircled the enchanting +picture. And the galleys came and went in this symphonic, glittering +spectacle. + +"Turner would have died of envy," said Gerald aloud. There was a +remarkable vibration of life, not as he had seen it in mechanical +bioscopes, but the vivid life of earth and sunshine. + +The scenes that succeeded were many: episodes from profane and sacred +histories; simulacra of the great saints. A war between giants and +pygmies was shown with all its accompanying horrors. The firmament +dripped crimson. The four cryptic creatures of Ezekiel's vision came out +of the north, a great cloud of "infolding fire" and the colour was +amber. A cyclopean and dazzling staircase thronged by moving angelic +shapes, harping mute harps, stretched from sea to sky, melting into the +milky way like the tail of a starry serpent. Followed the opening of the +dread prophetic seals; but, after an angel had descended from heaven, +his face as the sun and at his feet pillars of fire, the people, +prostrate like stalks of corn beaten by a tempest, worshipped in fear. +These things were supernatural. The heavens were displaying the glory of +God. + +Not knowing whether the signs in the skies might be construed as +blasphemous, and lost in fathomless admiration for the marvellous power +of the wizard, Gerald sought to get closer to Karospina and Mila. But +wedged in by uniformed men, and the darkness thick as an Egyptian +plague, he despairingly awaited the apotheosis. His eyes were sated by +the miracles of harmonies--noiseless harmonies. It _was_ a new art, and +one for the peoples of the earth. Never had the hues of the universe +been so assembled, grouped, and modulated. And the human eye, adapting +itself to the new synthesis of arabesque and rhythm, evoked order and +symbolism from these novel chords of colour. There were solemn mountains +of opalescent fire which burst and faded into flaming colonnades, and in +an enchanting turquoise effervescence became starry spears and scimiters +and sparkling shields, and finally the whole mass would reunite and +evaporate into brilliant violet auroras or seven-tailed, +vermilion-coloured comets. There were gleaming rainbows of unknown +tints--strange scales of chromatic pigments; "a fiery snow without +wind;" and once a sun, twice the size of our own, fell into the ocean; +and Gerald could have sworn that he felt a wave of heated air as if from +a furnace; that he heard a seething sound, as if white-hot metal had +come in contact with icy water. Consumed by anxiety for Mila's safety, +he wished that these soundless girandoles, this apocalypse of +architectural fire and weaving flame, would end. + +He had not long to wait. A shrewd hissing apprised him that something +unusual was about to occur. Like the flight of a great rocket a black +object quickly mounted to the zenith. It did not become visible for +several seconds; Gerald's nerves crisped with apprehension. The +apparition was an incandescent chariot; in it sat Karospina, and beside +him--oh! the agony of her lover--Mila Georgovics. As the fiery horses +swooped down, he could see her face in a radiant nimbus of meteors, +which encircled the equipage. Karospina proudly directed its course over +the azure route, and once he passed Gerald at a dangerously low curve +earthward, shouting:-- + +"The Spiral! The Spiral!" + +It was his last utterance; possibly through some flaw in the mechanism, +the chariot zig-zagged and then drove straight upon the reservoir. To +the reverberation of smashed steel and blinding fulguration the big +sphere was split open and Mila with Karospina vanished in the nocturnal +gulf. + +Gerald, stunned by the catastrophe, threw himself down, expecting a +mighty explosion; the ebon darkness was appalling after the +scintillating rain of fire. But the liberated gas in the guise of an +elongated cloud had rushed seaward, and there gathering density and +strength, assumed the shape of a terrific funnel, an inky spiral, its +gyrating sides streaked with intermittent flashes. Its volcanic roaring +and rapid return to land was a signal for vain flight--the miserable +lover knew it to be the flamboyant ether of the pyromaniac transformed +into a trumpeting tornado. And he hoped that it would not spare him, as +this phantasm twirled and ululated in the heavens, a grim portent of the +iron wrath of the Almighty. In a twinkling it had passed him, high in +the dome of heaven, only to erase in a fabulous blast the moaning +multitude. And prone upon the strand between the stormy waters and the +field of muddy dead, Gerald Shannon prayed for a second cataclysm which +might bring oblivion to him alone. + + + + +VI + +A MOCK SUN + + Where are the sins of yester-year? + + +I + + +The grating of the carriage wheels awoke her from the dream which had +lightly brushed away the night and the vision of the Arc de +Triomphe--looming into the mystery of sky and stars, its monumental +flanks sprawling across the Place de l'Etoile. She heard her name called +by Mrs. Sheldam as their coachman guided his horses through the gateway +of the Princesse de Lancovani's palace. + +"Now, Ermentrude! Wake up, dear; we are there," said Mrs. Sheldam, in +her kind, drawling tones. Mr. Sheldam sighed and threw away the +unlighted cigar he had bitten during the ride along the Champs Elysees. +Whatever the evening meant for his wife and niece, he saw little +entertainment in store for himself; he did not speak French very well, +he disliked music and "tall talk"; all together he wished himself at the +Grand Hotel, where he would be sure to meet some jolly Americans. Their +carriage had halted in front of a spacious marble stairway, lined on +either side with palms, and though it was a June night, the glass doors +were closed. + +Ermentrude's heart was in her throat, not because of the splendour, to +which she was accustomed; but it was to be her first meeting with a +noble dame, whose name was historic, at whose feet the poets of the +Second Empire had prostrated themselves, passionately plucking their +lyres; the friend of Liszt, Wagner, Berlioz, of Manet, Degas, Monet; the +new school--this wonderful old woman knew them all, from Goncourt and +Flaubert to Daudet and Maupassant. Had she not, Ermentrude remembered as +she divested herself of her cloak, sent a famous romancer out of the +house because he spoke slightingly of the Pope? Had she not cut the +emperor dead when she saw him with a lady not his empress? What a night +this would be in the American girl's orderly existence! And _he_ was to +be there, he had promised the princess. + +Her heart was overflowing when she was graciously received by the great +lady who stood in the centre of a group at the back of the +drawing-room--a lofty apartment in white and gold, the panels painted by +Baudry, the furniture purest Empire. She noted the height and majestic +bearing of this cousin of kings, noted the aquiline nose drooped over a +contracted mouth--which could assume most winning curves, withal shaded +by suspicious down, that echoed in hue her inky eyebrows. The eyes of +the princess were small and green and her glance penetrating. Her white +hair rolled imperially from a high, narrow forehead. + +Ermentrude bore herself with the utmost composure. She adored the Old +World, adored genius, but after all she was an Adams of New Hampshire, +her sister the wife of a former ambassador. It was more curiosity than +_gaucherie_ that prompted her to hold the hand offered her and +scrutinize the features as if to evoke from the significant, etched +wrinkles the tremendous past of this hostess. The princess was pleased. + +"Ah, Miss Adams," she said, in idiomatic English, "you have candid eyes. +You make me feel like telling stories when you gaze at me so +appealingly. Don't be shocked"--the girl had coloured--"perhaps I shall, +after a while." + +Mr. Sheldam had slipped into a corner behind a very broad table and +under the shaded lamps examined some engravings. Mrs. Sheldam talked in +hesitating French to the Marquis de Potachre, an old fellow of venerable +and burlesque appearance. His fierce little white mustaches were curled +ceilingward, but his voice was as timid as honey. He flourished his +wizened hand toward Miss Adams. + +"Charming! Delightful! She has something English in her _insouciant_ +pose, and is wholly American in her cerebral quality. And what +colouring, what gorgeous brown hair! What a race, madame, is yours!" + +Mrs. Sheldam began to explain that the Adams stock was famous, but the +marquis did not heed her. He peered at her niece through a gold-rimmed +monocle. The princess had left the group near the table and with two +young men slowly moved down the salon. Miss Adams was immediately +surrounded by some antiquated gentlemen wearing orders, who paid her +compliments in the manner of the eighteenth century. She answered them +with composure, for she was sure of her French, sure of herself--the +princess had not annihilated her. Her aunt, accompanied by the marquis, +crossed to her, and the old nobleman amused her with his saturnine +remarks. + +"Time was," he said, "when one met here the cream of Parisian wit and +fashion: the great Flaubert, a noisy fellow at times, I vow; Dumas +_fils_; Cabanel, Gerome, Duran; ever-winning Carolus--ah, what men! Now +we get Polish pianists, crazy Belgians, anarchistic poets, and +Neo-impressionists. I have warned the princess again and again." + +"_Becasse!_" interrupted the lady herself. "Monsieur Rajewski has +consented to play a Chopin nocturne. And here are my two painters, Miss +Adams--Messieurs Bla and Maugre. They hate each other like the Jesuits +and Jansenists of the good old days of Pascal." + +"She likes to display her learning," grumbled the marquis to Mrs. +Sheldam. "That younger man, Bla, swears by divided tones; his neighbour, +Maugre, paints in dots. One is always to be recognized a half-mile away +by his vibrating waterscapes--he calls them Symphonies of the Wet; the +other goes in for turkeys in the grass, fowls that are cobalt-blue +daubs, with grass a scarlet. It's awful on the optic nerves. +_Pointillisme_, Maugre names his stuff. Now, give me Corot--" + +"Hush, hush!" came in energetic sibilants from the princess, who rapped +with her Japanese walking-stick for silence. Mr. Sheldam woke up and +fumbled the pictures as Rajewski, slowly bending his gold-dust aureole +until it almost grazed the keyboard, began with deliberate accents a +nocturne. Miss Adams knew his playing well, but its poetry was not for +her this evening; rather did the veiled tones of the instrument form a +misty background to the human tableau. So must Chopin have woven his +magic last century, and in a salon like this--the wax candles burning +with majestic steadiness in the sculptured sconces; the huge fireplace, +monumental in design, with its dull brass garnishing; the subdued +richness of the decoration into which fitted, as figures in a frame, the +various guests. Even the waxed floor seemed to take on new +reverberations as the pianoforte sounded the sweet despair of the Pole. +To her dismay Ermentrude caught herself drifting away from the moment's +hazy charm to thoughts of her poet. It annoyed her, she sharply +reminded herself, that she could not absolutely saturate herself with +the music and the manifold souvenirs of the old hotel; perhaps this may +have been the spell of Rajewski's playing.... + +The music ceased. A dry voice whispered in her ear:-- + +"Great artist, that chap Rajewski. Had to leave Russia once because he +wouldn't play the Russian national hymn for the Czar. Bless me, but he +was almost sent to Siberia--and in irons too. Told me here in this very +room that he was much frightened. They lighted fires in Poland to honour +his patriotism. He acknowledged that _he_ would have played twenty +national hymns, but he couldn't remember the Russian one, or never knew +it--anyhow, he was christened a patriot, and all by a slip of the +memory. Now, that's luck, isn't it?" + +She began to dislike this cynical old man with his depreciating tales of +genius. She knew that her idols often tottered on clay feet, but she +hated to be reminded of that disagreeable reality. She went to Monsieur +Rajewski and thanked him prettily in her cool new voice, and again the +princess nodded approval. + +"She is _chic_, your little girl," she confided in her deep tones to +Mrs. Sheldam, whose tired New England face almost beamed at the +compliment. + +"We were in Hamburg at the Zooelogical Garden; I always go to see +animals," declaimed the princess, in the midst of a thick silence. "For +you know, my friends, one studies humanity there in the raw. Well, I +dragged our party to the large monkey cage, and we enjoyed +ourselves--immensely! And what do you think we saw! A genuine novelty. +Some mischievous sailor had given an overgrown ape a mirror, and the +poor wretch spent its time staring at its image, neglecting its food and +snarling at its companions. The beast would catch the reflection of +another ape in the glass and quickly bound to a more remote perch. The +keeper told me that for a week his charge had barely eaten. It slept +with the mirror held tightly in its paws. Now, what did the mirror mean +to the animal! I believe"--here she became very vivacious--"I really +believe that it was developing self-consciousness, and in time it would +become human. On our way back from Heligoland, where we were entertained +on the emperor's yacht at the naval manoeuvres, we paid another visit to +our monkey house. The poor, misguided brute had died of starvation. It +had become so vain, so egotistical, so superior, that it refused food +and wasted away in a corner, gazing at itself, a hairy Narcissus, or +rather the perfect type of your modern Superman, who contemplates his +ego until his brain sickens and he dies quite mad." + +Every one laughed. Mrs. Sheldam wondered what a Superman was, and +Ermentrude felt annoyed. Zarathustra was another of her gods, and this +brusquely related anecdote did not seem to her very spirituelle. But +she had not formulated an answer when she heard a name announced, a name +that set her heart beating. At last! The poet had kept his word. She was +to meet in the flesh the man whose too few books were her bibles of art, +of philosophy, of all that stood for aspiration toward a lovely ideal in +a dull, matter-of-fact world. + +"Now," said the princess, as if smiling at some hidden joke, "now you +will meet _my_ Superman." And she led the young American girl to Octave +Keroulan and his wife, and, after greeting them in her masculine manner, +she burst forth:-- + +"Dear poet! here is one of your adorers from overseas. Guard your +husband well, Madame Lys." + +So he was married. Well, that was not such a shocking fact. Nor was +Madame Keroulan either--a very tall, slim, English-looking blonde, who +dressed modishly and evidently knew that she was the wife of a famous +man. Ermentrude found her insipid; she had studied her face first before +comparing the mental photograph of the poet with the original. Nor did +she feel, with unconscious sex rivalry, any sense of inferiority to the +wife of her admired one. He was nearly forty, but he looked older; gray +hairs tinged his finely modelled head. His face was shaven, and with the +bulging brow and full jaw he was more of the German or Belgian than +French. Black hair thrown off his broad forehead accented this +resemblance; a composer rather than a prose-poet and dramatist, was the +rapid verdict of Ermentrude. She was not disappointed, though she had +expected a more fragile type. The weaver of moonshine, of mystic +phrases, of sweet gestures and veiled sonorities should not have worn +the guise of one who ate three meals a day and slept soundly after his +mellow incantations. Yet she was not--inheriting, as she did, a modicum +of sense from her father--disappointed. + +The conversation did not move more briskly with the entrance of the +Keroulans. The marquis sullenly gossiped with Mr. Sheldam; the princess +withdrew herself to the far end of the room with her two painters. +Rajewski was going to a _soiree_, he informed them, where he would play +before a new picture by Carriere, as it was slowly undraped; no one less +in rank than a duchess would be present! A little stiffly, Ermentrude +Adams assured the Keroulans of her pleasure in meeting them. The poet +took it as a matter of course, simply, without a suspicion of posed +grandeur. Ermentrude saw this with satisfaction. If he had clay +feet,--and he must have them; all men do,--at least he wore his genius +with a sense of its responsibility. She held tightly her hands and +leaned back, awaiting the precious moment when the oracle would speak, +when this modern magician of art would display his cunning. But he was +fatuously commonplace in his remarks. + +"I have often told Madame Keroulan that my successes in Europe do not +appeal to me as those in far-away America. Dear America--how it must +enjoy a breath of real literature!" + +Mrs. Sheldam sat up primly, and Ermentrude was vastly amused. With a +flash of fun she replied:-- + +"Yes, America does, Monsieur Keroulan. We have so many Europeans over +there now that our standard has fallen off from the days of Emerson and +Whitman. And didn't America give Europe Poe?" She knew that this boast +had the ring of the amateur, but it pleased her to see how it startled +him. + +"America is the Great Bribe," he pursued. "You have no artists in New +York." + +"Nor have we New Yorkers," the girl retorted. "The original writing +natives live in Europe." + +He looked puzzled, but did not stop. "You have depressed literature to +the point of publication," he solemnly asserted. This was too much and +she laughed in mockery. Husband and wife joined her, while Mrs. Sheldam +trembled at the audacity of her niece--whose irony was as much lost on +her as it was on the poet. + +"But _you_ publish plays and books, do you not?" Ermentrude naively +asked. + +Madame Keroulan interposed in icy tones:-- + +"Mademoiselle Adams misunderstands. Monsieur Keroulan is the Grand +Disdainer. Like his bosom friend, Monsieur Mallarme, he cares little for +the Philistine public--" + +He interrupted her: "Lys, dear friend, you must not bore Miss Adams with +my theories of art and life. _She_ has read me--" + +Ermentrude gave him a grateful glance. He seemed, despite his +self-consciousness, a great man--how great she could not exactly define. +His eyes--two black diamonds full of golden reflections, the eyes of a +conqueror, a seer--began to burn little bright spots into her +consciousness, and, selfishly, she admitted, she wished the two women +would go away and leave her to interrogate her idol in peace. There were +so many things to ask him, so many difficult passages in The Golden +Glaze and Hesitations, above all in that great dramatic poem, The +Voices, which she had witnessed in Paris, with its mystic atmosphere of +pity and terror. She would never forget her complex feelings, when at a +Paris theatre, she saw slowly file before her in a Dream-Masque the +wraith-like figures of the poet, their voices their only corporeal gift. +Picture had dissolved into picture, and in the vapours of these crooning +enchantments she heard voices of various timbres enunciating in +monosyllables the wisdom of the ages, the poetry of the future. This +play was, for her, and for Paris, too, the last word in dramatic art, +the supreme _nuance_ of beauty. Everything had been accomplished: +Shakespeare, Moliere, Ibsen; yet here was a new evocation, a fresh peep +at untrodden paths. In bliss that almost dissolved her being, the +emotional American girl reached her hotel, where she tried to sleep. +When her aunt told her of the invitation tendered by the princess, a +rare one socially, she was in the ninth heaven of the Swedenborgians. +Any place to meet Octave Keroulan! + +And now he sat near her signalling, she knew, her sympathies, and as the +fates would have it two dragons, her aunt and his wife, guarded the +gateway to the precious garden of his imagination. She could have cried +aloud her chagrin. Such an inestimable treasure was genius that to see +it under lock and key invited indignation. The time was running on, and +her great man had said nothing. He could, if he wished, give her a +million extraordinary glimpses of the earth and the air and the waters +below them, for his eyes were mirrors of his marvellous and +many-coloured soul; but what chance had he with a conjugal iceberg on +one side, a cloud of smoke--poor Aunt Sheldam--on the other! She felt in +her fine, rhapsodic way like a young priestess before the altar, ready +to touch with a live coal the lips of the gods, but withheld by a +malignant power. For the first time in her life Ermentrude Adams, +delicately nurtured in a social hothouse, realized in wrath the major +tyranny of caste. + +The evening wore away. Mrs. Sheldam aroused her husband as she cast a +horrified glance at the classic prints he had been studying. The +princess dismissed her two impressionists and came over to the poet. +She, too plainly, did not care for his wife, and as the party broke up +there was a sense of relief, though Ermentrude could not conceal her +dissatisfaction. Her joy was sincere when Madame Keroulan asked Miss +Adams and her aunt to call. It was slightly gelid, the invitation, +though accepted immediately by Ermentrude. The _convenances_ could look +out for themselves; she would not go back to America without an +interview. The princess raised her hand mockingly. + +"What, I go to one of your conferences! Not I, _cher poete_. Keep your +mysteries for your youthful disciples." She looked at Ermentrude, who +did not lower her eyes--she was triumphant now. Perhaps _he_ might say +something before they parted. He did not, but the princess did. + +"Beware, young America, of my Superman! You remember the story of the +ape with the mirror!" + +Ermentrude flushed with mortification. This princess was decidedly rude +at times. But she kept her temper and thanked the lady for a unique +evening. Her exquisite youth and grace pleased the terrible old woman, +who then varied her warning. + +"Beware," she called out in comical accents as they slowly descended the +naked marble staircase, "of the Sleeping Princess!" + +The American girl looked over her shoulder. + +"I don't think your Superman has a mirror at all." + +"Yes, but his princess holds one for him!" was the jesting reply. + +The carriage door slammed. They rolled homeward, and Ermentrude suffered +from a desperate sense of the unachieved. The princess had been +impertinent, the Keroulans rather banal. Mrs. Sheldam watched her +charge's face in the intermittent lights of the Rue de Rivoli. + +"I think your poet a bore," she essayed. Then she shook her +husband--they had reached their hotel. + + +II + +It was the garden of a poet, she declared, as, with the Keroulans and +her aunt, Ermentrude sat and slowly fanned herself, watching the Bois de +Boulogne, which foamed like a cascade of green opposite this pretty +little house in Neuilly. The day was warm and the drive, despite the +shaded, watered avenues, a dusty, fatiguing one. Mrs. Sheldam had, +doubtfully, it is true, suggested the bourgeois comfort of the +Metropolitain, but she was frowned on by her enthusiastic niece. What! +ride underground in such weather? So they arrived at the poet's not in +the best of humour, for Mrs. Sheldam had quietly chidden her charge on +the score of her "flightiness." These foreign celebrities were well +enough in their way, but--! And now Ermentrude, instead of looking +Octave Keroulan in the face, preferred the vista of the pale blue sky, +awash with a scattered, fleecy white cloud, the rolling edges of which +echoed the dazzling sunshine. The garden was not large, its few trees +were of ample girth, and their shadows most satisfying to eyes weary of +the city's bright, hard surfaces. There were no sentimental plaster +casts to disturb the soft harmonies of this walled-in retreat, and if +Ermentrude preferred to regard with obstinacy unusual in her mobile +temperament the picture of Paris below them, it was because she felt +that Keroulan was literally staring at her. + +A few moments after their arrival and with the advent of tea, he had +accomplished what she had fervently wished for the night she had met +him--he succeeded, by several easy moves, in isolating her from her +aunt, and, notwithstanding her admiration, her desire to tap with her +knuckles the metal of her idol and listen for a ring of hollowness, she +was alarmed. Yet, perversely, she knew that he would not exhibit his +paces before his wife--naturally a disinterested spectator--or before +her aunt, who was hardly "intimate" enough. The long-desired hour found +her disquieted. She did not have many moments to analyze these mixed +emotions, for he spoke, and his voice was agreeably modulated. + +"You, indeed, honour the poor poet's abode with your youth and your +responsive soul, Miss Adams. I thank you, though my gratitude will seem +as poor as my hospitality." She looked at him now, a little fluttered. +"You bring to me across seas the homage of a fresh nation, a fresh +nature." She beat a mental retreat at these calm, confident phrases; +what could he know of her homage? "And if Amiel has said, 'Un paysage +est un etat de l'ame,' I may amend it by calling _my_ soul a state of +landscape, since it has been visited by your image." This was more +reassuring, if exuberant. + +"Man is mere inert matter when born, but his soul is his own work. +Hence, I assert: the Creator of man is--man." _Now_ she felt at ease. +This wisdom, hewn from the vast quarry of his genius, she had +encountered before in his Golden Glaze, that book which had built +temples of worship in America wherein men and women sought and found the +pabulum for living beautifully. He was "talking" his book. Why not? It +was certainly delightful plagiarism! + +"You know, dear young lady," he continued, and his eyes, with their +contracting and expanding disks, held her attention like a clear flame, +"do you know that my plays, my books, are but the drama of my conscience +exteriorized? Out of the reservoirs of my soul I draw my inspiration. I +have an aesthetic horror of evidence; like Renan, I loathe the deadly +heresy of affirmation; I have the certitude of doubt, for are we poets +not the lovers of the truth decorated? When I built my lordly palace of +art, it was not with the ugly durability of marble. No; like the +Mohammedan who constructed his mosque and mingled with the cement +sweet-smelling musk, so I dreamed my mosque into existence with music +wedded to philosophy. Music and philosophy are the twin edges of my +sword. Ah! you smile and ask, Where is Woman in this sanctuary? She is +not barred, I assure you. My music--is Woman. Beauty is a promise of +happiness, Stendhal says. I go further: Life--the woman one has; +Art--the woman one loves!" + +She was startled. Her aunt and Madame Keroulan had retired to the end of +the garden, and only a big bee, brumming overhead, was near. He had +arisen with the pontifical air of a man who has a weighty gospel to +expound. He encircled with his potent personality the imagination of his +listener; the hypnotic quality of his written word was carried leagues +farther in effect by his trained, soothing voice. Flattered, no longer +frightened, her nerves deliciously assaulted by this coloured rhetoric, +Ermentrude yielded her intellectual assent. She did not comprehend. She +felt only the rhythms of his speech, as sound swallowed sense. He held +her captive with a pause, and his eloquent eyes--they were of an +extraordinary lustre--completed the subjugation of her will. + +"Only kissed hands are white," he murmured, and suddenly she felt a +velvety kiss on her left hand. Ermentrude did not pretend to follow the +words of her aunt and Madame Keroulan as they stopped before a bed of +June roses. Nor did she remember how she reached the pair. The one vivid +reality of her life was the cruel act of her idol. She was not conscious +of blushing, nor did she feel that she had grown pale. His wife treated +her with impartial indifference, at times a smile crossing her face, +with its implication--to Ermentrude--of selfish reserves. But this +hateful smile cut her to the soul--one more prisoner at his chariot +wheels, it proclaimed! Keroulan was as unconcerned as if he had written +a poetic line. He had expected more of an outburst, more of a rebuff; +the absolute snapping of the web he had spun surprised him. His choicest +music had been spread for the eternal banquet, but the invited one +tarried. Very well! If not to-day, to-morrow! He repeated a verse of +Verlaine, and with his wife dutifully at his side bowed to the two +Americans and told them of the pleasure experienced. Ermentrude, her +candid eyes now reproachful and suspicious, did not flinch as she took +his hand--it seemed to melt in hers--but her farewell was conventional. +In the street, before they seated themselves in their carriage, Mrs. +Sheldam shook her head. + +"Oh, my dear! What a woman! What a man! I have _such_ a story to tell +you. No wonder you admire these people. The wife is a genius--isn't she +handsome?--but the man--he is an angel!" + +"I didn't see his wings, auntie," was the curt reply. + + +III + +The Sheldams always stayed at the same hotel during their annual visits +to Paris. It was an old-fashioned house with an entrance in the Rue +Saint-Honore and another in the Rue de Rivoli. The girl sat on a small +balcony from which she could view the Tuileries Gardens without turning +her head; while looking farther westward she saw the Place de la +Concorde, its windy spaces a chessboard for rapid vehicles, whose +wheels, wet from the watered streets, ground out silvery fire in the +sun-rays of this gay June afternoon. Where the Avenue des Champs Elysees +began, a powdery haze enveloped the equipages, overblown with their +summer toilets, all speeding to Longchamps. It was racing day, and +Ermentrude, feigning a headache, had insisted that her uncle and aunt go +to the meeting. It would amuse them, she knew, and she wished to be +alone. Nearly a week had passed since the visit to Neuilly, and she had +been afraid to ask her aunt what Madame Keroulan had imparted to +her--afraid and also too proud. Her sensibility had been grievously +wounded by the plainly expressed feelings of Octave Keroulan. She had +reviewed without prejudice his behaviour, and she could not set down to +mere Latin gallantry either his words or his action. No, there was too +much intensity in both,--ah, how she rebelled at the brutal +disillusionment!--and there were, she argued, method and sequence in his +approach and attack. If she had been the average coquetting creature, +the offence might not have been so mortal. But, so she told herself +again and again,--as if to frighten away lurking darker thoughts, ready +to spring out and devour her good resolutions,--she had worshipped her +idol with reservations. His poetry, his philosophy, were so inextricably +blended that they smote her nerves like the impact of some bright +perfume, some sharp chord of modern music. Dangerously she had filed at +her emotions in the service of culture and she was now paying the +penalty for her ardent confidence. His ideas, vocal with golden +meanings, were never meant to be translated into the vernacular of life, +never to be transposed from higher to lower levels; this base betrayal +of his ideals she felt Keroulan had committed. Had he not said that love +should be like "un baiser sur un miroir"? Was he, after all, what the +princess had called him? And was he only a mock sun swimming in a +firmament of glories which he could have outshone? + +A servant knocked and, not receiving a response, entered with a letter. +The superscription was strange. She opened and read:-- + + DEAR AND TENDER CHILD: I know you were angry with me when + we parted. I am awaiting here below your answer to come to you and + bare my heart. Say yes! + +"Is the gentleman downstairs?" she asked. The servant bowed. The blood +in her head buzzing, she nodded, and the man disappeared. Standing there +in the bright summer light, Ermentrude Adams saw her face in the oval +glass, above the fireplace, saw its pallor, the strained expression of +the eyes, and like a drowning person she made a swift inventory of her +life, and, with the insane hope of one about to be swallowed up by the +waters, she grasped at a solitary straw. Let him come; she would have an +explanation from him! The torture of doubt might then be brought to an +end.... + +Some one glided into the apartment. Turning quickly, Ermentrude +recognized Madame Keroulan. Before she could orient herself that lady +took her by both hands, and uttering apologetic words, forced the amazed +girl into a chair. + +"Don't be frightened, dear young lady. I am not here to judge, but to +explain. Yes, I know my husband loves you. But do not believe in him. He +is a _terrific_ man." This word she emphasized as if doubtful of its +meaning. "Ah, if you but knew the inferno of my existence! There are so +many like you--stop, do not leave! You are not to blame. I, Lillias +Keroulan, do not censure your action. My husband is an evil man and a +charlatan. Hear me out! He has only the gift of words. He steals all his +profundities of art from dead philosophers. He is not a genuine poet. He +is not a dramatist. I swear to you that he is now the butt of artistic +Paris. The Princesse de Lancovani made him--she is another of his sort. +He _was_ the mode; now he is desperate because his day has passed. He +knows you are rich. He desires your money, not _you_. I discovered that +he was coming here this day. Oh, I am cleverer than he. I followed. Here +I am to save you from him--and from yourself--he is not now below in the +salon." + +"Please go away!" indignantly answered Ermentrude. She was furious at +this horrible, plain-spoken, jealous creature. Save her from herself--as +if ever she had wavered! The disinterested adoration she had entertained +for the great artist--what a hideous ending was this! The tall, blond +woman with the narrow, light blue eyes watched the girl. How could any +one call her handsome, Ermentrude wondered! Then her visitor noticed the +crumpled letter on the table. With a gesture of triumph she secured it +and smiling her superior smile she left, closing the door softly behind +her. + +Only kissed hands are white! Ermentrude threw herself on the couch, her +cheeks burning, her heart tugging in her bosom like a ship impatient at +its anchorage. And was this the sordid end of a beautiful dream?... + +"Do you know, dearest, we have had such news!" exclaimed Mrs. Sheldam as +she entered, and so charged with her happiness that she did not notice +the drawn features of her niece. "Charlie, Charlie will be here some +time next week. He arrives at Havre. He has just cabled his father. Let +us go down to meet the boy." Charlie was the only son of the Sheldams +and fonder of his cousin than she dare tell herself. She burst into +tears, which greatly pleased her aunt. + +In the train, eight days later, Ermentrude sat speechless in company +with her aunt and uncle. But as the train approached Havre she +remembered something. + +"Aunt Clara," she bravely asked, "do you recall the afternoon we spent +at the Keroulans'? What did Madame Keroulan tell you then? Is it a +secret?" She held tightly clenched in her hand the arm-rest at the side +of the compartment. + +"Oh, dear, no! The madame was very chatty, very communicative. It's +funny I've not told you before. She confessed that she was the happiest +woman on earth; not only was she married to a grand genius,--for the +life of me I can't see where _that_ comes in!--but he was a good man +into the bargain. It appears that his life is made weary by women who +pester him with their attentions. Even our princess--yes, _the_ +princess; isn't it shocking?--was a perfect nuisance until Mr. Keroulan +assured her that, though he owed much of his success in the world to +her, yet he would never betray the trust reposed in him by his wife. +What's the matter, dear, does the motion of the car affect you? It +_does_ rock! And _he_ shows her all the letters he gets from silly women +admirers--oh, these foreign women and their queer ways! And he tells her +the way they make up to him when he meets them in society." + +Ermentrude shivered. The princess also! And with all her warning about +the Superman! Now she understood. Then she took the hand of Mrs. +Sheldam, and, stroking it, whispered:-- + +"Auntie, I'm so glad I am going to Havre, going to see Charlie soon." +The lids of her eyes were wet. Mrs. Sheldam had never been so motherly. + +"You _are_ a darling!" she answered, as she squeezed Ermentrude's arm. +"But there is some one who doesn't seem to care much for Havre." She +pointed out Mr. Sheldam, who, oblivious of picturesque Normandy through +which the train was speeding, slept serenely. Ermentrude envied him his +repose. He had never stared into the maddening mirror which turned poets +into Supermen and--sometimes monsters. Had she herself not gazed into +this distorting glass? The tune of her life had never sounded so +discouragingly faint and inutile. Perhaps she did not posses the higher +qualities that could extort from a nature so rich and various as Octave +Keroulan's its noblest music! Perhaps his wife had told the truth to +Mrs. Sheldam and had lied to her! And then, through a merciful mist of +tears, Ermentrude saw Havre, saw her future. + + + + +VII + +ANTICHRIST + + To wring from man's tongue the denial of his existence is proof of + Satan's greatest power.--PERE RAVIGNAN. + + +The most learned man and the most lovable it has been my good fortune to +know is Monsignor Anatole O'Bourke--alas! I should write, was, for his +noble soul is gathered to God. I met him in Paris, when I was a music +student. He sat next to me at a Pasdeloup concert in the Cirque d'Hiver, +how many years ago I do not care to say. A casual exclamation betrayed +my nationality, and during the intermission we drifted into easy +conversation. Within five minutes he held me enthralled, did this +big-souled, large-brained Irishman from the County Tipperary. We +discussed the programme--a new symphonic poem by Rimski-Korsakoff, +Sadko, had been alternately hissed and cheered--and I soon learned that +my companion mourned a French mother and rejoiced in the loving presence +of a very Celtic father. From the former he must have inherited his +vigorous, logical intellect; the latter had evidently endowed him with a +robust, jovial temperament, coupled with a wonderful perception of +things mystical. + +After the concert we walked slowly along the line of the boulevards. It +was early May, and the wheel of green which we traversed, together with +the brilliant picture made by the crowds, put us both in a happy temper. +It was not long before Monsignor heard the confession of my ideals. He +smiled quickly when I raved of music, but the moment I drifted into the +theme of mysticism--the transposition is ever an easy one--I saw his +interest leap to meet mine. + +"So, you have read St. John of the Cross?" I nodded my head. + +"And St. Teresa, that marvellous woman? The Americans puzzle me," he +continued. "You are the most practical people on the globe and yet the +most idealistic. When I hear of a new religion, I am morally certain +that it is evolved in America." + +"A new religion!" I started. This phrase had often assailed me, both in +print and in the depths of my imagination. He divined my thought--ah! he +was a wonder-worker in the way he noted a passing _nuance_. + +"When we wear out the old one, it will be time for a new religion," he +blandly announced; "you Americans, because of your new mechanical +inventions, fancy you have free entry into the domain of the spiritual. +But come, my dear young friend. Here is my hotel. Can't I invite you to +dinner?" We had reached the Boulevard Malsherbe and, as I was miles out +of my course, I consented. The priest fascinated me with his erudition, +which swam lightly on the crest of his talk. He was, so I discovered +during the evening, particularly well versed in the mystical writers, in +the writings of the Kabbalists and the books of the inspired Northman, +Swedenborg. As we sat drinking our coffee at one of the little tables in +the spacious courtyard, I revived the motive of a new religion. + +"Monsignor, have you ever speculated on the possible appearance of a +second Mahomet, a second Buddha? What if, from some Asiatic jungle, +there sallied out upon Europe a terrible ape-god, a Mongolian with +exotic eyes and the magnetism of a religious madman--" + +"You are speaking of Antichrist?" he calmly questioned. + +"Antichrist! Do you really believe in the Devil's Messiah?" + +"Believe, man! why, I have _seen_ him." + +I leaned back in my chair, wondering whether I should laugh or look +solemn. He noted my indecision, and his eyes twinkled--they were the +blue-gray of the Irish, the eyes of a seer or an amiable ironist. + +"Listen! but first let us get some strong cigars. Garcon!" As we smoked +our panatelas he related this history:-- + +"You ask me if I believe in an Antichrist, thereby betraying your +slender knowledge of the Scriptures--you will pardon the liberty! I may +refer you not only to John's Epistles, to the revelations of the +dreamer of Patmos, but to so many learned doctors of the faith that it +would take a week merely to enumerate the titles of their works all +bearing on the mysterious subject. Our Holy Mother the Church has held +aloof from any doctrinal pronouncements. The Antichrist has been +predicted for the past thousand years. I recall as a boy poring over the +map of the world which a friend of my mother had left with her. This +lady my father called 'the angel with the moulting wings,' because she +was always in an ecstatic tremor over the second coming of the Messiah. +She would go to the housetop at least once every six months, and there, +with a band of pious deluded geese dressed in white flowing robes, would +inspect the firmament for favourable signs. Nothing ever happened, as we +know, yet the predictions sown about the borders of that strange-looking +chart have in a measure come true. + +"There were the grimmest and most resounding quotations from the +Apocalypse. 'Babylon is fallen, is fallen!' hummed in my ears for many a +day. And the pale horse also haunted me. What would I have given to hear +the music of that 'voice from heaven, as the voice of many waters, and +as the voice of great thunder.' I mean the 'harpers harping with their +harps' the 'new song before the throne, before the four beasts and the +elders.' It is recorded that 'no man could learn that song but the +hundred and forty _and_ four thousand, which were redeemed from the +earth.' That is a goodly multitude. Let us hope we shall be of it. +Learned Sir Thomas Browne asked what songs the sirens sang. I prefer to +hear that wonderful 'harped' song. + +"But I wander. The fault lies in that wondrous map of the world, with +its pictured hordes of Russians sweeping down upon Europe and America +like a plague of locusts, the wicked unbaptized Antichrist at the head +of them, waving a cross held in reversed fashion. Don't ask me the +meaning of this crazy symbolism. The sect to which my mother's friend +belonged--God bless her, for she was a dear weak-minded lady--must have +set great store by these signs. I admit that as a boy they scared me. +Sitting here now, after forty years, I can still see those cryptograms. +However, to my tale. About ten years ago I was in Paris, and in my +capacity as Monsignor I had to attend a significant gathering at the +embassy of the Russian ambassador in this city of light." He waved his +left hand, from which I caught the purple fire of amethyst. + +"It was a notable affair, and I don't mind telling you now that it was +largely political. I had just returned from a secret mission at Rome, +and I was forced to mingle with diplomatic people. Prince Wronsky was +the representative of the Czar at that time in France, a charming man +with a flavour of _diablerie_ in his speech. He was a fervent Greek +Catholic, like most of his countrymen, and it pleased him to fence +mischievously with me on the various dogmas of our respective faiths. +He called himself _the_ Catholic; I was only a Roman Catholic. I told +him I was satisfied. + +"On this particular night he was rather agitated when I made my +salutations. He whispered to me that madame the princess had that very +day presented him with a son and heir. Naturally I congratulated him. +His restlessness increased as the evening wore on. At last he beckoned +to me--we were very old friends--to follow him into his library. There +he hesitated. + +"'I want you to do me a favour, an odd one; but as you are known to me +so long I venture to ask it. Do go upstairs and see my boy--' His tone +was that of entreaty. I smiled. + +"'Dear prince, I am, as a priest, hardly a judge of children. But if you +wish it--is there anything wrong with the little chap's health?' + +"'God forbid!' he ejaculated and piously crossed himself. We went to the +first _etage_ of his palace--he was gorgeously housed--and there he +said:-- + +"'Madame is in another wing of our apartments--go in here--the child is +attended by the nurse.' With that he pushed me through a swinging door +and left me standing in a semi-lighted chamber. I was very near ill +temper, I assure you, for my position was embarrassing. The room was +large and heavily hung with tapestries. A nurse, a hag, a witch, a dark +old gypsy creature, came over to me and asked me, in Russian:-- + +"'Do you wish to see his Royal Highness the King of Earth and Heaven?' +Thinking she was some stupid _moujik's_ wife, I nodded my head +seriously, though amused by the exalted titles. She put up a thin hand +and I tiptoed to a cradle of gold and ivory--it certainly seemed so to +my inexperienced eyes--the nurse parted the curtains, and there I saw--I +saw--but my son, you will think I exaggerate--I saw the most exquisite +baby in the universe. You laugh at an old bachelor's rhapsody! In +reality I don't care much for children. But that child, that supreme +morsel of humanity, was too much for me. I stood and stared and stood +and stared, and all the while the tiny angel was smiling in my eyes, oh! +such a celestial smile. From his large blue eyes, like flowers, he +smiled into my very soul. I was chained to the floor as if by lead. +Every fibre of my soul, heart, and brain went out to that little +wanderer from the infinite. It was a pathetic face, full of suppressed +sorrow--_Dieu_! but he was older than his father. I found my mind +beginning to wander as if hypnotized. I tried to divert my gaze, but in +vain. Some subtle emanation from this extraordinary child entered my +being, and then, as if a curtain were being slowly lowered, a mist +encompassed my soul; I was ceding, I felt, the immortal part of me to +another, and all the time I was smiling at the baby and the baby +smiling back. I remember his long blond hair, parted in the middle and +falling over his shoulders; but even that remarkable trait for an infant +a few hours old did not puzzle me, for my sanity was surely being +undermined by the persistent gaze of the boy. I vaguely recall passing +my hand across my breast as if to stop the crevice through which my +personality was filtering; I was certain that my soul was about to be +stolen by that damnable child. Then the nurse dropped something, and my +thoughts came back,--they were surely on the road to hell, for they were +red and flaming when I got hold of them,--and the spell, or whatever it +was, snapped. + +"I looked up and noticed the woman maliciously smiling--if it had been +in the days of the inquisition, I would have sent her to the faggots, +for she was a hell-hag. The child had fallen back in his cradle as if +the effort of holding my attention had exhausted him. Then it struck me +that there was something unholy about this affair, and I resolutely +strode to the crib and seized the baby. + +"'What changeling is this?' I demanded in a loud voice, for the being +that twisted in my grip was two or two hundred years old. + +"'Lay him down, you monster!' clamoured the nurse, as I held the +squirming bundle by both hands. It was a task--and I'm very strong. A +superhuman strength waged against my muscles; but I was an old football +half-back at the university, so I conquered the poor little devil. It +moaned like a querulous old man; the nurse, throwing her weight upon me, +forced me to let go my hold. As I did so the baby turned on its face, +its dainty robe split wide open, and to my horror I saw on its back, +between its angelically white shoulders, burnt in as if by branding +irons, the crucifix--and _upside down_!" + +I shuddered. I knew. He lowered his voice and spoke in detached phrases. + +"It was--oh! that I live to say it--it was the dreaded Antichrist--yes, +this Russian baby--it was predicted that he would be born in Russia--I +trembled so that my robes waved in an invisible wind. The reversed +cross--the mark of the beast--the sign by which we are to know the Human +Satan--the last opponent of Christianity. I confess that I was +discomposed at the sight of this little fiend, for it meant that the red +star, the baleful star of the north, would rise in the black heavens and +bloody war spread among the nations of the earth. It also meant that +doomsday was not far off, and, good Christian as I believe myself to be, +a shiver ran down my spine at the idea of Gabriel's trump and the +resurrection of the dead. Yes, I shan't deny it--so material are the +sons of men, I among them! And the very thought of Judgment Day and its +blasting horrors withered my heart. Still something had to be done, +prophecy or no prophecy. To fulfil the letter of the law this infernal +visitor was let loose from hell. There was one way, so I grasped--" + +"Great God, Monsignor, you didn't strangle the demon?" I cried. + +"No, no--something better. I rushed over to a marble wash-basin and +seized a ewer of water, and, going back to the crib, despite the frantic +remonstrances of the old sorceress, I baptized the Antichrist in the +name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Before my eyes I +saw the inverted cross vanish. Then I soundly spanked the presumptuous +youngster and, running down the staircase, I sought the prince and said +to him:-- + +"'Your boy is now a Roman, not a Greek Catholic. We are quits!'" + +The idea of a spanked Antichrist disconsolately roaming the earth, +unwilling to return to his fiery home for fear of a scolding, his guns +of evil spiked, his virus innocuous, his mission of spiritual +destruction a failure--for what could a baptized devil's child do but +pray and repent?--all this dawned upon me, and I burst into laughter, +the worthy Monsignor discreetly participating. His bizarre recital +proved to me that, despite his Gallic first name, Monsignor Anatole +O'Bourke hailed from the County Tipperary. + + + + +VIII + +THE ETERNAL DUEL + + What is the sorriest thing that enters Hell? + + --D.G. ROSSETTI, _Vain Virtues_. + + +The face set him to a strange wondering; he sat at the coffin and +watched it. His wife's face it was, and above the sorrow of irrevocable +parting floated the thought that she did not look happy as she lay in +her bed of death. Monross had seen but two dead faces before, those of +his father and mother. Both had worn upon the mask which death models an +expression of relief. But this face, the face of his wife, of the woman +with whom he had lived--how many years! He asked himself why he +shuddered when he looked down at it, shuddered and also flushed with +indignation. Had she ever been happy? How many times had she not voiced +her feelings in the unequivocal language of love! Yet she seemed so +hideously unhappy as she stretched before him in her white robes of +death. Why? What secret was this disclosed at the twelfth hour of life, +on the very brink of the grave? Did death, then, hold the solution to +the enigma of the conquering Sphinx! + +Monross, master of psychology, tormented by visions of perfection, a +victim to the devouring illusion of the artist,--Monross asked himself +with chagrin if he had missed the key in which had sounded the symphony +of this woman's life. This woman! His wife! A female creature, +long-haired, smiling, loquacious--though reticent enough when her real +self should have flashed out signals of recognition at him--this wife, +the Rhoda he had called day and night--what had she been? + +She had understood him, had realized his nobility of ideal, his gifts, +his occasional grandeur of soul,--like all artistic men he was desultory +in the manifestation of his talent,--and had read aloud to him those +poems written for another woman in the pitch-hot passion of his +youth--before he had met her. To her he had been always, so he told +himself, a cavalier in his devotion. Without wealth, he had kept the +soles of her little feet from touching the sidewalks of life. Upon her +dainty person he had draped lovely garments. Why then, he wondered, the +vindictive expression etched, as if in aqua fortis, upon her carved +features? + +Some Old World superstition held him captive as he gazed. Death is the +grand revealer, he thought; death alone stamps upon the crumbling canvas +of mortality the truth. Rhoda was dead. Yet her face was alive for the +first time. He saw its truth; and he shuddered, for he also discerned +the hate that had lurked a life long in its devious and smiling +expressions--expressions like a set of scenery pushed on and off as the +order of the play demanded. Oh, the misery of it all! He, Monross, poet, +lover, egoist, husband, to be confronted by this damnable defiance, this +early-born hate! What had he done! And in the brain cells of the man +there awakened a processional fleet of pictures: Rhoda wooed; Rhoda +dazzled; Rhoda won; Rhoda smiling before the altar; Rhoda resigned upon +that other altar; Rhoda, wife, mother; and Rhoda--dead! + +But Rhoda loved--again he looked at the face. The brow was virginally +placid, the drooping, bitter mouth alone telling the unhappy husband a +story he had never before suspected. Rhoda! Was it possible this tiny +exquisite creature had harboured rancour in her soul for the man who had +adored her because she had adored him? Rhoda! The shell of his egoism +fell away from him. He saw the implacable resentment of this tender girl +who, her married life long, had loathed the captain that had invaded the +citadel of her soul, and conqueror-like had filched her virgin zone. The +woman seemingly stared at the man through lids closed in death--the +woman, the sex that ages ago had feared the barbarian who dragged her to +his cave, where he subdued her, making her bake his bread and bear his +children. + +In a wide heaven of surmise Monross read the confirmation of his +suspicions--of the eternal duel between the man and the woman; knew +that Rhoda hated him most when most she trembled at his master bidding. +And now Rhoda lay dead in her lyre-shaped coffin, saying these ironic +things to her husband, when it was too late for repentance, too early +for eternity. + + + + +IX + +THE ENCHANTED YODLER + + +A MARIENBAD ELEGY + +I + +The remorseless rain had washed anew the face of the dark blue sky that +domed Marienbad and its curved chain of hills. Hugh Krayne threw open +his window and, leaning out, exclaimed, as he eagerly inhaled the soft +air of an early May morning:-- + +"At last! And high time!" For nine days he had waded through the wet +streets, heavily leaping the raging gutters and stopping before the door +of every optician to scrutinize the barometer. And there are many in +this pretty Bohemian health resort, where bad weather means bad temper, +with enforced confinement in dismal lodgings or stuffy _restaurations_, +or--last resort of the bored--the promenade under the colonnade, while +the band plays as human beings shuffle ponderously over the cold stones +and stare at each other in sullen desperation. + +But this day was a glorious one; in high spirits the Englishman left the +house on the Oberkreuzbrunnenstrasse and moved slowly toward the +springs. He was not thirty, but looked much older, for his weight was +excessive. An easy-going temperament, a good appetite, a well-filled +purse, and a conscience that never disturbed his night's slumber +contributed to this making of flesh. He waddled, despite his great +height, and was sufficiently sensitive to enjoy Marienbad as much for +its fat visitors as for its curative virtues. Here at least he was not +remarkable, while in London or Paris people looked at him sourly when he +occupied a stall at the theatre or a seat in a cafe. Not only had he +elbow room in Marienbad, but he felt small, positively meagre, in +comparison with the prize specimens he saw painfully progressing about +the shaded walks or puffing like obese engines up the sloping roads to +the Ruebezahl, the Egerlaender, the Panorama, or the distant Podhorn. + +The park of the Kreuzbrunnen was crowded, though the hour of six had +just been signalled from a dozen clocks in the vicinity. The crowd, +gathered from the four quarters of the globe, was in holiday humour, as, +glass in hand, it fell into line, until each received the water doled +out by uniformed officials. Occasionally a dispute as to precedence +would take place when the serpentine procession filed up the steps of +the old-fashioned belvedere; but quarrels were as rare as a lean man. A +fat crowd is always good-tempered, irritable as may be its individual +members. Hugh Krayne kept in position, while two women shoved him about +as if he were a bale of hay. He heard them abusing him in Bohemian, a +language of which he did not know more than a few words; their +intonations told him that they heartily disliked his presence. Yet he +could not give way; it would not have been Marienbad etiquette. At last +he reached the spring and received his usual low bow from the man who +turned the polished wheel--the fellow had an eye tuned for gratuities. +With the water in his glass three-fourths cold and one-fourth warm, a +small napkin in his left hand, the Englishman moved with the jaunty +grace of a young elephant down the smooth terraced esplanade that has +made Marienbad so celebrated. The sun was riding high, and the tender +green of the trees, the flashing of the fountains, and the music of the +band all caused Hugh to feel happy. He had lost nearly a pound since his +arrival the week before, and he had three more weeks to stay. What might +not happen! + +Just where the promenade twists under the shaded alleys that lead to the +Ferdinandsbrunnen, he saw four women holding hands. They were dressed in +Tyrolean fashion--pleated skirts, short enough to show white, plump +stockings, feet in slippers, upon the head huge caps, starched and +balloony; their massive white necks, well exposed, were encircled by +collars that came low on bodices elaborately embroidered. Behind them +marched several burly chaps, in all the bravery of the Austrian +Tyrol--the green alpine hat, with the feather at the back, the short +gray jacket, the bare knees, and the homespun stockings. Krayne regarded +curiously this strolling band of singers. Their faces seemed familiar to +him, and he rapidly recalled souvenirs of Salzburg and an open-air +concert. But this morning there was something that arrested his +attention in the group. It was a girl of eighteen or twenty, with a +brilliant complexion, large blue eyes, and a robust, shapely figure. As +she passed she gave him such an imploring look, such an appealing look, +that all his chivalric instincts rushed into the field of his +consciousness. He awkwardly dropped his tumbler. He turned around, half +expecting to see the big child still looking at him. Instead he gazed +upon the athletic backs of her male companions and to the unpleasant +accompaniment of hearty feminine laughter. Were these women laughing at +him? No fool like a fat one, he merrily thought, as he bought a new +glass at a bazaar, which a grinning, monkey-faced creature sold him at +the regular price redoubled. + +Before his meagre breakfast of one egg and a dry rusk, Krayne +endeavoured to evoke the features of the pretty creature who had so +strongly attracted him. He saw a tangle of black hair, a glance that +touched his heart with its pathos, a pair of soft, parted red lips, and +dazzling teeth. It was an impression sufficiently powerful to keep him +company all the forenoon. Fat men, he reasoned on the steep pass that +conducts to the Cafe Forstwarte, are always sentimental, by no means +always amiable, and, as a rule, subject to sudden fancies. Ten years of +his sentimental education had been sown with adventures that had begun +well, caprices that had no satisfactory endings. He had fallen in love +with the girl who played Chopin on the piano, the girl who played +Mendelssohn on the violin, the girl who played Goltermann on the +violoncello. Then followed girls who painted, poetized, botanized, and +hammered metal. Once--an exception--he had succumbed to the charms of an +actress who essayed characters in the dumps--Ibsen soubrettes, +Strindberg servants, and Maxim Gorky tramps. Yet he had, somehow or +other, emerged heart whole from his adventures among those masterpieces +of the cosmos--women. + +Certainly this might be another romance added to the long list of his +sentimental fractures. He ate his dinner, the one satisfactory meal of +the day allowed him by a cruel doctor, with the utmost deliberation. He +had walked three hours during the morning, and now, under the spacious +balconies of the Forstwarte, he knew that his beef and spinach would be +none the worse for a small bottle of very dry, light Voeslauer. Besides, +his physician had not actually forbidden him a little liquid at the +midday meal. Just before bedtime he was entitled--so his dietetic +schedule told him--to one glass of Pilsner beer. Not so bad, after all, +this banting at Marienbad, he reflected. Anyhow, it was better than the +existence of those fellows at sea-shore and mountain, who gorged and +guzzled their summer away. Then he tried to remember among his London +club friends any who were as heavy as he, but he could not. Idly +smoking, he regarded the piazzas, with their tables and groups of obese +humanity, eating, drinking, and buzzing--little fat flies, he thought, +as he drew his waistcoat in, feeling quite haughty and slender. + +He read on a placard that the "Praeger Bavarian Sextet" would give a +"grand" concert at the Hotel Bellevue this very afternoon. "Ah ha!" said +Krayne aloud, "that's the girl I saw!" Then he wasted several hours more +loitering about the beautiful park on the Kaiserstrasse and looking in +the shop windows at views of Marienbad on postal cards, at +yellow-covered French, German, and Russian novels, at pictures of kings, +queens, and actresses. He also visited the houses wherein Goethe, +Chopin, and Wagner had dwelt. It was four o'clock when he entered the +garden of the Bellevue establishment and secured a table. The waiter at +his request removed the other chairs, so he had a nook to himself. Not a +very large crowd was scattered around; visitors at Marienbad do not care +to pay for their diversions. In a few minutes, after a march had been +banged from a wretched piano--were pianos ever tuned on the Continent, +he wondered?--the sextet appeared, looking as it did in the morning, and +sang an Austrian melody, a capella. It was not very interesting. + +The women stood in front and yelled with a hearty will; the men roared +in the background. Krayne saw his young lady, holding her apron by the +sides, her head thrown back, her mouth well opened; but he could not +distinguish her individual voice. How pretty she was! He sipped his +coffee. Then came a zither solo--that abominable instrument of plucked +wires, with its quiver of a love-sick clock about to run down; this +parody of an aeolian harp always annoyed Krayne, and he was glad when the +man finished. A stout soprano in a velvet bodice, her arms bare and +brawny, the arms of a lass accustomed to ploughing and digging potatoes, +sang something about turtle doves. She was odious. Odious, too, was her +companion, in a duo through which they screamed and rumbled--"Verlassen +bin i." At last she came out and he saw by the programme that her name +was Roeselein Gich. What an odd name, what an attractive girl! He +finished his coffee and frantically signalled his waitress. It was +against the doctor's orders to take more than one cup, and then the +sugar! Hang the doctor, he cried, and drank a second cup. + +She sang. Her voice was an unusually heavy, rich contralto. That she was +not an accomplished artiste he knew. He did not haunt opera houses for +naught, and, like all fat men who wear red ties in the forenoon, he was +a trifle dogmatic in his criticism. The young woman had the making of an +opera singer. What a Fricka, Brangaene, Ortrud, Sieglinde, Erda, this +clever girl might become! She was musical, she was dramatic in +temperament--he let his imagination run away with him. She only sang an +Oberbayerische yodel, and, while her voice was not very high, she +contrived a falsetto that made her English listener shiver. This yodel +seemed to him as thrilling as the "_Ho yo to ho!_" of Brunnhilde as she +rushes over the rocky road to Valhall. _La la liriti! La la lirita! +Hallali!_ chirped Roeselein, with a final flourish that positively +enthralled Hugh Krayne. He applauded, beating with his stick upon the +table, his face flushed by emotion. Decidedly this girl was worth the +visit to Marienbad. + +And he noted with delight that Fraeulein Gich had left the stage. Basket +in hand, she went from table to table, selling pictures and programmes +and collecting admission fees. At last he would be able to speak with +the enchantress, for he prided himself on the purity of his German. +Smiling until she reached his table, she suddenly became serious when +she saw this big Englishman in the plaid suit and red necktie. Again he +felt the imploring glance, the soft lips parted in childish +supplication. It was too much for his nerves. He tossed into her basket +a gold piece, grabbed at random some pictures, and as her beseeching +expression deepened, her eyes moist with wonder and gratitude, he tugged +at a ring on his corpulent finger, and, wrenching it free, presented it +to her with a well-turned phrase, adding:-- + +"Thou hast the making of a great singer in thee, Fraeulein Roeselein. I +wish I could help thee to fame!" + +The girl gave him an incredulous stare, then reddening, the muscles on +her full neck standing out, she ran like a hare back to her companions. +Evidently he had made an impression. The honest folk about him who +witnessed the little encounter fairly brimmed over with gossip. The +stout basso moved slowly to Krayne, who braced himself for trouble. Now +for it! he whispered to himself, and grasped his walking-stick firmly. +But, hat in hand, his visitor, a handsome blond man, approached and +thanked Hugh for his generosity. He was a lover of music, the yodler +assured him, and his wife and himself felt grateful for the interest he +displayed in Fraeulein Roeselein, his wife's sister. Yes, she had a +remarkable voice. What a pity--but wouldn't the gentleman attend the +concert to be given that evening up at the Cafe Alm? It was, to be sure, +rather far, the cafe, but the moon would be up and if he could find his +way there he might do the company the honour of coming back with them. + +The Fraeulein would sing a lot for him--Bohemian, Tyrolean, French, and +German songs. Ah, she was versatile! The man did not speak like a +peasant, and seemed a shrewd, pleasant fellow. Hugh Krayne, in excellent +though formal German, assured the other of his pleasure and accepted the +invitation. Then he looked over at Roeselein, who stood on the stage, +and as he did so she waved a crimson handkerchief at him as a friendly +sign. He took off his hat, touched significantly his own tie to indicate +a reciprocity of sentiment, and all aglow he ordered a third cup of +coffee. + +The cure could take care of itself. _Man lebt nur einmal!_ + + +II + +On his way to the Alm he met the fattest man in Marienbad, a former chef +of the German emperor, and gave him a friendly salute. He liked to see +this monster, who made the scales groan at six hundred pounds, more than +double his own weight, for it put him at ease with himself. But this +evening he felt uncomfortable. What if he were to reach such a climax in +adiposity What if in the years to come he should be compelled, as was +the unfortunate man from Berlin, to sit on a chair every five minutes, a +chair carried by an impudent boy! What--here his heart sank--if the +Fraeulein should mock his size! He walked so rapidly at this idea that +other victims of rotundity stopped to look at his tall figure and nodded +approval. Ach! Marienbad was wonderful! + +After he had found a seat at the Alm next to the low wall, across which +he could see a vast stretch of undulating country, lighted by a moon +that seemed to swing like a silver hoop in the sky, Krayne ordered +Pilsner. He was fatigued by the hilly scramble and he was thirsty. Oh, +the lovely thirst of Marienbad--who that hath not been within thy +hospitable gates he knoweth it not! The magic of the night was making of +him a poet. He could see his Tyrolean friends behind the glass partition +of the little hall. There would they sing, not in the open. It was +nearly the same, for presently the windows were raised and their voices +came floating out to him, the bourdon of Roeselein's organ easily +distinguishable. Love had sharpened his ears. He drained his glass and +sent for another. He felt that he was tumbling down an abyss of passion +and that nothing in the world could save him. + +The intermission! He stood up to attract the attention of Herr Johan +Praeger. Roeselein saw him and at once neared him, but without the basket. +This delicacy pleased Krayne very much. It showed him that he was not on +the same footing as the public. He made the girl take a seat, and though +he felt the eyes of the crowd upon him, he was not in the least +concerned. London was far away and the season was too young for the +annual rush of his compatriots. Would the Fraeulein take something? She +accepted coffee, which she drank from a long glass with plenty of milk +and sugar. She again gazed at him with such a resigned expression that +he felt his starched cuffs grow warm from their contiguity to his +leaping pulses. + +"Yes, Fraeulein," he said, employing the familiar _du_, "thou hast +overcome me. Why not accept my offer?" Was this the prudent Hugh Krayne +talking? She smiled sweetly and shook her head. Her voice was delicious +in colour and intonation, nor did it betray humble origin. + +"I fear, dear sir, that what you offer is impossible. My sister, the +soprano, would never hear of such a thing. My brother, her husband, +would not allow it. And I owe them my living, my education. How could I +repay them if I left them now?" she hesitated. + +"Simply enough. You would be a singer at the opera some day, and take +them all to live with you. Is there no other reason?" He recollected +with a vivid sense of the disagreeable the lively antics of a lithe +youth in the company, who, at the close of the concert, executed with +diabolic dexterity what they called a _Schuhplattltanz_. This dance had +glued Krayne's attention, for Roeselein was the young tenor singer's +partner. With their wooden sabots they clattered and sang, waving wildly +their arms or else making frantic passages of pretended love and +coquetry. It upset the Englishman to see the impudence of this common +peasant fellow grasping Roeselein by the waist, as he whirled her about +in the boorish dance. Hence the clause to his question. She endured his +inquiring gaze, as she simply answered:-- + +"No, there is no other reason." She put her hand on the arm of her +companion and the lights suddenly became misty, for he was of an +apoplectic tendency. They talked of music, of the opera in Vienna and +Prague. She was born in Bavaria, not more than a day's ride from +Marienbad. You could almost see her country from the top of the +Podhornberg, in the direction of the Franconian Mountains, not far from +Bayreuth. The place was called Schnabelwaid, and it was very high, very +windy. Since her tenth year she had been singing--yes, even in the +chorus at the Vienna opera, with her sister and brother. They were no +common yodlers. They could sing all the music of the day. The yodling +was part of their business, as was the costume. Later, when she had +enough saved, she would study in Vienna for grand opera! + +He was enraptured. How romantic it all was! A free-born maiden--he was +certain she was reared in some old castle--wandering about earning money +for her musical education. What a picture for a painter! What a story +for a novelist! They were interrupted. The dancer, a young man with a +heavy shock of hair growing low on his forehead, under which twinkled +beady black eyes, had been sent to tell Fraeulein Roeselein that her +colleagues were waiting for her. With a courtesy she went away. Krayne +now thoroughly hated the dancer. + +It was long after eleven when the concert was over and the party started +on its homeward trip. Krayne and Roeselein walked behind the others, and +soon the darkness and the narrowness of the road forced him to tread +after the girl. The moon's rays at intervals pierced the foliage, +making lacelike patches of light in the gloom. At times they skirted the +edges of a circular clearing and saw the high pines fringing the +southern horizon; overhead the heavens were almost black, except where +great streams of stars swept in irregular bands. It was a glorious +sight, Krayne told Roeselein--too sublime to be distracted by mere mortal +love-making, he mentally added. Nevertheless he was glad when they were +again in the woods; he could barely distinguish the girl ahead of him, +but her outline made his heart beat faster. Once, as they neared the +town, he helped her down a declivity into the roadway, and he could not +help squeezing her hand. The pressure was returned. He boldly placed her +arm within his, and they at last reached the streets, but not before, +panting with mingled fright and emotion, he solemnly kissed her. She did +not appear surprised. + +"Call me Roesie--thou!" she murmured, and her naivete brought the ready +tears to his eyes. They made a rendezvous for the next morning on the +Promenade Platz. The only thing he did not like was the scowling face of +the dancer when he said good night to the others under the electric +lights of the Kreuzbrunnen. He was correct, then, in his premonition. + +That night Hugh Krayne dreamed he was a very skeleton for thinness--not +an unusual vision of fat men--and also a Tyrolean yodler, displaying +himself before a huge audience of gigantic human beings, who laughed so +loudly that he could not open his lips to frame the familiar words of +his song. In the despair of a frantic nightmare, his face streaming with +anguished tears, he forced his voice:-- + +_La, la, liriti! La, la, larita! Hallali!_ Then he awoke in triumph. Was +he not a yodler? + + +III + +He told her of his dream and strange ambition. She did not discourage +him. It could be settled easily enough. Why not join the company and +take a few lessons? "With such a teacher?" he had exclaimed, and his +gesture was so impassioned that the promenaders, with their shining +morning goblets of water, were arrested by the spectacle. Wonderful, +wonderful Marienbad! was the general comment! But Krayne was past +ridicule. He already saw Roeselein his bride. He saw himself a yodler. +The cure? Ay, there was the rub. He laid bare his heart. She aided him +with her cool advice. She was very sensible. Her brother-in-law and her +sister would welcome him in their household, for he was a lover of music +and his intentions were honourable. Of course, he sighed, of course, and +fingered his red tie. Why not, she argued, remain at Marienbad for three +weeks more and complete his cure? Anyhow, he was not so stout! She +looked up at him archly. Again he saw mist. + +That settled it. For another three weeks he lived in a cloud of +expectation, of severe training, long walks, dieting, and Turkish baths. +No man worked harder. And he was rewarded by seeing his flesh melt away +a pound or two daily. When the company returned after its itinerary in +the neighbourhood Roesie was surprised to meet a man who did not weigh +much over two hundred pounds, healthy, vigorous, and at least five years +younger in appearance. She was very much touched. So was her sister. +There was a family consultation, and despite the surly opposition of the +dancer, Hugh Krayne was welcomed as a member of the Praeger Bavarian +Sextette company. Forgetting the future he had arranged for Roesie, he +began his vocal lessons immediately. + +In July he sang for the first time in public at Eger. He was extremely +frightened, but as it was only a duo he managed fairly well. Then he +sang at Tepl, this time alone. His voice broke badly in the yodel and he +was jeered by a rude audience. He had grown very much thinner. His +doctor warned him against continuing the waters, and advised rice, +potatoes, and ale, but he did not listen. He now paid the bills of the +company while travelling. Roesie had confessed with tears that they were +fearfully poor. From that time he handed her his purse. He even placated +the jealous dancer with a gold watch and a box of hair pomade. Ah! how +he loathed the fellow's curly locks, his greasy familiarities! Roesie +told him this acrobat was necessary in the company until he could be +replaced. Already Hugh--she called him "Ue"--could yodel better. Some day +he might, when thinner, dance better. Perhaps--again that appealing +glance, the corner of her lips faintly touched by the mysterious smile +of a Monna Lisa. Krayne redoubled his arduous training, practised +yodling in the forests, danced jigs on the pine-needles, and doubled his +allowance of the waters. + +They went to Carlsbad. He yodled. He was applauded. The dancer was in a +fine rage. Although Krayne had asked Roesie to buy a first-class +compartment on the railroad trip over and back, they went in a +third-class car. Praeger declared that it was good enough for him, and he +didn't wish to spoil his troupe! His wife now held the purse-strings, as +Roesie was too engrossed with her art and Hugh too absorbed in his love +to notice such mere sublunary matters. The girl had promised nothing +positive for the future. She kept him on the brittle edge of nervous +expectation. The opposition of the dancer had been successfully met by +threats of dismissal; Hugh continued to lose flesh and gain in vocal and +pedal agility. + +He danced for the first time at Koenigswart, not far from the chateau of +the Metternichs. It was August. So great was the applause that the +younger dancer was discharged. He left with muttered threats of +vengeance. The next day Krayne turned over all his business affairs to +the able hand of Frau Praeger; he lived only for Roesie and his art.... + +September was at hand. The weather was so warm and clear, that the king +of England deferred his departure for a few days. One afternoon, just +before the leaves began to brown on the hills, there was a concert at +the garden of the Hotel Bellevue. The royal party attended. The yodling +was much praised, especially that of a good-looking young woman and her +escort, a very tall man of cadaverous aspect, his shanks like the wooden +stilts of the shepherds on the Bordeaux Landes. His face, +preternaturally emaciated and fatigued, opened to emit an amazing yodel. +When the _Schuhplattltanz_ was reached he surprised the audience by an +extraordinary exhibition. He threw his long legs about like billiard +cues, while his arms flapped as do windmills in a hard gale. He was +pointed out as a celebrity--once a monster Englishman, who had taken the +_Kur_; who was in love, but so poor that he could not marry. The girl +with him was certain to make a success in grand opera some day. Yes, +Marienbad was proud of Krayne. He was one of her show sons, a witness to +her curative powers. Proud also of the Bavarian Praeger Sextette. Herr +Praeger was reputed a rich man.... + +The night of that concert Marienbad saw the last of the Bavarian +sextette, which at midnight, joined by its old dancer with the tenor +voice, left in a third-class carriage for Vienna. Hugh Krayne, not +possessing enough to pay his passage, had not been invited; nor was he +informed of the sudden departure until a day later.... + + * * * * * + +On the road to the Alm, of moonlight nights, toiling visitors catch +glimpses of a human, almost a skeleton, dressed in rags, his head bare +as his feet, about his neck a flaming crimson handkerchief. He is known +to Marienbaeders as "The Man Who Stayed Too Long." He never addresses +passers-by; but as they lose sight of him they hear the woods resound +with his elegiac howl:-- + +_La la liriti! La la lirita! Hallali!_ + + + + +X + +THE THIRD KINGDOM + + +I + +A DOUBTER + +Brother Hyzlo sat in his cell and read. The gentle stillness of a rare +spring morning enveloped him with its benison. And the clear light fell +upon the large pages of a book in his hand,--the window through which it +streamed was the one link between the young recluse and the life of the +world. From it he could see the roofs of the city beneath him; when he +so wished, he might, without straining his gaze, distinguish the +Pantheon at the end of that triumphal avenue which spanned the Seine and +had once evoked for him visions of antique splendour. But Brother Hyzlo +no longer cared for mundane delights. His doubting soul was the +battle-field over which he ranged day and night searching for diabolic +opponents. Exterior existence had become for him a shadow; the only life +worth living was that of the spirit. + +In his book that fresh spring morning he read as if in the flare of a +passing meteor these disquieting words:-- + +"How were it if, some day or night, a demon stole after thee into thy +most solitary solitude, and said to thee: 'This life, as thou livest it +now, and hast lived it, thou shalt have to live over again, and not once +but innumerable times; and there will be nothing new in it, but every +pain and every pleasure and every thought and sigh, and everything in +thy life, the great and the unspeakably petty alike, must come again to +thee, and all in the same series and succession; this spider, too, and +this moonlight betwixt the trees and this moment likewise and I myself. +The eternal sand-glass of time is always turned again, and thou with it, +thou atom of dust'? Wouldst thou not cast thyself down and with gnashing +of teeth curse the demon who thus spoke? Or, hast thou ever experienced +the tremendous moment in which thou wouldst answer him: 'Thou art a god +and never heard I anything more divine'?" + +The book slipped from his hands. "Why not?" he murmured, "why not? There +is no such thing as chance. The law of probabilities is not a mere +fancy, but an austere need. Matter is ever in evolution. Energy alone is +indestructible. Radium has revealed this to us. In eternity when the +Infinite throws the dice, double-sixes are sure to come up more than +once. Miracles? But why miraculous? Infinity of necessity must repeat +itself, and then I, sitting here now, will sit here again, sit and doubt +the goodness of God, ay, doubt His existence.... How horrible!" He +paused in the whirl of his thoughts. + +"Yet how beautiful, for if the eternal recurrence be truth, then must +the great drama of the Redemption be repeated. Then will our foes be +convinced of Christianity and its reality. But shall we be conscious in +that far-off time of our anterior existence? Ah! hideous, coiling doubt. +What a demon is this Nietzsche to set whirring in the brains of poor, +suffering humanity such torturing questions! Better, far better for the +world to live and not to think. Thought is a disease, a morbid secretion +of the brain-cells. Ah! materialist that I am, I can no longer think +without remembering the ideas of Cabanis, that gross atheist. Why am I +punished so? What crimes have I committed in a previous +existence--Karma, again!--that I must perforce study the writings of +impious men? Yet I submitted myself as a candidate for the task, to save +my brethren in Christ from soiling their hearts. Heaven preserve me from +the blight of spiritual pride, but I believe that I am now a scapegoat +for the offences of my fellow-monks, and, thus, may redeem my own +wretched soul. Ah! Nietzsche--Antichrist." + +He arose and threw the volume across his cell. Then going to the window +regarded with humid gaze the world that sprawled below him in the +voluptuous sunshine. But so sternly was the inner eye fixed on the +things of the spirit that he soon turned away from the delectable +picture, and as he did so his glance rested upon a crucifix. He started, +his perturbed imagination again touched. + +"What if Nietzsche were right? The first Christian, the only Christian, +died on the cross, he has said. What an arraignment of our precious +faith, Jesus Christ, our Lord God! What sweet names are Thine! How could +Nietzsche not feel the music of that Hebrew-Greek combination? Perhaps +he did; perhaps he masked a profound love behind his hatred. Jesus our +Lord! Hebrew-Greek. But why Greek? Why ...?" Another pause in this +sequestered chamber where the buzzing of an insect could assume a +thunderous roar. "The eternal return. Why should Christ return? Must the +earth be saved again and again and a billion times again? Awful thought +of a God descending to a horrible death to cleanse the nameless myriads +from sins which they seek ever as flies treacle. More ghastly still is +the thought that the atheist Scandinavian put into the mouth of his +Julian the Apostate: When our Christ is not saving this earth from +eternal damnation then he may be visiting remote planets or inaccessible +stars, where coloured double suns of blinding brilliancy revolve +terrifically in twin harness. There, too, are souls to be rescued. What +a grand idea! It is Ibsen's, as is the interpretation of the Third +Kingdom. It should have been Nietzsche's. Why this antinomianism? Why +this eternal conflict of evil and good, of night and day, of sweet and +sour, of God and devil, of Ormuzd and Ahriman?" + +The exotic names transposed his thoughts to another avenue. If Christ is +to come again, and the holy word explicitly states that He will, why not +Buddha? Why not Brahma? Why not ...? Again a hiatus. This time something +snapped in his head. He sank back in his chair. Buddha! Was there ever a +Buddha? And if there was not, was there ever such a personality as +Christ's? Scholar that he was he knew that myth-building was a pastime +for the Asiatic imagination, great, impure, mysterious Asia--Asia the +mother of all religions, the cradle of the human race. To deny the +objective existence of Christ would set at rest all his doubts, one +overwhelming doubt swallowing the minor doubts. He had never speculated +at length upon the Christ legend, for did not Renan, yes, that silky +heretic, believe in the personality of Jesus, believe and lovingly +portray it? The Nietzsche doctrine of the eternal recurrence had so +worked upon his sensitive mental apparatus that he could have almost +denied the existence of Christ rather than deny that our universe +repeats itself infinitely. Eternity is a wheel, earthly events are the +spokes of this whirring wheel. It was the seeming waste of divine +material that shocked his nerves. One crucifixion--yes; but two or two +quintillions and infinitely more! + +Brother Hyzlo stared at the crucifix. Was it only a symbol, as some +learned blasphemers averred? The human figure so painfully extended +upon it was a God, a God who descended from high heaven to become a +shield between the wrath of His Father and humanity. Why? Why should the +God who created us grow angry with our shortcomings? We are His +handiwork. Are we then to blame for our imperfections? Is not Jesus, +instead of a mediator, rather a votive offering to the wounded vanity of +the great Jehovah? Was not Prometheus--a light broke in upon Hyzlo. +Prometheus, a myth, Buddha a myth. All myths. There were other +virgin-born saviours. Krishna, Mithra, Buddha. Vishnu had not one but +nine incarnations. Christianity bears alarming resemblances to +Mithraism. Mithra, too, was born in a cave. The dates of Christ's birth +and death may be astronomical: the winter and vernal equinoxes. But the +conflict of the authorities regarding these dates is mortifying. The +four gospels are in reality four witnesses warring against each other. +They were selected haphazard at a human council. They were not composed +until the latter part of the second century, and the synoptic gospels +are compilations from unknown writers, while the fourth gospel is a much +later work. And how colourless, imitative, is the New when compared to +the Old Testament,--echoing with the antiphonal thunders of Jehovah and +his stern-mouthed Prophets! The passage in Josephus touching on Christ +is now known to have been interpolated. Authentic history does not +record the existence of Christ. Not one of His contemporaries mentions +him. That tremendous drama in Galilee was not even commented upon by the +Romans, a nation keen to notice any deviation from normal history. The +Jewish records are doubtful, written centuries after His supposed death. +And they are malicious. What cannot happen in two centuries? Hyzlo +reflected sadly upon Moslemism, upon Mormonism, upon the vagaries of a +strange American sect at whose head was said to be a female pope. + +The similarity of circumstances in the lives of Buddha and Christ also +annoyed him. Both were born of virgins, both renounced the world, both +were saviours. There were the same temptations, the same happenings; +prophecies, miracles, celestial rejoicings, a false disciple, the seven +beatitudes--a reflection of the Oriental wisdom--an expiatory death and +resurrection. The entire machinery of the Christian church, its saints, +martyrs, festivals, ritual, and philosophies are borrowed from the +mythologies of the pagans. Sun-worship is the beginning of all +religions. To the genius of the epileptic Paul, or Saul,--founders of +religions are always epilepts,--a half Greek and disciple of the +Pharisee Gamaliel, who saw visions and put to the sword his enemies, to +Paul, called a saint, a man of overwhelming personal force, to this +cruel anarchist, relentless, half-mad fanatic and his theological +doctrines we owe the preservation and power of the Christian Church. At +first the Christians were the miserable offscourings of society, slaves, +criminals, and lunatics. They burrowed in the Catacombs, they fastened +themselves upon a decaying and magnificent civilization like the +parasites they were. A series of political catastrophes, a popular +uprising against the rotten emperors of decadent Rome, and the wide +growth of the socialist idea--these things and an unscrupulous man, +Constantine the Great, put the Christians firmly in the saddle. And soon +came cataracts of blood. If the tales of the imperial persecutions are +true, then hath Christianity been revenged a million fold; where her +skirt has trailed there has been the cruel stain of slaughter. It must +not be forgotten, too, that immorality of the grossest sort was promised +the deluded sectarians, compared with which the Mahometan paradise is +spiritual. And the end of the world was predicted at the end of every +century, and finally relegated to the millennial celebration of +Christianity's birth. When, in 1000 A.D., this catastrophe did +not occur, the faith received its first great shock. + +He summoned to his memory a cloud of witnesses, all contradictory. +Josephus was barred. Philo Judaeus, who was living near the centre of +things, an observer on the scent of the spiritual, a man acquainted with +the writings of Rabbi Hillel, and the father of Neoplatonism--never +mentions Jesus, nor does he speak of any religious uprising in Judea. +The passage in Virgil, which has through the doubtful testimony of +monkish writers been construed into a prophecy of a forthcoming Messiah, +Hyzlo, who was a scholar, knew to have been addressed to a son of +Virgil's intimate friend. Tacitus, too, has been interpolated. Seneca's +ideal man is not Jesus, for Jesus is Osiris, Horus, Krishna, Mithra, +Hercules, Adonis,--think of this beautiful young god's death!--Buddha. +Such a mock trial and death could not have taken place under the Roman +or Jewish laws. The sacraments derive from the Greeks, from the +Indians--the mysteries of Ceres and Bacchus, from the _Haoma_ sacrifice +of the Persians, originally Brahmanic. The Trinity, was it not a relic +of that ineradicable desire for polytheism implanted in the human bosom? +Was the crucifixion but a memory of those darker cults and blood +sacrifices of Asia, and also of the expiating goats sent out into the +wilderness? What became of that Hosanna-shouting crowd which welcomed +Christ on Palm Sunday? And there never were such places as Gethsemane +and Calvary. Alas! the Son of Man had indeed no spot to lay his head. +And why had He made no sign when on earth! Brother Hyzlo wept bitter +tears. + +But he wiped them away as he considered the similarity of the massacre +of the Innocents in Judea and the massacre of the male children ordered +by the wicked Indian Rajah of Madura, who feared the Krishna, just +conceived by divine agency. Yes, the chronicles were full of these gods +born of virgins, of crucifixions,--he could remember sixteen,--of these +solar myths. He caught tripping in a thousand cases the translations of +our holy books. The Ox and Ass legend at the Nativity he realized was +the Pseudo-Matthew's description to Habakkuk of the literal presence: +"In the midst of two animals thou shalt be known;" which is a +mistranslated Hebrew text in the Prayer ascribed to Habakkuk. It got +into the Greek Septuagint version of the Prophet made by Egyptian Jews +before 150 B.C. It should read, "in the midst of the years," +not "animals." "Ah!" cried Hyzlo, "in this as in important cardinal +doctrines have the faithful been the slaves of the learned and +unscrupulous pious forgers. Even the notorious Apollonius of Tyana +imitated the miracles of Christ--all of them. And what of that wicked +wizard, Simon Magus?" + +The very repetition of these miracles in all races, at all epochs, +pointed to the doctrine of recurrence. But back of all the negations, +back of the inexpugnable proof that no such man or God as Christ +existed, or was known to his contemporaries, Jewish and Roman, there +must have been some legend which had crystallized into a mighty +religion. Was He an agitator who preferred His obscurity that His glory +might be all the greater? There _must_ have been a beginning to the +myth; behind the gospels--though they are obviously imitated from the +older testaments, imitated and diluted--were unknown writings; previous +to these there was word of mouth and--and ...? + +The day had advanced, the sun was very warm. A shaft of light fell upon +the cold stone floor, and in its fiery particles darted myriads of +motes. Hyzlo followed their spiral flights, thinking all the while of +humanity which flashes from out the dark void, plays madly in the light, +only to vanish into the unknown night. His gaze was held by the +smoothness of the flagging at his feet. Then it became transformed into +marble, the walls of his cell widened, and he closed his eyes, so +blinding were the long ladders of light.... + + +II + +TWO DREAMERS + +He opened them ... the harbour with its army of galleys and pleasure +craft lay in the burning sunshine, its surface a sapphire blue. Overhead +the sky echoed this tone, which modulated into deeper notes of purple on +the far-away hills whose tops were wreathed in mist. Under his sandalled +feet was marble, back of him were the gleaming spires and towers of the +great city, and at his left was a mountain of shining marble, the +Pharos. + +"Alexandria?" he called out as he was jostled by a melon-seller, and +startled by the fluted invitations of a young girl--an antique statue +come to life. + +"Of course it is Alexandria," replied a deep, harsh voice at his elbow. +He turned. It was his friend Philo. + +"You have at last emerged from your day-dream, Hyzlo! I thought, as our +bark clove the water, that you were enjoying visions." And it seemed to +Hyzlo that he had just awakened from a bizarre dream of a monastic cell, +to more beautiful sights and shapes and sounds. The pair now traversed +the quay, past the signal masts, the fortified towers, pushing through +the throng of sailors, courtesans, philosophers, fruitsellers, soldiers, +beggars, and idle rich toward the spacious city. Past the palace to the +wall of the Canal, along the banks of the Royal Port, they finally +struck into a broad, deserted avenue. At its head was a garden wall. +Philo introduced himself and his companion through a low door and +presently they were both in an apartment full of parchments, glittering +brass and gold instruments all reposing on a wide, long table. + +"Hyzlo," said the Jewish philosopher, in his slightly accented Greek, "I +have long promised you that I would reveal to you my secret, my life +work. I am downcast by sadness. Rome is full of warring cults, Greek, +African, Babylonian, Buddhistic; the writings of the great teachers, the +masters, Heraclitus, Zeno, Anaxagoras, Plato, Socrates, Epictetus, +Seneca, are overlaid with heretical emendations. The religion of my +fellow-countrymen is a fiery furnace, Jerusalem a den of warring +thieves. The rulers of earth are weary and turn a deaf ear on their +peoples. The time is ripe for revolt. Sick of the accursed luxury and +debauchery, fearful of the threatening barbarians from Asia and the +boreal regions, who are hemming the civilized world, waiting like +vultures for the first sign of weakness to destroy everything, the +slaves in revolt--all these impending terrors assure me that the end of +the old order is at hand. But what will become of the new if there is no +central belief to steady the ensanguined hands of furious mobs? For +years I have bethought me of a drama, a gigantic world-drama which shall +embody all the myths of mankind, all the noblest thoughts of the +philosophers. I shall take the Buddha myth, surely the supreme myth, and +transpose its characters to Jerusalem. A humble Jew shall be _my_ +Buddha. He shall be my revenge on our conquerors; for my people have +been trampled upon by the insolent Romans, and who knows--a Jewish God, +a crucified God, may be worshipped in the stead of Jupiter and his vile +pantheon of gods and goddesses! _One_ God, the son of Jahveh who comes +upon earth to save mankind, is crucified and killed, is resurrected and +like Elijah is caught up to heaven in a fiery chariot. But you know the +usual style of these Asiatic legends! They are all alike; a virgin +birth, a miraculous life, and transfiguration. That sums up myths from +Adonis to Krishna, from Krishna to Buddha; though Monotheism comes from +the Hebrews, the Trinity from the Indians, and the _logos_ was +developed by Plato. Where I am original is that I make my hero a +Jew--the Jews are still half-cracked enough to believe in the coming of +a Messiah. And to compass a fine dramatic moment I have introduced an +incident I once witnessed in Alexandria at the landing of King Agrippa, +when the populace dressed up a vagabond named Karabas as a mock king and +stuck upon his head papyrus leaves for a crown, in his hand a reed for a +sceptre, and then saluted him as king. I shall make my Jew-God seized by +the Jews, his own blood and kin, given over to the Romans, mocked, +reviled, and set aside for some thief who shall be called Karabas. Then, +rejected, he shall be crucified, he a god born of a virgin, by the very +people who are looking for their Messiah. He is their Messiah; yet they +know it not. They shall never know it. That shall be their tragedy, the +tragedy of my race, which, notwithstanding the prophecies, turned its +back upon the Messiah because he came not clothed in the purple of +royalty. Is that not a magnificent idea for a drama?" + +"Excellent," answered Hyzlo, in a critical tone; "but continue!" + +"You seem without enthusiasm, Hyzlo. I tell you that AEschylus, +Sophocles, or Euripides never conceived a story more infinitely dramatic +or pathetic, or--thanks to my Hebraic blood--so suffused with tragic +irony. I shall make a very effective tableau at the death; on some +forbidding stony hill near Jerusalem I shall plant my crucified hero, +and near him a converted courtesan--ah! what a master of the theatre I +am!--in company with a handful of faithful disciples. The others have +run away to save their cowardly skins in the tumult. The mobs that +hailed him as King of the Jews now taunt him, after the manner of all +mobs. His early life I shall borrow outright from the Buddha legends. He +shall be born of a virgin; he shall live in the desert; as a child he +shall confute learned doctors in the temple; and later in the desert he +shall be tempted by a demon. All this is at hand. My chief point is the +philosophies in which I shall submerge my characters. + +"My hero shall be the _logos_ of Heraclitus with the superadded +authority of the Hebrew high priest. You may recall the fact that I +greatly admire the Essenes and their system. My deity is a pure essence; +not Jehovah the protector or avenger. The _logos_, or mediator, I have +borrowed from the writings of the Greek philosophers. This _logos_ +returns to the bosom of God after the sacrifice. Greek philosophy +combined with Hebraic moral principles! Ah! it is grand synthesis; +Seneca with his conception of a perfected humanity, Lucretius, +Manlius--who called, rightfully too, Epicurus a god--and Heraclitus with +the first idea of a _logos_: all these ancient ideas I have worked into +my romantic play, including the old cult of the Trinities; the +Buddhistic: Buddha, Dharma, and Saingha; the Chinese: Heaven, Earth, +and Emperor; the Babylonian: Ea, the father, Marduk, the son, and the +Fire God, Gibil, who is also the Paraclete. So my philosophy is merely a +continuation and modification of that taught by Heraclitus and Plato, +but with a Jewish background--for _mine_ is the only moral nation. The +wisdom of the Rabbis, their Monotheism and ethics, are all there." His +eyes were ablaze. + +"You are very erudite, Philo Judaeus!" exclaimed his listener; "but, tell +me, is there no actual foundation for your Jewish god?" Hyzlo eagerly +awaited a reply, though he could not account for this curiosity. + +"Yes," answered Philo, lightly, "there is, I freely acknowledge, a +slight foundation. Some years ago in Jerusalem they arrested a +poverty-stricken fanatic, the son of a Jewess. His father was said to +have been an indigent and aged carpenter. This Joshua, or Ieshua, was +driven out of Jerusalem, and he took refuge among a lot of poor +fishermen on Lake Gennesareth. There he joined a sect called the +Baptists, because their founder, a socialist named Ioakanaan, poured +water on the heads of the converted. Ieshua never married and was +suspected of idolatrous practices, which he had absorbed from hermits of +the Egyptian Thebaid. Josephus, a wise friend and companion of my youth, +wrote me these details. He said that Ieshua disappeared after his mad +attempt to take Jerusalem by storm, riding--as is depicted the Bona +Dea--on the back of a humble animal. Yet, if you wish to appeal to the +common folk, make your hero a deposed king or divinity, who walks +familiarly among the poor, as walked the gods at the dawn of time with +the daughters of men. I depict my protagonist as a half-cracked Jew. I +call him Iesus Christos--after Krishna; and this poor man's god proposes +to redeem the world, to place the lowly in the seats of the mighty--he +is an Anarchos, as they would say in Athens. He promises the Kingdom of +God to those who follow him; but only a few do. He is the friend of +outcasts, prostitutes, criminals. And though he does not triumph on +earth, nevertheless he is the spiritual ruler of earth; he is the Son of +the Trinity which comprises the Father and Holy Ghost. The contending +forces to my hero will be incarnated by Pontius Pilatus, the Roman +governor, and Judas of Kerioth, a very dangerous and powerful Hebrew +politician--a man of very liberal ideas, one who believed in the +supremacy of the West. What a glorious play it will make! I have named +it The Third Kingdom, Hyzlo. What a glorious idea it is, Hyzlo--the +greatest drama the world has ever witnessed!" + + +III + +THE DOVE + +"The greatest drama the world has ever witnessed" ... mumbled his +disciple.... The sun still shone on the cold stone flagging, and upon +the wall facing him hung the crucifix. But the motes no longer danced +merrily in the light. Evening was setting in apace, and Hyzlo, accepting +one dream as equal in veracity with the other, crossed to the embrasure +and, his elbows on the sill, watched the sun--looking like a +sulphur-coloured cymbal--sink behind the sky-line. He was still in the +same attitude when the blue of the heavens--ah! but not that gorgeous, +hard Alexandrian blue--melted into peacock and cool saffron hues. He +mused aloud:-- + +"By the very nature of his mental organs man can never grasp reality. It +is always the sensation, never the real thing, he feels. The +metaphysicians are right. We can never know the actual world outside of +ourselves. We are imprisoned in a dream cage; the globe itself is a cage +of echoes. Science, instead of contradicting religion, has but affirmed +its truths. Matter is radiant energy--matter is electric phenomenon. The +germ-plasma from which we stem--the red clay of Genesis--is eternal. The +individual is sacrificed to the species. The species never dies. And how +beautifully logical is the order of our ancestry as demonstrated by the +science of embryology. Fish, batrachians, reptiles, mammals; in which +latter are included the marsupials as well as lemurs, primates, Man. And +after what struggles Man assumed an erect position and looked into the +eyes of his mate! After Man? Nietzsche preaches that man is a link +between the primate and Superman; Superman--the angels! But intelligence +in man may be an accident caused by over-nutrition, the brain developing +from rich phosphors. If this were so--how would fall to earth our house +of pride! Are we so close to the animal? But Quinton proves that _after_ +man in the zooelogical series comes the bird. Birds--half reptiles, half +angels. Angels! Do evolution and revelation meet here on common ground? +Or was Joachim, the Abbot of Flores, inspired when he wrote of the Third +Kingdom, that Kingdom in which the empire of the flesh is swallowed up +in the empire of the spirit; that Third Kingdom in which the +twin-natured shall reign, as Ibsen declares; the Messiah--neither +Emperor nor Redeemer, but the Emperor-God. The slime shall become sap +and the sap become spirit! From gorilla to God! Man in the coming Third +Kingdom may say: "I, too, am a god." But is this not blasphemous? And +after the wheel of the universe has again revolved, will I see, as +foresaw Nietzsche, the selfsame spider, the same moonlight? There is +nothing new under the sun, says Ecclesiastes. Wretched man is never to +know the entire truth but will be always at daggers drawn with his +destiny. After classic Paganism came romantic Christianity; after the +romantic will the pendulum swing back--or--alas! is there coming another +horde of atheists with a new Attila at their head?" + +He threw himself before the crucifix and sobbed. + +"Lord Jesus, Our Christ! Thou art the real Christ and not the fiction of +that supersubtle Greek-Jewish and boastful philosopher in Alexandria! +Make for me, O God, a sign! Give me back in all its purity my faith; +faith, noblest gift of all! Oh! to hear once more the thrilling of the +harps divine, whereon the dawn plays, those precursors of the Eternal +Harmony! _Gloria in Excelsis_." He remained prostrate, his heart no +longer battered by doubts and swimming in blissful love for his +crucified God. The celestial hurricane subsided in his bosom; he arose +and again interrogated the heavens. The stars in the profound splendours +of the sky stared at him like the naked eyes of _houris_. Suddenly a +vast white cloud sailed over the edge of the horizon and as it +approached his habitation assumed the shape of a monstrous dove, its +fleecy wings moving in solemn rhythms. In the resurgence of his hopes +this apparition was the coveted sign from the Almighty. + +And flat upon the floor of his cell, his face abased in the dust, Hyzlo +worshipped in epileptic frenzy, crying aloud, after the manner of the +sad-tongued Preacher:-- + +"The thing that hath been, it _is_ that which shall be!" + + + + +XI + +THE HAUNTED HARPSICHORD + +[In the Style of Mock-Mediaeval Fiction] + + +I told Michael to look sharply to his horse. It was dusk; a few bits of +torn clouds, unresolved modulations of nebulous lace, trembled over the +pink pit in the west, wherein had sunk the sun; and one evening star, +silver pointed, told the tale of another spent day. + +Michael was surly, I was impatient, and the groom, who lagged in the +rear, whistled softly; but I knew that both men were tired and hungry, +and so were the horses. The road, hard and free from dust, echoed the +resilient hoof-falls of our beasts. The early evening was finely cool, +for it was the month of September. We had lost our way. Green fields on +either side, and before us the path declined down a steep slope, that +lost itself in huddled foliage. + +Michael spoke up:-- + +"We are astray. I knew this damnable excursion would lead to no good." + +I gently chided him. "Pooh, you braggart! Even Arnold, who rides a brute +a world too wide for him, has not uttered a complaint. Brave Michael, if +her ladyship heard you now!" + +His face grew hard as he muttered:-- + +"Her ladyship! may all the saints in the calendar watch over her +ladyship! But I wish she had never taken you at your hot-headed word. +Then we would not have launched upon this madcap adventure." + +I grew stern. "Her ladyship, I bid you remember, my worthy man, is our +mistress, and it ill behooves you to question her commands, especially +in the presence of a groom." + +Michael growled, and then the sudden turn in the road startled our +horses on a gallop, and for a quarter of an hour we thrashed our way +ahead in the twilight. We had entered a small thicket when an +ejaculation from Arnold--who had been riding abreast--brought us all up +to a sharp standstill. + +"There's a light," said the groom, in a most tranquil manner, pointing +his heavy crop stick to the left. How we had missed seeing the inn from +the crest of the hill was strange. A hundred yards away stood a low, +red-tiled house, with lights burning downstairs, and an unmistakable air +of hostlery for man and beast. We veered at once in our course, and in a +few minutes were hallooing for the host or the hostler. + +"Now I hope that you are satisfied, my friend," I said exultantly to +Michael, who only grunted as he swung off his animal. Arnold followed, +and soon we were chatting with an amiable old man in a white cap and +apron, who had run out of the house when we shouted. + +"Amboise?" he answered me when I told him of our destination. "Amboise; +why, sirrah, you are a good five leagues from Amboise! Step within and +remain here for the night. I have plenty of convenience for you and your +suite." + +I glanced at Michael, but he was busily employed in loosening his +pistols from the holster, and Arnold, in company with a lame man, led +the horses to the stable. There was little use in vain regrets. The +_other_ had the start of the half-day, and surely we could go no further +that night. I gritted my teeth as the little fat landlord led us into +the house. + +In half an hour we were smoking our pipes before a lively fire--the +night had grown chilly--and enjoying silent recollections of a round of +beef and several bottles of fortifying burgundy. + +Our groom had gone to bed, and I soon saw that I could get nothing out +of Michael for the present. He stared moodily into the fire. I noticed +that his pistols were handy. The host came in and asked my permission to +join us. He felt lonely, he explained, for he was a widower, and his +only son was away in the world somewhere. I was very glad to ease myself +with gossip; my heart was not quite at peace with this expedition of +ours. I knew what her ladyship asked of us was much, so much that only a +bold spirit and a thirst for the unknown could pardon the folly of the +chase. + +I bade the innkeeper to take a seat at the fire, and soon we fell to +chatting like ladies' maids. He was a Norman and curious as a cat. He +opened his inquiries delicately. + +"You have ridden far and fast to-day, my sir. Your horses were all but +done for. Yet there is no cloud of war in the sky and you are too far +from Paris to be honourable envoys. I hope you like our country?" + +I dodged his tentative attempt at prying by asking him a question +myself. + +"You don't seem to have many guests, good host? Yet do I hardly wonder +at it. You are all but swallowed up in the green and too far from the +main travelled road." + +The little man sighed and said in sad accents: "Too true, yet the +Scarlet Dragon was once a thriving place, a fine money-breeding house. +Before my son went away--" + +I interrupted him. "Your son, what is he, and where is he now?" + +The other became visibly agitated and puffed at his pipe some minutes +before replying. + +"Alas! worthy sir," he said at last in a lower key, "my son dare not +return here for reasons I cannot divulge. Indeed, this was no cheerful +house for the boy. He had his ambitions and he left me to pursue them." + +"What does he do, this youngster?" interrupted Michael, in his gruffest +tones. The landlord started. + +"Indeed, good sir, I could not tell you, for I know not myself." + +"Humph!" grunted my sullen companion; but I observed his suspicious +little eyes fixed persistently on the man of the inn. + +I turned the talk, which had threatened to languish. The old man did not +relish the questions about his son, and began deploring the poor crops. +At this juncture an indefinable feeling that we were losing time in +stopping at this lonely place came over me. I am not superstitious, but +I swear that I felt ill at ease and confused in my plans. + +On bended knee I had sworn to my lady that I would bring back to her the +fugitive unharmed, and I would never return to her empty-handed, +confessing failure. Michael's queer behaviour disconcerted me. From the +outset of the chase he had turned sour and inaccessible, and now he was +so ill-tempered that I feared he would pick a quarrel at the slightest +provocation with our host. + +With a strange sinking at the heart I asked about our horses. + +"They will be attended to, my sirs; my servant is a good boy. He is +handy, although he can't get about lively, for he was thrown in a turnip +field from our only donkey." + +I was in no mood for this sort of chatter and quizzed the fellow as to +our beds. + +"We must be off early in the morning; we have important business to +transact at Amboise before the sun sets to-morrow," I testily remarked. + +"At Amboise--h'm, h'm! Well, I don't mind telling you that you can reach +Amboise by stroke of noon; and so you have business at Amboise, eh?" + +I saw Michael's brow lower at this wheedling little man's question, and +answered rather hastily and imprudently:-- + +"Yes, business, my good man, important business, as you will see when we +return this road to-morrow night with the prize we are after." + +Michael jumped up and cried "Damnation!" and I at once saw my mistake. +The landlord's manner instantly altered. He looked at me triumphantly +and said:-- + +"Beds, beds! but, my honoured sirs, I have no beds in the house. I +forgot to tell you that no guest has been upstairs in years, for certain +reasons. Indeed, sirs, I am so embarrassed! I should have told you at +once I have only a day trade. My regular customers would not dare to +stop here over night, as the house,"--here a cunning, even sinister, +look spread over the fellow's fat face--"the house bears an evil +reputation." + +Michael started and crossed himself, but not I. I suspected some deep +devilry and determined to discover it. + +"So ho? Haunted, eh? Well, ghosts and old women's stories shan't make me +budge until dawn. Go fetch more wine and open it here, mine host of the +Scarlet Dragon," I roared. The little man was nonplussed, hesitated a +moment, and then trotted off. + +I saw that Michael was at last aroused. + +"What diabolical fooling is this? If the place is haunted, I'm off." + +"I'm damned if I am," I said quite bravely, and more wine appeared. We +both sat down. + +The air had become nipping, and the blaze on the hearth was reassuring. +Besides, the wind was querulous, and I didn't fancy a ride at midnight, +even if my lady's quest were an urgent one. + +Michael held his peace as the wine was poured out, and I insisted on the +landlord drinking with us. We finished two bottles, and I sent for more. +I foresaw that sleep was out of the question, and so determined to make +a night of it. + +"Touching upon this ghost," I began, when the other bade me in God's +name not to jest. There were some things, he said, not to be broached in +honest Christian company. + +"A fig for your scruples!" I cried, emptying my glass; my head was hot +and I felt bold. "A fig, I say, for your bogie-man nonsense! Tell me at +what time doth this phantom choose to show itself." The landlord +shivered and drew his seat closer to the fire. + +"Oh, sir, do not jest! What I tell you is no matter for rude laughter. +Begging your pardon for my offer, if you will be patient, I will relate +to you the story, and how my misfortune came from this awful visitant." + +Even Michael seemed placated, and after I nodded my head in token of +assent the landlord related to us this story:-- + + * * * * * + +Once upon a time, sirs, when the great and good Louis, sixteenth of his +name, was King of France, this domain was the property of the Duke of +Langlois. The duke was proud and rich, and prouder and haughtier was his +duchess, who was born Berri. Ah! they were mighty folk then, before the +Revolution came with its sharp axes to clip off their heads. This inn +was the stable of the chateau, which stood off yonder in the woods. +Alas! nothing remains of it to-day but a few blackened foundations, for +it was burned to the earth by the red devils in '93. But at the time I +speak of, the chateau was a big, rich palace, full of gay folk; all the +nobility came there, and the duchess ruled the land. + +She was crazy for music, and to such lengths did she go in her madness +that she even invited as her guests celebrated composers and singers. +The duke was old-fashioned and hated those crazy people who lived only +to hum and strum. He would have none of them, and quarrels with his +duchess were of daily occurrence. Indeed, sirs, so bad did it become +that he swore that he would leave the house if Messire Gluck, or Messire +Piccini, or any of the other strolling vagabonds--so the duke called +them--entered his chateau. And he kept his word, did the duke. The +Chevalier Gluck, a fine, shapely man, was invited down by the duchess +and amused her and her guests by playing his wonderful tunes on the +beautiful harpsichord in the great salon. + +The duke would have none of this nonsense and went to Paris, where he +amused himself gambling and throwing gold into his mistresses' laps. The +duchess kept right on, and then the gossips of the neighbourhood began +to wag their busy tongues. The lady of the chateau was getting very fine +pleasure from the company of the handsome Austrian chevalier. It was +whispered that the Queen Marie Antoinette had looked with favourable +eyes upon the composer, and, furthermore, had lent him certain moneys to +further his schemes for reforming the stage. + +Reform, forsooth! all he cared for was the company of the duchess, and +he vowed that he could make better music at the chateau than up in noisy +Paris. On a fine afternoon it is said that it was no uncommon sight to +see the chevalier, all togged up in his bravest court costume, sword and +all, sitting at his harpsichord, playing ravishing music. This was out +in the pretty little park back of the chateau, and the duchess would sit +at Gluck's side and pour out champagne for him. All this may have been +idle talk, but at last the duke got wind of the rumours, and one night +he surprised the pair playing a duo at the harpsichord, and stabbed them +both dead. + +Since then the chateau was burned down, but the place has been haunted. +I, myself, good gentlemen, have heard ghostly music, and I swear to +you-- + +"Oh, my God, listen, listen!" + +"What pagan nonsense!" blurted out Michael. + +I cautioned silence, and we all listened. The old man had slid off his +chair, and his face was chalky white. Michael's ugly mouth was half +opened in his black beard, and I confess that I felt rather chilly. + +Music, faint, tinkling, we certainly heard. It came with the wind in +little sobs, and then silence settled upon us. + +"It's the Chevalier Gluck, and he is playing to his duchess out in the +fields. See, I will open the door and show you," whispered the fat +landlord. + +He went slowly to the door, and we followed him breathlessly. The door +was pushed open, and we peered out. The wind was still high, and the +moon rode among rolling boulders of yellow, fleecy clouds. + +"There, there, over yonder, look; Mother of Christ, look at the ghost!" +the old man pointed a shaking hand. + +Just then the moonlight was blackened by a big cloud, and we heard the +tinkling music of a harpsichord again, but could see naught. The sounds +were plainer now, and presently resolved into the rhythmic accents of a +gavotte. But it seemed far away and very plaintive! + +"Hark," said Michael, in a hoarse voice. "That's the gavotte from +Pagliacci. Listen! Don't you remember it?" + +"Pshaw!" I said roughly, for my nerves were all astir. "It's the Alceste +music of Gluck." + +"Look, look, gentlemen!" called our host, and as the moon glowed again +in the blue we saw at the edge of the forest a white figure, saw it, I +swear, although it vanished at once and the music ceased. I started to +follow, but Michael and the old man seized my arms, the door was closed +with a crash, and we found ourselves staring blankly into the fire, all +feeling a bit shaken up. + +It was Michael's turn to speak. "You may do what you please, but I stay +here for the night, no sleep for me," and he placed his pistols on his +knee. + +I looked at the landlord and I thought I saw an expression of +disappointment on his face, but I was not sure. He made some excuse +about being tired and went out of the room. We spent the rest of the +night in gloomy silence. We did not speak five words, for I saw that +conversation only irritated my companion. + +At dawn we walked into the sweet air and I called loudly for Arnold, who +looked sleepy and out of sorts when he appeared. The fat old man came to +see us off and smilingly accepted the silver I put into his hand for our +night's reckoning. + +"Au revoir, my old friend," I said as I pressed the unnecessary spur +into my horse's flank. "Au revoir, and look out for the ghost of the +gallant Chevalier Gluck. Tell him, with my compliments, not to play +such latter-day tunes as the gavotte from Pagliacci." + +"Oh, I'll tell him, you may be sure," said he, quite dryly. + +We saluted and dashed down the road to Amboise, where we hoped to +capture our rare prize. + +We had ridden about a mile when a dog attempted to cross our path. We +all but ran the poor brute down. + +"Why, it's lame!" exclaimed Arnold. + +"Oh, if it were but a lame man, instead of a dog!" fervently said the +groom, who was in the secret of our quest. + +A horrid oath rang out on the smoky morning air. Michael, his wicked +eyes bulging fiercely, his thick neck swollen with rage, was cursing +like the army in Flanders, as related by dear old Uncle Toby. + +"Lame man! why, oddsbodkins, that hostler was lame! Oh, fooled, by God! +cheated, fooled, swindled and tricked by that scamp and scullion of the +inn! Oh, we've been nicely swindled by an old wives' tale of a ghost!" + +I stared in sheer amazement at Michael, wondering if the strangely spent +night had upset his reason. He could only splutter out between his awful +curses:-- + +"Gluck, the rascal, the ghost, the man we're after! That +harpsichord--the lying knave--that tune--I swear it wasn't Gluck--oh, +the rascal has escaped again! The ghost story--the villain was told to +scare us out of the house--to put us off the track. A thousand devils +chase the scamp!" And Michael let his head drop on the pommel of his +saddle as he fairly groaned in the bitterness of defeat. + +I had just begun a dignified rebuke, for Michael's language was +inexcusable, when it flashed upon me that we had been, indeed, duped. + +"Ah," I cried, in my fury, "of course we were taken in! Of course his +son was the lame hostler, the very prize we expected to bag! O Lord! +what will we say to my lady? We are precious sharp! I ought to have +known better. That stuff he told us! Langlois, pshaw, Berri--pouf! A +Berri never married a Langlois, and I might have remembered that Gluck +wasn't assassinated by a jealous duke. What shall we do?" + +We all stood in the middle of the road, gazing stupidly at the lame dog +that gave us the clue. Then Arnold timidly suggested:-- + +"Hadn't we better go back to the inn?" + +Instantly our horses' heads were turned and we galloped madly back on +our old tracks. Not a word was uttered until we reined up in front of +the lonely house, which looked more haunted by daylight than it did the +night before. + +"What did I tell you?" suddenly cried Michael. + +"What do you mean?" I asked. + +"Over there, you blind bat!" he said, coarsely and impatiently; and +pulling out his pistol he fired thrice, and a low, melodious sound +followed the reports of his weapon. When the smoke cleared away I saw +that he had hit an old harpsichord which stood against a tree, facing +the house. + +"The ghost!" we yelled, and then we laughed consumedly. But the shots +that winged the old-fashioned instrument had a greater result. The fat +host appeared on the edge of the forest, and he waved a large napkin as +a flag of truce. With him was the lame hostler. + +"Mercy, gentlemen, mercy, we beseech you!" he cried, and we soon +surrounded both and bound them securely. + +"You will pay dearly for the trick you put upon us, my man," said +Michael, grimly, and, walking our horses, we went by easy stages toward +the castle, towing our prisoners along. + +When I fetched the lame man to my lady, her face glowed with joy, and +her Parisian eyes grew brilliant with victory. + +"So you tried to escape?" she cruelly asked of the poor, cowering +wretch. "You will never get another chance, I'll warrant me. Go, let the +servants put you to work in the large music room first. Begin with the +grands, then follow with the uprights. Thank you, gentlemen both, for +the courage and finesse you displayed in this desperate quest. I'll see +that you are both suitably rewarded." I fancied that Michael regarded +me sardonically, but he held his peace about the night's adventures. + +We had indeed reason to feel flattered at the success of the dangerous +expedition. Had we not captured, more by sheer good luck than strategy, +the only piano-tuner in mediaeval France? + + + + +XII + +THE TRAGIC WALL + + +I + +BY THE DARK POOL + +It was not so high, the wall, as massive, not so old as moss-covered. +After Rudolph Cot, the painter, had achieved celebrity with his +historical canvas, The Death of the Antique World, now in the Louvre, he +bought the estate of Chalfontaine, which lies at the junction of two +highroads: one leading to Ecouen, the other to Villiers-le-Bel. Almost +touching the end of the park on the Ecouen side there is a little lake, +hardly larger than a pool, and because of its melancholy +aspect--sorrowful willows hem it about, drooping into stagnant +waters--Monsieur Cot had christened the spot: The Dark Tarn of Auber. He +was a fanatical lover of Poe, reading him in the Baudelaire translation, +and openly avowing his preference for the French version of the great +American's tales. That he could speak only five words of English did not +deter his associates from considering him a profound critic of +literature. + +After his death his property and invested wealth passed into the hands +of his youthful widow, a charming lady, a native of Burgundy, and--if +gossip did not lie--a former model of the artist; indeed, some went so +far as to assert that her face could be seen in her late husband's +masterpiece--the figure of a young Greek slave attired as a joyous +bacchante. But her friends always denied this. Her dignified bearing, +sincere sorrow for her dead husband, and her motherly solicitude for her +daughter left no doubt as to the value of all petty talk. It was her +custom of summer evenings to walk to the pool, and with her daughter +Berenice she would sit on the broad wall and watch the moon rise, or +acknowledge the respectful salutations of the country folk with their +bran-speckled faces. In those days Villiers-le-Bel was a dull town a +half-hour from Paris on the Northern Railway, and about two miles from +the station. + +The widow was not long without offers. Her usual answer was to point out +the tiny Berenice, playing in the garden with her nurse. Then a +landscape painter, one of the Barbizon group, appeared, and, as a former +associate of Rudolph Cot, and a man of means and position, his suit was +successful. To the astonishment of Villiers-le-Bel, Madame Valerie Cot +became Madame Theophile Mineur; on the day of the wedding little +Berenice--named after a particularly uncanny heroine of Poe's by his +relentless French admirer--scratched the long features of her +stepfather. The entire town accepted this as a distressing omen and it +was not deceived; Berenice Cot grew up in the likeness of a determined +young lady whose mother weakly endured her tyranny, whose new father +secretly feared her. + +At the age of eighteen she had refused nearly all the young painters +between Ecouen and Domaine de Vallieres; and had spent several summers +in England, and four years at a Lausanne school. She feared neither man +nor mouse, and once, when she saw a famous Polish pianist walking on his +terrace at Morges, she took him by the hand, asked for a lock of his +hair, and was not refused by the amiable virtuoso. After that Berenice +was the acknowledged leader of her class. The teachers trembled before +her sparkling, wrathful black eyes. At home she ruled the household, and +as she was an heiress no one dared to contradict her. Her contempt for +her stepfather was only matched by her impatience in the company of +young men. She pretended--so her intimates said--to loathe them. +"Frivolous idiots" was her mildest form of reproof when an ambitious boy +would trench upon her pet art theories or attempt to flirt. She called +her mother "the lamb" and her stepfather "the parrot"--he had a long +curved nose; all together she was very unlike the pattern French girl. +Her favourite lounging place was the wall, and after she had draped it +with a scarlet shawl and perched herself upon it, she was only too +happy to worry any unfortunate man who presented himself. + +The night Hubert Falcroft called at Chalfontaine Mademoiselle Elise +Evergonde told him that her cousin, Madame Mineur, and Berenice had gone +in the direction of the pool. He had walked over from the station, +preferring the open air to the stuffy train. So a few vigorous steps +brought to his view mother and daughter as they slowly moved, encircling +each other's waist. The painter paused and noted the general loveliness +of the picture; the setting sun had splashed the blue basin overhead +with delicate pinks, and in the fretted edges of some high floating +cloud-fleece there was a glint of fire. The smooth grass parquet swept +gracefully to the semicircle of dark green trees, against the foliage of +which the virginal white of the gowns was transposed to an ivory tone by +the blue and green keys in sky and forest. + +"By Jove!" he exclaimed, "paint in the foreground a few peacocks +languidly dragging their gorgeous tails, and you have a Watteau or a +Fragonard--no, a Monticelli! Only, Monticelli would have made the +peacocks the central motive with the women and trees as an arabesque." + +He was a portraitist who solemnly believed in the principle of +decoration--character must take its chances when he painted. Falcroft +was successful with women's heads, which he was fond of depicting in +misty shadows framed by luxurious accessories. They called him the +Master of Chiffon, at Julien's; when he threw overboard his old friends +and joined the new crowd, their indignation was great. His title now was +the Ribbon Impressionist, and at the last salon of the Independents, +Falcroft had the mortification of seeing a battalion of his former +companions at anchor in front of his picture, The Lady with the Cat, +which they reviled for at least an hour. He was an American who had +lived his life long in France, and only showed race in his nervous, +brilliant technic and his fondness for bizarre subjects.... + +He had not stood many minutes when a young voice saluted him:-- + +"Ah, Monsieur Falcroft. Come, come quickly. Mamma is delighted to see +you!" His mental picture was decomposed by the repeated waving of the +famous shawl, which only came into view as Berenice turned. Hubert +regretted that she had not worn it--the peacocks could have been +exchanged for its vivid note of scarlet. Pretending not to have heard +her speech, he gravely saluted the mother and daughter. But Berenice was +unabashed. + +"Mamma was wondering if you would visit us to-night, Monsieur Falcroft, +when I saw you staring at us as if we were ghosts." A burst of malicious +laughter followed. + +"Berenice, Berenice," remonstrated her mother, "when will you cease such +tasteless remarks!" She blushed in her pretty matronly fashion and put +her hand on her daughter's mouth. + +"Don't mind her, Madame Mineur! I like to meet a French girl with a +little unconventionality. Berenice reminds me now of an English girl--" + +"Or one of your own countrywomen!" interrupted Berenice; "and +please--_Miss_, after this, I am a grown young lady." He joined in the +merriment. She was not to be resisted and he wished--no, he did not +wish--but he thought, that if he were younger, what gay days he might +have. Yet he admired her mother much more. Elaine Cot-Mineur was an +old-fashioned woman, gentle, reserved, and at the age when her beauty +had a rare autumnal quality--the very apex of its perfection; in a few +years, in a year, perhaps, the change would come and crabbed winter set +in. He particularly admired the oval of her face, her soft brown eyes, +and the harmonious contour of her head. He saw her instantly with a +painter's imagination--filmy lace must modulate about her head like a +dreamy aureole; across her figure a scarf of yellow silk; in her hands +he would paint a crystal vase, and in the vase one rose with a heart of +sulphur. And her eyes would gaze as if she saw the symbol of her +age--the days slipping away like ropes of sand from her grasp. He could +make a fascinating portrait he thought, and he said so. Instantly +another peal of irritating laughter came from Berenice:-- + +"Don't tell papa. He is _so_ jealous of the portrait he tried to make of +mamma last summer. You never saw it! It's awful. It's hid away behind a +lot of canvases in the atelier. It looks like a Cezanne still-life. I'll +show it to you sometime." Her mother revealed annoyance by compressing +her lips. Falcroft said nothing. They had skirted the pool in single +file, for the path was narrow and the denseness of the trees caused a +partial obscurity. When they reached the wall, the moon was rising in +the eastern sky. + +"_L'heure exquise_," murmured Madame Mineur. Berenice wandered down the +road and Hubert helped her mother to the wall, where he sat beside her +and looked at her. He was a big, muscular man with shaven cheeks, dark +eyes, and plenty of tumbled hair, in which flecks of gray were showing. +He had been a classmate of Theophile Mineur, for whose talents or +personality he had never betrayed much liking. But one day at a +_dejeuner_, which had prolonged itself until evening, Mineur insisted on +his old friend--the Burgundy was old, too--accompanying him to +Villiers-le-Bel, and not without a motive. He knew Falcroft to be rich, +and he would not be sorry to see his capricious and mischievous +stepdaughter well settled. But Falcroft immediately paid court to Madame +Mineur, and Berenice had to content herself with watching him and making +fun to her stepfather of the American painter's height and gestures. +The visit had been repeated. Berenice was amused by a dinner _en ville_ +and a theatre party, and then Hubert Falcroft became a friend of the +household. When Mineur was away painting, the visits were not +interrupted. + +"Listen," said Madame Mineur; "I wish to speak with you seriously, my +dear friend." She made a movement as if to place her hand on his +shoulder, but his expression--his face was in the light--caused her to +transfer her plump fingers to her coiffure, which she touched +dexterously. Hubert was disappointed. + +"I am listening," he answered; "is it a sermon, or consent--to that +portrait? Come, give in--Elaine." He had never called her by this name +before, and he anxiously awaited the result. But she did not relax her +grave attitude. + +"You must know, Monsieur Falcroft, what anxieties we undergo about +Berenice. She is too wild for a French girl, too wild for her age--" + +"Oh, let her enjoy her youth," he interrupted. + +"Alas! that youth will be soon a thing of the past," she sighed. +"Berenice is past eighteen, and her father and I must consider her +future. Figure to yourself--she dislikes young men, eligible or not, and +you are the only man she tolerates." + +"And I am hopelessly ineligible," he laughingly said. + +"Why?" asked the mother, quietly. + +"Why! Do you know that I am nearing forty? Do you see the pepper and +salt in my hair? After one passes twoscore it is time to think of the +past, not of the future. I am over the brow of the hill; I see the easy +decline of the road--it doesn't seem as long as when I climbed the other +half." He smiled, threw back his strong shoulders, and inhaled a huge +breath of air. + +"Truly you are childish," she said; "you are at the best part of your +life, of your career. Yes, Theophile, my husband, who is so chary in his +praise, said that you would go far if you cared." Her low, warm voice, +with its pleading inflections, thrilled him. He took her by the wrist. + +"And would it please _you_, if I went far?" She trembled. + +"Not too far, dear friend--remember Berenice." + +"I remember no one but you," he impatiently answered; and relaxing his +hold, he moved so that the moonlight shone on her face. She was pale. In +her eyes there were fright and hope, decision and delight. He admired +her more than ever. + +"Let me paint you, Elaine, these next few weeks. It will be a surprise +for Mineur. And I shall have something to cherish. Never mind about +Berenice. She is a child. I am a middle-aged man. Between us is the +wall--of the years. Never should it be climbed. While you--" + +"Be careful--Hubert. Theophile is your friend." + +"He is not. I never cared for him. He dragged me out here after he had +been drinking too much, and when I saw you I could not stay away. Hear +me--I insist! Berenice is nice, but the wall is too high for her to +climb; it might prove a--" + +"How do you know the wall is too steep for Berenice?" the girl cried as +she scaled the top with apish agility, where, after a few mocking steps +in the moonlight, she sank down breathless beside Hubert, and laughed so +loudly that her mother was fearful of hysteria. + +"Berenice! Berenice!" she exclaimed. + +"Oh, Berenice is all right, mamma. Master Hubert, I want you to paint my +portrait before papa returns--that's to be in four weeks, isn't it?" The +elder pair regarded her disconcertedly. + +"Oh, you needn't look so dismal. I'll not tell tales out of school. +Hubert and mamma flirting! What a glorious jest! Isn't life a jest, +Hubert? Let's make a bargain! If you paint mamma, you paint me, also. +Then--you see--papa will not be jealous, and--and--" She was near tears +her mother felt, and she leaned over Hubert and took the girl's hand. +She grazed the long fingers of the painter, who at once caught both +feminine hands in his. + +"Now I have you both," he boasted, and was shocked by a vicious tap on +the cheek--Berenice in rage pulled her left hand free. Silence ensued. +Hubert prudently began to roll another cigarette, and Madame Mineur +retreated out of the moonlight, while Berenice turned her back and soon +began to hum. The artist spoke first: + +"See here, you silly Berenice, turn around! I want to talk to you like a +Dutch uncle--as we say in the United States. Of course I'll paint you. +But I begin with your mother. And if you wish me to like you better than +ever, don't say such things as you did. It hurts your--mother." His +voice dropped into its deepest bass. She faced him, and he saw the +glitter of wet eyelashes. She was charming, with her hair in disorder, +her eyes two burning points of fire. + +"I beg your pardon, mamma; I beg your pardon, Hubert. I'll be good the +rest of this evening. Isn't it lovely?" She sniffed in the breeze with +dilating nostrils, and the wild look of her set him to wondering how +such a gentle mother could have such a gypsy daughter. Perhaps it was +the father--yes, the old man had been an Apache in his youth according +to the slang of the studios. + +"But you must paint me as I wish, not as you will," resumed Berenice. "I +hate conventional portraits. Papa Mineur chills me with his cabinet +pictures of haughty society ladies, their faces as stiff as their +starched gowns." + +"Oh, Berenice, will you never say polite things of your father?" + +"Never," she defiantly replied. "He wouldn't believe me if I did. No, +Hubert, I want to pose as Ophelia. Oh, don't laugh, please!" They could +not help it, and she leaped to the grass and called out:-- + +"I don't mean a theatrical Ophelia, singing songs and spilling flowers; +I mean Ophelia drowned--" she threw herself on the sward, her arms +crossed on her bosom, and in the moonlight they could see her eyes +closed as if by death. + +"Help me down, Hubert. That girl will go mad some day." He reached the +earth and he gave her a hand. Berenice had arisen. Sulkily she said:-- + +"Shall I step into the Dark Tarn of Auber and float for you? I'll make a +realistic picture, my Master Painter--who paints without imagination." +And then she darted into the shrubbery and was lost to view. Without +further speech the two regained the path and returned to the house. + + +II + +THE CRIMSON SPLASH + +When Eloise was asked by Berenice how long Monsieur Mineur would remain +away on his tour, she did not reply. Rather, she put a question herself: +why this sudden solicitude about the little-loved stepfather. Berenice +jokingly answered that she thought of slipping away to Switzerland for +a _vacance_ on her own account. Eloise, who was not agreeable looking, +viewed her charge suspiciously. + +"Young lady, you are too deep for me. But you'll bear watching," she +grimly confessed. Berenice skipped about her teasingly. + +"I know something, but I won't tell, unless you tell." + +"What is it?" + +"Will you tell?" + +"Yes." + +"When is he coming back, and where is he now?" she insisted. + +"Your father, you half-crazy child, expects to return in a month--by the +first of June. And if you wish to wire or write him, let me know." + +"Now I won't tell you _my_ secret," and she was off like a gale of wind. +Eloise shook her head and wondered. + +In the atelier Hubert painted. Elaine sat on a dais, her hands folded in +her lap; about her head twisted nun's-veiling gave her the old-fashioned +quality of a Cosway miniature--the very effect he had sought. It was to +be a "pretty" affair, this picture, with its subdued lighting, the face +being the only target he aimed at; all the rest, the suave background, +the gauzy draperies, he would brush in--suggest rather than state. + +"I'll paint her soul, that sensitive soul of hers which tremulously +peeps out of her eyes," he thought. Elaine was a patient subject. She +took the pose naturally and scarcely breathed during the weary sittings. +He recalled the early gossip and sought to evoke her as a professional +model. But he gave up in despair. She was hopelessly "ladylike," and to +interpret her adequately, only the decorative patterns of earlier +men--Mignard, Van Loo, Nattier, Largilliere--would translate her native +delicacy. + +For nearly four weeks he had laboured on the face, painting it in with +meticulous touches only to rub it out with savage disgust. To transcribe +those tranquil, liquid eyes, their expression more naive than her +daughter's--this had proved too difficult a problem for the usually +facile technique of Falcroft. Give him a brilliant virtuoso theme and he +could handle it with some of the sweep and splendour of the early +Carolus Duran or the brutal elegance of the later Boldini. But Madame +Mineur was a pastoral. She did not express nervous gesture. She was +seldom dynamic. To "do" her in dots like the _pointillistes_ or in +touches after the manner of the earlier impressionists would be +ridiculous. Her abiding charm was her repose. She brought to him the +quiet values of an eighteenth-century eclogue--he saw her as a divinely +artificial shepherdess watching an unreal flock, while the haze of +decorative atmosphere would envelop her, with not a vestige of real life +on the canvas. Yet he knew her as a natural, lovable woman, a mother who +had suffered and would suffer because of her love for her only child. +It was a paradox, like many other paradoxes of art. + +The daughter--ah! perhaps she might better suit his style. She was +admirable in her madcap carelessness and exotic colouring. Decidedly he +would paint her when this picture was finished--if it ever would be. + +Berenice avoided entering the studio during these sittings. She no +longer jested with her mother about the picture, and with Hubert she +preserved such an air of dignity that he fancied he had offended her. He +usually came to Villiers-le-Bel on an early train three or four times a +week and remained at Chalfontaine until ten o'clock. Never but once had +a severe storm forced him to stay overnight. Since the episode on the +wall he had not attempted any further advances. He felt happy in the +company of Elaine, and gazing into her large eyes rested his spirit. It +was true--he no longer played with ease the role of a soul-hunter. His +youth had been troubled by many adventures, many foolish ones, and now +he felt a calm in the midway of his life and that desire for domestic +ease which sooner or later overtakes all men. He fancied himself +painting Elaine on just such tranquil summer afternoons under a soft +light. And oh! the joys of long walks, discreet gossip, and dinners at a +well-served table with a few chosen friends. Was he, after all, longing +for the flesh-pots of the philistine--he, Hubert Falcroft, who had +patrolled the boulevards like other sportsmen of midnight! + +At last the picture began to glow with that inner light he had so +patiently pursued. Elaine Mineur looked at him from the canvas with +veiled sweetness, a smile almost enigmatic lurking about her lips. +Deepen a few lines and her expression would be one of contented +sleekness. _That_ Hubert had missed by a stroke. It was in her eyes that +her chief glory abided. They were pathetic without resignation, liquid +without humidity, indescribable in colouring and form. Their full cup +and the accents which experience had graven under them were something he +had never dreamed of realizing. It was a Cosway; but a Cosway broadened +and without a hint of genteel namby-pamby or overelaborate finesse. +Hubert was fairly satisfied. Madame Mineur had little to say. During the +sittings she seldom spoke, and if their eyes met, the richness of her +glance was a compensation for her lack of loquacity. Hubert did not +complain. He was in no hurry. To be under the same roof with this +adorable woman was all that he asked. + +The day after he had finished his picture, he returned to Chalfontaine +for the midday breakfast. Berenice was absent--in her room with a +headache, her mother explained. The weather was sultry. He questioned +Elaine during the meal. Had Berenice's temper improved? They passed out +to the balcony where their coffee was served, and when he lighted his +cigarette, Madame Mineur begged to be excused. She had promised Cousin +Eloise to pay some calls. He strolled over the lawn, watching the +hummocks of white clouds which piled up in architectural masses across +the southern sky. Then he remembered the portrait and mounted to the +atelier. As he put his hand on the knob of the door he thought he heard +some one weeping. Suddenly the door was pulled from his grasp and +Berenice appeared. Her hair hung on her shoulders. She was in a white +dressing-gown. Her face was red and her eyes swollen. She did not +attempt to move. Affectionately Hubert caught her in his arms and asked +about her headache. + +"It is better," she answered in scarcely audible accents. + +"Why, you poor child! I hope you are not going to be ill! Have you been +racing in the sun without your hat?" + +"No. I haven't been out of doors since yesterday." + +"What's the matter, little Berenice? Has some one been cross with her?" +She pushed him from her violently. + +"Hubert Falcroft, when you treat me as a woman and not as a child--" + +"But I am treating you as a woman," he said. Her dark face became +tragic. She had emerged from girlhood in a few hours. And as he held her +closer some perverse spirit entered into his soul. Her vibrating youth +and beauty forced him to gaze into her blazing eyes until he saw the +pupils contract. + +"Let me go!" she panted. "Let me free! I am not a doll. Go to your +portrait and worship it. Let me free!" + +"And what if I do not?" Something of her rebellious feeling filled his +veins. He felt younger, stronger, fiercer. He put his arms about her +neck and, after a silent battle, kissed her. Then she pushed by him and +disappeared. He could see nothing, after the shock of the adventure, for +some moments, and the semi-obscurity of the atelier was grateful to his +eyes. A picture stood on the easel, but it was not, he fancied, the +portrait. He went to the centre of the room where hung the cords that +controlled the curtains covering the glass roof. Then in the flood of +light he barely recognized the head of Elaine. It was on the easel, and +with a sharp pain at his heart he saw across the face a big crimson +splash. + + * * * * * + + +III + +MOON-RAYS + +The dewy brightness of tangled blush roses had faded in the vague +twilight; through the aisles of the little wood leading to the pool the +light timidly flickered as Hubert and Elaine walked with the hesitating +steps of perplexed persons. They had not spoken since they left the +house--there in a few hurried words he told her of the accident and +noted with sorrow the look of anguish in her eyes. Without knowing why, +they went in the direction of the wall. + +There was no moon when they reached the highroad. It would rise later, +Elaine said in her low, slightly monotonous voice. Hubert was so stunned +by the memory of his ruined picture that he forgot his earlier encounter +with Berenice--that is, in describing it he had failed to minutely +record his behaviour. But in the cool evening air his conscience became +alive and he guiltily wondered whether he dare tell his misconduct--no, +imprudence? Why not? She regarded him as a possible husband for +Berenice--but how embarrassing! He made up his mind to say nothing; when +the morrow came he would write Elaine the truth and bid her good-by. He +could not in honour continue to visit this home where resided the woman +he loved--with a jealous daughter. Why jealous? What a puzzle, and what +an absurd one! He helped Elaine to a seat on the wall and sat near her. +For several minutes neither spoke. They were again facing the pool, +which looked in the dusk like a cracked mirror. + +"It is not clear yet to me," murmured Elaine. "That the unfortunate +child has always been more or less morbid and sick-brained, I have been +aware. The world, marriage, and active existence will mend all that, I +hope. I fear she is a little spoilt and selfish. And she doesn't love me +very much. She has inherited all her father's passion for Poe's tales. +My dear friend, she is jealous--that's the only solution of this +shocking act. She disliked the idea of my portrait from the start. You +remember on this spot hardly a month ago she challenged you to paint her +as the drowned Ophelia!--and all her teasing about Monsieur Mineur and +his jealousy, and--" + +"Our flirtation," added Hubert, sadly. + +"Oh, pray do not say such a thing! She is so hot-headed, so fond of you. +Yes, I saw it from the beginning, and your talk about the insurmountable +wall of middle-age did not deceive me. I only hope that will not be a +tragic wall for her, for you--or for me...." + +Her words trailed into a mere whisper. He put his hand over hers and +again they were silent. About them the green of the forest had been +transformed by the growing night into great clumps of velvety darkness +and the vault overhead was empty of stars. June airs fanned their +discontent into mild despair, and simultaneously they dreamed of another +life, of a harmonious existence far from Paris, into which the phantom +of Theophile Mineur would never intrude. Yet they made no demonstration +of their affection--they would have been happy to sit and dream on this +moon-haunted wall, near this nocturnal pool, forever. Hubert pictured +Berenice in her room, behind bolted doors, lying across the bed weeping, +or else staring in sullen repentance at the white ceiling. Why had she +indulged in such vandalism? The portrait was utterly destroyed by the +flaring smear laid on with a brush in the hand of an enraged young +animal. What sort of a woman might not develop from this tempestuous +girl! He knew that he had mortally offended her by his rudeness. But it +was after, not before, the cruel treatment of his beloved work. Yet, how +like a man had been his rapid succumbing to transitory temptation! For +it was transitory--of that he was sure. The woman he loved, with a +reverent love, was next to him, and if his pulse did not beat as +furiously at this moment as earlier in the day, why--all the better. He +was through forever with his boyish recklessness. + +"Another peculiar thing," broke in Elaine, as if she had been thinking +aloud, "is that Berenice has been pestering Eloise for her father's +address." + +"Her father's address?" echoed her companion. + +"Yes; but whether she wrote to him Eloise could not say." + +"Why should she write to him? She dislikes him--dislikes him almost as +much--" he was about to pronounce his own name. She caught him up. + +"Yes, that is the singular part of this singular affair. She felt +slighted because you painted my portrait before hers. I confess I have +had my misgivings. You should have been more considerate of her +feelings, Hubert, my friend." She paused and sighed. For him the sigh +was a spark that blew up the magazine of his firmest resolves. He had +been touching her hands fraternally. His arm embraced her so that she +could not escape, as this middle-aged man told his passion with the +ardour of an enamoured youth. + +"You dare not tell me you do not care for me! Elaine--let us reason. I +loved you since the first moment I met you. It is folly to talk of +Mineur and my friendship for him. I dislike, I despise him. It is folly +to talk of Berenice and her childish pranks. What if she did cruelly +spoil my work, _our_ work! She will get over it. Girls always do get +over these things. Let us accept conditions as they are. Say you love +me--a little bit--and I'll be content to remain at your side, a friend, +_always_ that. I'll paint you again--much more beautifully than before." +He was hoarse from the intensity of his feelings. The moon had risen and +tipped with its silver brush the tops of the trees. + +"And--my husband? And Berenice?" + +"Let things remain as they are." He pressed her to him. A crackling in +the underbrush and a faint plash in the lake startled them asunder. They +listened with ears that seemed like beating hearts. There was no +movement; only a night bird plaintively piped in the distance and a +clock struck the quarter. + +Elaine, now thoroughly frightened, tried to get down from the wall. +Hubert restrained her, and as they stood thus, a moaning like the wind +in autumnal leaves reached them. The moon-rays began to touch the water, +and suddenly a nimbus of light formed about a floating face in the pool. +The luminous path broadened, and to their horror they saw Berenice, her +hair outspread, her arms crossed on her young bosom, lying in the little +lake. Elaine screamed:-- + +"My God! My God! It is Berenice!--Berenice, I am punished for my +wickedness to you!" Hubert, stunned by the vision, did not stir, as the +almost fainting mother gripped his neck. + +And then the eyes of the whimsical girl opened. A malicious smile +distorted her pretty face. Slowly she arose, a dripping ghost in white, +and pointing her long, thin fingers in the direction of the Ecouen road +she mockingly cried:-- + +"There is some one to see your portrait at last, dear Master Painter." +And saying this she vanished in the gloom, instantly followed by her +agitated mother. + +Hubert turned toward the wall, and upon it he recognized the stepfather +of Berenice. After staring at each other like two moon-struck wights, +the American spoke:-- + +"I swear that I, alone, am to blame for this--" The other wore the grin +of a malevolent satyr. His voice was thick. + +"Why apologize, Hubert? You know that it has been my devoted wish that +you marry Berenice." He swayed on his perch. Hubert's brain was in a +fog. + +"Berenice!" said he. + +"Yes--Berenice. Why not? She loves you." + +"Then--you--Madame Mineur--" stammered Hubert. The Frenchman placed his +finger on his nose and slyly whispered:-- + +"Don't be afraid! I'll not tell my wife that I caught Berenice with you +alone in the park--you Don Juan! Now to the portrait--I must see that +masterpiece of yours. Berenice wrote me about it." He nodded his head +sleepily. + +"Berenice wrote you about it!" was the mechanical reply. + +"I'll join you and we'll go to the house." He tried to step down, but +rolled over at Hubert's feet. + +"What a joke is this champagne," he growled as he was lifted to his +tottering legs. "We had a glorious time this afternoon before I left +Paris. Hurrah! You're to be my son-in-law. And, my boy, I don't envy +you--that's the truth. With such a little demon for a wife--I pity you, +pity you--hurrah!" + +"I am more to be despised," muttered Hubert Falcroft, as they moved away +from the peaceful moonlit wall. + + + + +XIII + +A SENTIMENTAL REBELLION + + I came not to send peace, but a sword.... I am come to send fire on + the earth. + + +I + +Her living room was a material projection of Yetta Silverman's soul. The +apartment on the north side of Tompkins Square, was small, sunny, and +comfortable. From its windows in spring and summer she could see the +boys and girls playing around the big, bare park, and when her eyes grew +tired of the street she rested them on her beloved books and pictures. +On one wall hung the portraits of Herzen, Bakounine and Kropotkin--the +Father, Son, and Holy Ghost of the anarchistic movement, as she piously +called them. Other images of the propaganda were scattered over the +walls: Netschajew--the St. Paul of the Nihilists--Ravachol, Octave +Mirbeau, Jean Grave, Reclus, Spies, Parsons, Engels, and Lingg--the last +four victims of the Haymarket affair, and the Fenians, Allen, Larkin, +and O'Brien, the Manchester martyrs. Among the philosophers, poets, and +artists were Schopenhauer, Tolstoy, Max Stirner--a rare drawing--Ibsen, +Thoreau, Emerson--the great American individualists--Beethoven, Zola, +Richard Strauss, Carlyle, Nietzsche, Gorky, Walt Whitman, Dostoiewsky, +Mazzini, Rodin, Constantin Meunier, Shelley, Turgenieff, Bernard Shaw, +and finally the kindly face and intellectual head of the lawyer who so +zealously defended the Chicago anarchists. This diversified group, +together with much revolutionary literature, poems, pamphlets, the works +of Proudhon, Songs Before Sunrise, by Swinburne, and a beautiful etching +of Makart's proletarian Christ, completed, with an old square +pianoforte, the ensemble of an individual room, a room that expressed, +as her admirers said, the strong, suffering soul of Yetta Silverman, +Russian anarchist, agitator, and exile. + +"Come in," she cried out in her sharp, though not unpleasant, voice. A +thin young man entered. She clapped her hands. + +"Oh, so you changed your mind!" He looked at her over his glasses with +his weak, blue eyes, the white of which predominated. Simply dressed, he +nevertheless gave the impression of superior social station. He was of +the New England theological-seminary type--narrow-chested, gaunt as to +visage, by temperament drawn to theology, or, in default of religious +belief, an ardent enthusiast in sociology. The contracted temples, +uncertain gaze, and absence of fulness beneath the eyes betrayed the +unimaginative man. Art was a sealed book to him, though taxation fairly +fired his suspicious soul. He was nervous because he was dyspeptic, and +at one time of his career he mistook stomach trouble for a call to the +pulpit. And he was a millionnaire more times than he took the trouble to +count. + +"Yes," he timidly replied, "I _did_ change my wavering mind--as you call +that deficient organ of mine--and so I returned. I hope I don't disturb +you!" + +"No, not yet. I am sitting with my hands folded in my lap, like the +women of your class--_ladies_, you call them." She accented the title, +without bitterness. A cursory estimate of her appearance would have +placed her in the profession of a trained nurse, or perhaps in the +remotest analysis, a sewing woman of superior tastes. She was small, +wiry, her head too large for her body; but the abounding nervous +vitality, the harsh fire that burned in her large brown eyes, and the +firm mouth would have attracted the attention of the most careless. Her +mask, with its high Slavic cheek-bones and sharp Jewish nose, proclaimed +her a magnetic woman. In her quarter on the far East Side the children +called her "Aunt Yetta." She was a sister of charity in the guise of a +revolutionist. + +"You sit but you think, and _my_ ladies never think," he answered, in +his boyish voice. He seemed proud to be so near this distinguished +creature. Had she not been sent to Siberia, driven out of France and +Germany, and arrested in New York for her incendiary speeches? She +possessed the most extraordinary power over an audience. Once, at Cooper +Union, Arthur had seen her control a crazy mob bent on destroying the +building because a few stupid police had interfered with the meeting. +Among her brethren Yetta Silverman was classed with Louise Michel, +Sophia Perowskaia, and Vera Zassoulitch, those valiant women, true +guardian angels, veritable martyrs to the cause. He thought of them as +he watched the delicate-looking young woman before him. + +Arthur was too chilly of blood to fall in love with her; his admiration +was purely cerebral. He was unlucky enough to have had for a father a +shrewd, visionary man, that curious combination of merchant and dreamer +once to be found in New England. A follower of Fourier, a friend of +Emerson, the elder Wyartz had gone to Brook Farm and had left it in a +few months. Dollars, not dreams, was his true ambition. But he +registered his dissatisfaction with this futile attempt by christening +his only son, Arthur Schopenhauer; it was old Wyartz's way of getting +even with the ideal. Obsessed from the age of spelling by his +pessimistic middle name, the boy had grown up in a cloudy compromise of +rebellion and the church. For a few years he vacillated; he went to +Harvard, studied the Higher Criticism, made a trip abroad, wrote a +little book recording the contending impulses of his pale, harassed +soul--Oscillations was the title--and returned to Boston a mild anarch. +Emerson the mystic, transposed to the key of France, sometimes makes +bizarre music. + +She arose and, walking over to him, put her hand nonchalantly on his +shoulder. + +"Arthur, comrade, what do you mean to do with yourself--come, what will +all this enthusiasm bring forth?" He fumbled his glasses with his thumb +and index finger--a characteristic gesture--and nervously regarded her +before answering. Then he smiled at his idea. + +"We might marry and fight the great fight together like the Jenkins +crowd." + +"Marry!" she exclaimed--her guttural Russian accent manifested itself +when she became excited--"marry! You are only a baby, Arthur +Schopenhauer Wyartz--_Herrgott_, this child bears _such_ a name!--and +while I am sure the thin Yankee blood of the Jenkins family needed a +Jewish wife, and a Slav, I am not that way of thinking for myself. I am +married to the revolution." Her eyes dwelt with reverence on her new +Christian saints, those Christs of the gutter, who had sacrificed their +lives in the modern arena for the idea of liberty, who were thrown to +the wild beasts and slaughtered by the latter-day pagans of wealth, and +barbarians in purple. He followed her glance. It lashed him to jerky +enthusiasm. + +"I am not joking," he earnestly asserted, "so pardon my rashness. Only +believe in my sincerity. I am no anarch on paper. I am devoted to your +cause and to you, Yetta, to my last heart's blood. Do you need my +wealth? It is yours. You can work miracles with millions in America. +Take it all." + +"It's not money we need, but men," she answered darkly. "Your millions, +which came to you innocently enough, represent the misery of--how many? +Let the multi-millionnaires give away their money to found theological +colleges and libraries--_my_ party will have none of it. Its men are +armed by the ideas that we prefer. I don't blame the rich or the +political tyrants--the mob has to be educated, the unhappy proletarians, +who have so long submitted to the crack of the whip that they wouldn't +know what to do with their freedom if they had it. All mobs believe +alike in filth and fire, whether antique slaves free for their day's +Saturnalia, or the Paris crowds of '93. Their ideas of happiness are +pillage, bloodshed, drunkenness, revenge. Every popular uprising sinks +the _people_ deeper in their misery. Every bomb thrown discredits the +cause of liberty." + +Astonished by this concession, Arthur wondered how she had ever earned +her reputation as the Russian "Red Virgin," as an unequivocal terrorist. +Thus he had heard her hailed at all the meetings which she addressed. +But she did not notice his perturbation, she was following another +train. + +"You Americans do not love money as much as the Europeans--who hoard it +away, who worship it on their naked knees; but you do something +worse--you love it for the sake of the sport, a cruel sport for the +poor. You go into speculation as the English go after big game. It is a +sport. This sport involves food--and you gamble with wheat and meat for +counters, while starving men and women pay for the game. America is yet +rich enough to afford this sport, but some day it will become crowded +like Europe, and then, beware! Wasn't it James Hinton who said that +'Overthrowing society means an inverted pyramid getting straight'? + +"And America," she continued, "bribes us with the gilded sentimental +phrases of Rousseau, Mirabeau, and Thomas Paine woven into your national +constitution, with its presumptuous declaration that all men are born +free and equal--shades of Darwin and Nietzsche!--and that universal +suffrage is a panacea for all evils. In no country boasting itself +Christian is there a system so artfully devised for keeping the _poor_ +free and unequal, no country where so-called public opinion, as +expressed in the press, is used to club the majority into submission. +And you are all proud of this liberty--a liberty at which the despised +serf in Russia or the man of the street in London sneers--there is +to-day more _individual_ liberty in England and Germany than in the +United States. Don't smile! I can prove it. As for France or Italy--they +are a hundred years ahead of you in municipal government. But I shan't +talk blue-books at you, Arthur!" + +"Why not, why not?" he quickly interposed. "You always impress me by +your easy handling of facts. And why won't my money be of use to the +social revolution?" Scornfully she started up again and began walking. + +"Why? Because convictions can't be bought with cash! Why! Because +philanthropy is the most selfish of vices. You may do good here and +there--but you do more harm. You create more paupers, you fine +gentlemen, with your Mission houses and your Settlement workers! You are +trying to cover the ugly sores with a plaster of greenbacks. It won't +heal the sickness--it won't heal it, I tell you." Her eyes were flaming +and she stamped the floor passionately. + +"We workers on the East Side have a name for you millionnaires. We call +you the White Mice. You have pretty words and white lies, pretty ways +and false smiles. Lies! lies! lies! You are only giving back, with the +aid of your superficial fine ladies, the money stolen from the true +money earners. You have discovered the Ghetto--you and the impertinent +newspaper men. And like the reporters you come down to use us for +'copy.' You live here in comfort among us and then go away, write a book +about our wretchedness and pose as altruistic heroes in your own silly +set. How I loathe that word--altruism! As if the sacrifice of your +personality does not always lead to self-deception, to hypocrisy! It is +an excuse for the busybody-rich to advertise their charities. If they +were as many armed as Briareus or the octopus, their charity would be +known to each and every hand on their arms. These sentimental anarchs! +They even marry our girls and carry them off to coddle their conscience +with gilded gingerbread. Yet they would turn their backs on Christ if he +came to Hester Street--Christ, the first modern anarch, a +destructionist, a proletarian who preached fire and sword for the evil +rich of his times. Nowadays he would be sent to Blackwell's Island for +six months as a disturber of the peace or for healing without a license +from the County Medical Association!" + +"Like Johann Most," he ventured. She blazed at the name. + +"No jokes, please. Most, too, has suffered. But I am no worshipper of +bombs--and beer." This made him laugh, but as the laugh was not echoed +he stared about him. + +"But Yetta,--we must begin somewhere. I wish to become--to +become--something like you.--" + +She interrupted him roughly: + +"To become--you an anarch! You are a sentimental rebel because your +stomach is not strong enough for the gourmands who waste their time at +your clubs. If your nerves were sound you might make a speech. But the +New England conscience of your forefathers--they were nearly all +clergymen, weren't they?--has ruined your strength. The best thing you +can do, my boy, is to enter a seminary and later go to China as a +missionary; else turn literary and edit an American edition of Who's Who +in Hell! But leave our East Side alone. Do you know what New York +reminds me of? Its centre is a strip of green and gold between two +smouldering red rivers of fire--the East and West Sides. If they ever +spill over the banks, all the little parasites of greater parasites, the +lawyers, brokers, bankers, journalists, ecclesiastics, and middle men, +will be devoured. Oh, what a glorious day! And oh, that terrible night +when we marched behind the black flag and muffled drums down Broadway, +that night in 1887 when the four martyrs were murdered, the hero Lingg +having killed himself. What would you have done in those awful times?" + +"Try me," he muttered, as he pulled down his cuffs, "try me!" + +"Very well, I'll try you. Like Carlo Cafiero, the rich Italian anarch, +you must give your money to us--every cent of it. Come with me to-night. +I address a meeting of the brethren at Schwab's place--you know, the +saloon across the street, off the square. We can eat our supper there, +and then--" + +"Try me," he reiterated, and his voice was hoarse with emotion, his +pulse painfully irregular. + + +II + +Notwithstanding his vows of heroism, Arthur could not force himself to +like the establishment of Schwab, where the meeting was to take place. +It was a beer-saloon, not one of those mock-mediaeval uptown palaces, but +a long room with a low ceiling, gaslit and shabby. The tables and chairs +of hard, coarse wood were greasy--napkins and table-cloths were not to +be mentioned, else would the brethren suspect the presence of an +aristocrat. At the upper end, beyond the little black bar, there was a +platform, upon it a table, a pianoforte, and a stool. Still he managed +to conceal his repugnance to all these uninviting things and he sipped +his diluted Rhine wine, ate his sandwich--an unpalatable one--under the +watchful eyes of his companion. By eight o'clock the room was jammed +with working-people, all talking and in a half dozen tongues. +Occasionally Yetta left him to join a group, and where she went silence +fell. She was the oracle of the crowd. At nine o'clock Arthur's head +ached. He had smoked all his Turkish cigarettes, the odour of which +caused some surprise--there was a capitalist present and they knew him. +Only Yetta prevented disagreeable comment. The men, who belonged to the +proletarian class, were poorly dressed and intelligent; the women wore +shawls on their heads and smoked bad cigarettes. The saloon did not +smell nice, Arthur thought. He had offered Yetta one of his imported +cigarettes, but she lighted a horrible weed and blew the smoke in his +face. + +At ten o'clock he wished himself away. But a short, stout man with a +lopsided face showing through his tangled beard, stood up and said in +German:-- + +"All who are not _our_ friends, please leave the house." + +No one stirred. The patron went from group to group saluting his +customers and eying those who were not. Whether any password or signal +was given Arthur could not say. When the blond, good-natured Schwab +reached him, Yetta whispered in his ear. The host beamed on the young +American and gave him a friendly poke in the back; Arthur felt as if he +had been knighted. He said this to Yetta, but her attention was +elsewhere. The doors and windows were quickly shut and bolted. She +nudged his elbow--for they were sitting six at the table, much to his +disgust; the other four drank noisily--and he followed her to the top of +the room. A babble broke out as they moved along. + +"It's Yetta's new catch. Yetta's rich fellow. Wait until she gets +through with him--poor devil." These broken phrases made him shiver, +especially as Yetta's expression, at first enigmatic, was now openly +sardonic. What did she mean? Was she only tormenting him? Was this to be +his test, his trial? His head was almost splitting, for the heat was +great and the air bad. Again he wished himself home. + +They reached the platform. "Jump up, Arthur, and help me," she +commanded. He did so. But his discomfiture only grew apace with the +increased heat--the dingy ceiling crushed him--and the rows in front, +the entire floor seemed transformed to eyes, malicious eyes. She told +him to sit down at the piano and play the Marseillaise. Then standing +before the table she drew from her bosom a scarlet flag, and accompanied +by the enthusiastic shoutings she led the singing. Arthur at the +keyboard felt exalted. Forgotten the pains of a moment before. He +hammered the keys vigorously, extorting from the battered instrument a +series of curious croakings. Some of the keys did not "speak," some gave +forth a brazen clangour from the rusty wires. No one cared. The singing +stopped with the last verse. + +"Now La Ravachole for our French brethren." This combination of +revolutionary lyrics--Ca Ira and Carmagnole--was chanted fervidly. Then +came for the benefit of the German the stirring measures from the +Scotch-German John Henry Mackay's Sturm:-- + + Das ist der Kampf, den allnaechtlich + Bevor das Dunkel zerrinnt, + Einsam und gramvoll auskaempt + Des Jahrhunderts verlorenes Kind. + +Yetta waved her long and beautifully shaped hands--they were her +solitary vanity. The audience became still. She addressed them at first +in deliberate tones, and Arthur noted that the interest was genuine--he +wondered how long his fat-witted club friends could endure or +appreciate the easy manner in which Yetta Silverman quoted from great +thinkers, and sprinkled these quotations with her own biting +observations. + +"Richard Wagner--who loved humanity when he wrote Siegfried and +regretted that love in Parsifal! + +"Richard Wagner--who loved ice-cream more than Dresden's +freedom--Wagner: the Swiss family bell-ringer of '48! + +"To Max Stirner, Ibsen, and Richard Strauss belongs the twentieth +century! + +"Nietzsche--the anarch of aristocrats! + +"Karl Marx--or the selfish Jew socialist! + +"Lassalle--the Jew comedian of liberty! + +"Bernard Shaw--the clever Celt who would sacrifice socialism for an +epigram. + +"Curse all socialists!" she suddenly screamed. + +Arthur, entranced by the playful manner with which she disposed of +friend and foe, was aghast at this outbreak. He saw another Yetta. Her +face was ugly and revengeful. She sawed the air with her thin arms. + +"Repeat after me," she adjured her hearers, "the Catechism of Sergei +Netschajew, but begin with Herzen's noble motto: 'Long live chaos and +destruction!'" + +"Long live chaos and destruction!" was heartily roared. + +The terrific catechism of the apostle Netschajew made Arthur shake with +alternate woe and wrath. It was bloody-minded beyond description. Like +a diabolic litany boomed the questions and answers:-- + +"Day and night we must have but one thought--inexorable destruction." +And Arthur recalled how this pupil of Bakounine had with the assistance +of Pryow and Nicolajew beguiled a certain suspected friend, Ivanow, into +a lonely garden and killed him, throwing the body into a lake. After +that Netschajew disappeared, though occasionally showing himself in +Switzerland and England. Finally, in 1872, he was nabbed by the Russian +government, sent to Siberia, and--! + +_Ugh!_ thought Arthur, what a people, what an ending! And Yetta--why did +she now so openly proclaim destruction as the only palliative for social +crime when she had so eloquently disclaimed earlier in the day the +propaganda by force, by dagger, and dynamite?--He had hardly asked +himself the question when there came a fierce rapping of wooden clubs at +door and window. Instantly a brooding hush like that which precedes a +hurricane fell upon the gathering. But Yetta did not long remain silent. + +"Quick, Arthur, play the Star-Spangled Banner! It's the police. I want +to save these poor souls--" she added, with a gulp in her throat; +"quick, you idiot, the Star-Spangled Banner." But Arthur was almost +fainting. His ringers fell listlessly on the keys, and they were too +weak to make a sound. The police! he moaned, as the knocking deepened +into banging and shouting. What a scandal! What a disgrace! He could +never face his own world after this! To be caught with a lot of crazy +anarchists in a den like this!--Smash, went the outside door! And the +newspapers! They would laugh him out of town. He, Arthur Schopenhauer +Wyartz, the Amateur Anarch! He saw the hideous headlines. Why, the very +daily in which some of his fortune was invested would be the first to +mock him most! + +The assault outside increased. He leaped to the floor, where Yetta was +surrounded by an excited crowd. He plucked her sleeve. She gazed at him +disdainfully. + +"For God's sake, Yetta, get me out of this--this awful scrape. My +mother, my sisters--the disgrace!" She laughed bitterly. + +"You poor chicken among hawks! But I'll help you--follow me." He reached +the cellar stairs, and she showed him a way by which he could walk +safely into the alley, thence to the street back of their building. He +shook her hand with the intensity of a man in the clutches of the ague. + +"But you--why don't you go with me?" he asked, his teeth chattering. + +The brittle sound of glass breaking was heard. She answered, as she took +his feverish hand:-- + +"Because, you brave revolutionist, I must stick to my colours. +Farewell!" And remounting the stairs, she saw the bluecoats awaiting +her. + +"I hope the police will catch him anyhow," she said. It was her one +relapse into femininity, and as she quietly surrendered she did not +regret it. + + +III + +Old Koschinsky's store on the avenue was the joy of the neighbourhood. +For hours, their smeary faces flattened against the glass, the children +watched the tireless antics of the revolving squirrels; the pouter +pigeons expand their breasts into feathered balloons; the goldfish, as +they stolidly swam, their little mouths open, their eyes following the +queer human animals imprisoned on the other side of the plate-glass +window. Canary birds by the hundreds made the shop a trying one for +sensitive ears. There were no monkeys. Koschinsky, whose heart was as +soft as butter, though he was a formidable revolutionist--so he swore +over at Schwab's--declared that monkeys were made in the image of +tyrannical humans. He would have none of them. Parrots? There were +enough of the breed around him, he told the gossiping women, who, with +their _scheitels_, curved noses, and shining eyes, lent to the quarter +its Oriental quality. + +It was in Koschinsky's place that Arthur first encountered Yetta. He was +always prowling about the East Side in search of sociological prey, and +the modest little woman with her intelligent and determined face +attracted him strongly. They fell into easy conversation near a cage of +canaries, and the acquaintance soon bloomed into a friendship. A week +after the raid on Schwab's, Arthur, very haggard and nervous, wandered +into Koschinsky's. The old man greeted him:-- + +"Hu! So you've just come down from the Island! Well--how did you like it +up there? Plenty water--eh?" The sarcasm was too plain, and the young +man, mumbling some sort of an answer, turned to go. + +"Hold on there!" said Koschinsky. "I expect a very fine bird soon. You'd +better wait. It was here only last night; and the bird asked whether you +had been in." Arthur started. + +"For me? Miss Silverman?" + +"I said a bird," was the dogged reply. And then Yetta walked up to +Arthur and asked:-- + +"Where have you been? Why haven't you called?" He blushed. + +"I was ashamed." + +"Because you were so, so--frightened, that night?" + +"Yes." + +"But nothing came of the affair. The police could get no evidence. We +had no flags--" + +"That scarlet one I saw you with--what of it?" She smiled. + +"Did you look in your pockets when you got home? I stuffed the flag in +one of them while we were downstairs." He burst into genteel laughter. + +"No, I threw off my clothes in such disgust that night that I vowed I +would never get into them again. I gave the suit to my valet." + +"Your valet," she gravely returned; "he may become _one of us_." + +"Fancy, when I reached the house--I went up in a hansom, for I was +bareheaded--my mother was giving the biggest kind of a ball. I had no +end of trouble trying to sneak in unobserved." + +She regarded him steadily. "Isn't it strange," she went on, "how the +bull-dog police of this town persecute us--and they _should_ be +sympathetic. They had to leave their own island because of tyranny. Yet +as soon as they step on this soil they feel themselves self-constituted +tyrants. Something of the sort happened with your own ancestors--" she +looked at him archly--"the Pilgrim Fathers were not very tolerant to the +Quakers, the Jews, Catholics, or any sect not their own. Now you do not +seem to have inherited that ear-slicing temperament--" + +"Oh, stop, Yetta! Don't make any more fun of me. I confess I am +cowardly--I hate rows and scandals--" + +"'What shall it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his +liberty?'" + +"Yes, I know. But this was such a nasty little affair. The newspapers +would have driven me crazy." + +"But suppose, for the sake of argument," she said, "that the row would +not have appeared in the newspapers--what then?" + +"What do you mean? By Jove, there was nothing in the papers, now that I +come to think of it. I went the next morning out to Tuxedo and +forgot--what do you mean by this mystery, Yetta?" + +"I mean this--suppose, for the sake of further argument, I should tell +you that there was no row, no police, no arrests!" He gasped. + +"O-h, what an ass I made of myself. So that was your trial! And I +failed. Oh, Yetta, Yetta--what shall I say?" The girl softened. She took +both his hands in her shapely ones and murmured:-- + +"Dear little boy, I treated you roughly. Forgive me! There was a real +descent by the police--it was no deception. That's why I asked you to +play the Star-Spangled Banner--" + +"Excuse me, Yetta; but why did you do that? Why didn't you meet the +police defiantly chanting the Marseillaise? That would have been +braver--more like the true anarchist." She held down her head. + +"Because--because--those poor folks--I wanted to spare them as much +trouble with the police as possible," she said in her lowest tones. + +"And why," he pursued triumphantly, "why did you preach bombs after +assuring me that reform must come through the spiritual propaganda?" She +quickly replied:-- + +"Because our most dangerous foe was in the audience. You know. The man +with the beard who first spoke. He has often denounced me as lukewarm; +and then you know words are not as potent as deeds with the +proletarians. One assassination is of more value than all the philosophy +of Tolstoy. And that old wind-bag sat near us and watched us--watched +me. That's why I let myself go--" she was blushing now, and old +Koschinsky nearly dropped a bird-cage in his astonishment. + +"Yetta, Yetta!" Arthur insisted, "wind-bag, you call your comrade? Were +you not, just for a few minutes, in the same category? Again she was +silent. + +"I feel now," he ejaculated, as he came very close to her, "that we must +get outside of these verbal entanglements. I want you to become my +wife." His heart sank as he thought of his mother's impassive, high-bred +air--with such a figure for a Fifth Avenue bride! The girl looked into +his weak blue eyes with their area of saucer-like whiteness. She shook +her stubborn head. + +"I shall never marry. I do not believe in such an institution. It +degrades women, makes tyrants of men. No, Arthur--I am fond of you, +perhaps--" she paused,--"so fond that I might enter into any relation +but marriage,--that never!" + +"And I tell you, Yetta, anarchy or no anarchy, I could never respect the +woman if she were not mine legally. In America we do these things +differently--" he was not allowed to finish. + +She glared at him, then she strode to the shop door and opened it. + +"Farewell to you, Mr. Arthur Schopenhauer Wyartz, amateur anarchist. +Better go back to your mother and sisters! _Mein Gott_, Schopenhauer, +too!" He put his Alpine hat on his bewildered head and without a word +went out. She did not look after him, but walked over to the old +bird-fancier and sat on his leather-topped stool. Presently she rested +her elbows on her knees and propped her chin with her gloveless hands. +Her eyes were red. Koschinsky peeped at her and shook his head. + +"Yetta--you know what I think!--Yetta, the boy was right! You shouldn't +have asked him for the Star-Spangled Banner! The Marseillaise would have +been better." + +"I don't care," she viciously retorted. + +"I know, I know. But a nice boy--_so_ well fixed." + +"I don't care," she insisted. "I'm married to the revolution." + +"Yah, yah! the revolution, Yetta--" he pushed his lean, brown forefinger +into the cage of an enraged canary--"the revolution! Yes, Yetta +Silverman, the revolution!" She sighed. + + + + +XIV + +HALL OF THE MISSING FOOTSTEPS + + So I saw in my dream that the man began to run. + + --_Pilgrim's Progress_. + + +I + +As the first-class carriage rolled languidly out of Balak's only railway +station on a sultry February evening, Pobloff, the composer, was not +sorry. + +"I wish it were Persia instead of Ramboul," he reflected. Luga, his +wife, he had left weeping at the station; but since the day she +disappeared with his orchestra for twenty-four hours, Pobloff's +affection had gradually cooled; he was leaving the capital without a +pang on a month's leave of absence--a delicate courtesy of the king's +extended to a brother ruler, though a semi-barbarous one, the khedive of +Ramboul. + +Pobloff was not sad nor was he jubilantly glad. The journey was an easy +one; a night and day and the next night would see him, God willing,--he +crossed himself,--in the semi-tropical city of Nirgiz. From Balak to +Nirgiz, from southeastern Europe to Asia Minor! + +The heir-apparent was said to be a music-loving lad, very much under +the cunning thumb of his grim old aunt, who, rumour averred, wore a +black beard, and was the scourge of her little kingdom. All that might +be changed when the prince would reach his majority; his failing health +and morbid melancholy had frightened the grand vizier, and the king of +Balakia had been petitioned to send Pobloff, the composer, designer of +inimitable musical masques, Pobloff, the irresistible interpreter of +Chopin, to the aid of the ailing youth. + +So this middle-aged David left his nest to go harp for a Saul yet in his +adolescence. What his duties were to be Pobloff had not the slightest +idea. He had received no special instructions; a member of the royal +household bore him the official mandate and a purse fat enough to soothe +his wife's feelings. After appointing his first violin conductor of the +Balakian Orchestra during his absence, the fussy, stout, good-natured +Russian (he was born at Kiew, 1865, the biographical dictionaries say) +secured a sleeping compartment on the Ramboul express, from the windows +of which he contemplated with some satisfaction the flat land that +gradually faded in the mists of night as the train tore its way noisily +over a rude road-bed. + + +II + +Pobloff slept. He usually snored; but this evening he was too fatigued. +He heard not the sudden stoppages at lonely way stations where hoarse +voices and a lantern represented the life of the place; he did not heed +the engine as it thirstily sucked water from a tank in the heart of the +Karpakians; and he was surprised, pleased, proud, when a hot February +sun, shining through his window, awoke him. + +It was six o'clock of a fine morning, and the train was toiling up a +precipitous grade to the spine of the mountain, where the down-slope +would begin and air-brakes rule. Pobloff looked about him. He scratched +his long nose, a characteristic gesture, and began wondering when coffee +would be ready. He pressed the bell. The guard entered, a miserable +bandit who bravely wore his peaked hat with green plumes a la Tyrol. He +spoke four tongues and many dialects; Pobloff calculated his monthly +salary at forty roubles. + +"No, Excellency, the coffee will be hot and refreshing at Kerb, where we +arrive about seven." He cleared his throat, put out his hand, bowed low, +and disappeared. The composer grumbled. Kerb!--not until that wretched +eyrie in the clouds! And such coffee! No matter. Pobloff never felt in +robuster health; his irritable nerves were calmed by a sound night's +sleep. The air was fresher than down in the malarial valley, where stood +the shining towers of Balak; he could see them pinked by the morning sun +and low on the horizon. All together he was glad.... + +Hello, this must be Kerb! A moment later Pobloff bellowed for the +guard; he had shattered the electric annunciator by his violence. Then, +not waiting to be served, he ran into the vestibule, and soon was on the +station platform, inhaling huge drafts of air into his big chest. Ah! It +was glorious up there. What surprised him was the number of human beings +clambering over the steps, running and gabbling like a lot of animals +let loose from their cages. The engineer beside his quivering machine +enjoyed his morning coffee. And there were many turbaned pagans and some +veiled women mixed with the crowd. + +The sparkling of bright colours and bizarre costumes did not disturb +Pobloff, who had lived too long on anonymous borders, where Jew, +Christian, Turk, Slav, African, and outlandish folk generally melted +into a civilization which still puzzled ethnologists. + +A negro, gorgeously clad, guarding closely a slim female, draped from +head to foot in virginal white, attracted the musician. The man's face +was monstrous in its suggestion of evil, and furthermore shocking, +because his nose was a gaping hole. Evidently a scimiter had performed +this surgical operation, Pobloff mused. + +The giant's eyes offended him, they so stared, and threateningly. + +Pobloff was not a coward. After his adventure in Balak, he feared +neither man nor devil, and he insolently returned the black fellow's +gaze. They stood about a buffet and drank coffee. The young woman--her +outlines were girlish--did not touch anything; she turned her face in +Pobloff's direction, so he fancied, and spoke at intervals to her +attendant. + +"I must be a queer-looking bird to this Turk and her keeper--probably +some Georgian going to a rich Mussulman's harem in company with his +eunuch," Pobloff repeated to himself. + +A gong was banged. Before its strident vibrations had ceased troubling +the thin morning air, the train began to move slowly out of Kerb. +Pobloff again was glad. + +He remained on the rear platform of his car as long as the white +station, beginning to blister under a tropical sun, was in sight. Then +he sought his compartment. His amazement and rage were great when he +found the two window seats occupied by the negro and the mysterious +creature. Pobloff's bag was tumbled in a corner, his overcoat, hat, and +umbrella tossed to the other end of the room. The big black man bared +his teeth smilingly, the shrouded girl shrank back as if in fear. + +"Well, I'll be--!" began the composer. Then he leaned over and pushed +the button, the veins in his forehead like whipcords, his throat parched +with wrath. But to no avail--the bell was broken. Pobloff's first +impulse was to take the smiling Ethiopian by the neck and pitch him out. +There were several reasons why he did not: the giant looked dangerous; +he plainly carried a brace of pistols, and at least one dagger, the +jewelled handle of which flashed over his glaring sash of many tints. +And then the lady--Pobloff was very gallant, too gallant, his wife said. +The bell would not ring! What was he to do? He soon made up his mind, +supple Slav that he was. With a muttered apology he sank back and closed +his eyes in polite despair. + +His consternation was overwhelming when a voice addressed him in +Russian, a contralto voice of some indefinable timbre, the voice of a +female, yet not without epicene intonations. His eyes immediately +opened. From her gauze veiling the young woman spoke:-- + +"We are sorry to derange you. The guard made a mistake. Pardon!" The +tone was slightly condescending, as if the goddess behind the cloud had +deigned to notice a mere mortal. Her attendant was smiling, and to +Pobloff his grin resembled a newly sliced watermelon. But her voice +filled him with ecstasy. His ear, as sensitive as the eye of a Claude +Monet, noted every infinitesimal variation in tone-colour, and each +shade was a symbol for the fantastic imagination of this poetic +composer. The girlish voice affected him strangely. It pierced his soul +like a poniard. It made his spine chilly. It evoked visions of white +women languorously moving in processional attitudes beneath the chaste +rays of an implacable moon. The voice modulated into crisp morning +inflections:-- + +"You are going far, Excellency?" She knew him! And the slave who +grinned and grinned and never spoke--what was _he_? She seemed to follow +Pobloff's thought. + +"Hamet is dumb. His tongue was cut at the same time he lost his nose. It +all happened at the siege of Yerkutz." + +Pobloff at last found words. + +"Poor fellow!" he said sympathetically, and then forgot all about the +mutilated one. "You are welcome to this compartment," he assured her in +his oiliest manner. "What surprises me is that I did not see your Serene +Highness when we left Balak." She started at the title that he bestowed +upon her, and he inwardly chuckled. Clever dog, Pobloff, clever dog! Her +eyes were brilliant despite obstructing veils. + +"I was _en route_ to Balak yesterday, but my servant became ill and I +stopped over night at Kerb." Pobloff was entranced. She was undoubtedly +a young dame of noble birth and her freedom, the freedom of a European +woman, delighted him. It also puzzled. + +"How is it--?" he asked. + +But they had begun that fearful descent, at once the despair and delight +of engineers. The mountain fell away rapidly as the long, clumsy train +raced down its flank at a breakneck pace. Pobloff shivered and clutched +the arms of his seat. He saw nothing but deep blue sky and the tall top +of an occasional tree. The racket was terrific, the heat depressing. She +sat in her corner, apparently sleeping, while the giant smiled, always +smiled, never removing his ugly eyes from the perspiring countenance of +Pobloff. + +As they neared earth's level, midday was over. Pobloff hungered. Before +he could go in search of the ever absent guard, the woman suddenly sat +up, clapped her hands, and said something; but whether it was Turkish, +Roumanian, or Greek, he couldn't distinguish. A hamper was hauled from +under the seat by the servant, and to his joy Pobloff saw white rolls, +grapes, wine, figs, and cheese. He bowed and began eating. The others +looked at him and for a moment he could have sworn he heard faint +laughter. + +"I am so hungry," he said apologetically. "And you, Serenity, won't you +join me?" He offered her fruit. It was declined with a short nod. He was +dying to smoke, and, behold! priceless Turkish tobacco was thrust into +his willing hand. He rolled a stout cigarette, lighted it. Then a sigh +reached his ears. "The lady smokes," he thought, and slyly chuckled. + +A sound of something tearing was heard, and a pair of beautiful hands +reached for the tobacco. In a few moments the slender fingers were +pressing a cigarette; the slave lighted a wax fusee; the lady took it, +put the cigarette in a rent of her veil, and a second volume of odorous +vapour arose. Pobloff leaned back, stupefied. A Mohammedan woman smoking +in a Trans-Caucasian railway carriage before a Frank! Stupendous! He +felt unaccountably gay. + +"This is joyful," he said aloud. She smoked fervently. "Western manners +are certainly invading the East," he continued, hoping to hear again +that voice of marvellous resonance. She smoked. "Why, even Turkish women +have been known to study music in Paris." + +"I am not a Turk," she said in her deepest chest tones. + +"Pardon! A Russian, perhaps? Your accent is perfect. I am a Russian." +She did not reply. + +The day declined, and there was no more conversation. As the train +devoured leagues of swampy territory, villages were passed. The +journey's end was nearing. Soon meadows were seen surrounding +magnificent villas. A wide, shallow river was crossed, the Oxal; Pobloff +knew by his pocket map that Nirgiz was nigh. And for the first time in +twenty-four hours he sorrowed. Despite his broad invitations and +unmistakable hints, he could not trap his travelling companion into an +avowal of her identity, of her destination. Nothing could be coaxed from +the giant, and it was with a sinking heart--Pobloff was very +sentimental--that he saw the lights of Nirgiz; a few minutes later the +train entered the Oriental station. In the heat, the clamour of half a +thousand voices, yelling unknown jargons, his resolution to keep his +companions in view went for naught. Beset by jabbering porters, he did +not have an opportunity to say farewell to the veiled lady; with her +escort she had disappeared when the car stopped--and without a word of +thanks! Pobloff was wretched. + + +III + +It was past nine o'clock as he roamed the vast garden surrounding the +Palace of a Thousand Sounds--thus named because of the tiny bells +tinkling about its marble dome. He had eaten an unsatisfying meal in a +small antechamber, waited upon by a stupid servant. And worse still, the +food was ill cooked. On presenting his credentials, earlier in the +evening, the grand vizier, a sneaky-appearing man, had welcomed him +coldly, telling him that her Serene Highness was too exhausted to +receive so late in the day; she had granted too many audiences that +afternoon. + +"And the prince?" he queried. The prince was away hunting by moonlight, +and could not be seen for at least a day. In the interim, Pobloff was +told to make himself at home, as became such a distinguished composer +and artistic plenipotentiary of Balakia's king. Then he was bowed out of +the chamber, down the low malachite staircase, into his supper room. It +was all very disturbing to a man of Pobloff's equable disposition. + +He thought of Luga, his little wife, his dove; but not long. She did not +appeal to his heart of hearts; she was a coquette. Pobloff sighed. He +was midway in his mortal life, a dangerous period for susceptible +manhood. He lifted moist eyes to the stars; the night was delicious. He +rested upon a cushioned couch of stone. About him the moonlight painted +the trees, until they seemed like liquefied ermine; the palace arose in +pyramidal surges of marble to the sky, meeting the moonbeams as if in +friendly defiance, and casting them back to heaven with triumphant +reflections. And the stillness, profound as the tomb, was punctuated by +glancing fireflies. Pobloff hummed melodiously. + +"A night to make music," whispered a deep, sweet voice. Before he could +rise, his heart bounding as if stung to its centre, a woman, swathed in +white, sat beside him, touched him, put such a pressure upon his +shoulder that his blood began to stir. It was she. He stumbled in his +speech. She laughed, and he ground his teeth, for this alone saved him +from foolishness, from mad behaviour. + +"Maestro--you could make music this lovely night?" Pobloff started. + +"In God's name, who are you, and what are you doing here? Where did you +go this evening? I missed you. Ah! unhappy man that I am, you will drive +me crazy!" + +She did not smile now, but pressed close to him. + +"I am a prisoner--like yourself," she replied simply. + +"A prisoner! How a prisoner? I am not a prisoner, but an envoy from my +king to the sick princeling." + +She sighed. + +"The poor, mad prince," she said, "he is in need of your medicine, +sadly. He sent for me a year ago, and I am now his prisoner for life." + +"But I saw you on the train, a day's journey hence," interrupted the +musician. + +"Yes, I had escaped, and was being taken back by black Hamet when we +met." + +Pobloff whistled. So the mystery was disclosed. A little white slave +from the seraglio of this embryo tyrant had flown the cage! No wonder +she was watched, little surprise that she did not care to eat. He +straightened himself, the hair on his round head like porcupine quills. + +"My dear young lady," he exclaimed in accents paternal, "leave all to +me. If you do not wish to stay in this place, you may rely on me. When I +see this same young man,--he must be a nice sprig of royalty!--I propose +to tell him what I think of him." Pobloff threw out his chest and +snorted with pride. Again he fancied that he heard suppressed laughter. +He darted glances in every direction, but the fall of distant waters +smote upon his ears like the crepuscular music of Chopin. His companion +shook with ill-suppressed emotion. It was some time before she could +speak. + +"Pobloff," she begged, in her dangerous contralto, a contralto like the +medium register of a clarinet, "Pobloff, let me adjure you to be +careful. Your coming here has caused political disturbances. The aunt of +the prince hates music as much as he adores it. She is no party to your +invitation. So be on your guard. Even now there may be spies in the +shrubbery." She put her hand on his arm. It was too much. In an instant, +despite her feeble struggle, the ardent musician grasped the creature +that had tantalized him since morning, and kissed her a dozen times. His +head whirled. Pobloff! Pobloff! a voice cried in his brain--and only +yesterday you left your Luga, your pretty pigeon, your wife! + +The girl was dragged away from him. In the moonshine he saw the grinning +Hamet, suspiciously observing him. The runaway stood up and pressed +Pobloff's hand desperately, uttering the cry of her forlorn heart:-- + +"Don't play in the great hall; don't play in that accursed place. You +will be asked, but refuse. Make any excuse, but do not set foot on its +ebon floors." + +He was so confused by the strangeness of this adventure, so confused by +the admonition of the unknown when he saw her white draperies disappear, +that his jaw fell and his courage wavered. A moment later two oddly +caparisoned soldiers, bearing lights, approached, and in the name of her +Highness invited him make midnight music in the Palace of a Thousand +Sounds. + + +IV + +Seated before a Steinway grand pianoforte, an instrument that found its +way to this far-away province through the caprice of some artistic +potentate, Pobloff nervously preluded. Notwithstanding the warning of +the girl, he had allowed himself to be convoyed to the great Hall of +Ebony, and there, quite alone, he sat waiting for some cue to begin. +None came. He glanced curiously about him. For all the signs of humanity +he might as well have been on the heights of Kerb, out among its thorny +groves, or in its immemorial forests. He preluded as he gazed around. He +could see, by the dim light of two flambeaux set in gold sconces, column +after column of blackness receding into inky depths of darkness. A +fringe of light encircled his instrument, and beside him was a gallery, +so vast that it became a gulf of the infinite at a hundred paces. Now, +Pobloff was a brave man. He believed that once upon a time he had peered +into strange crevices of space; what novelty could existence hold for +him after that shuddering experience? Again he looked into the tenebrous +recesses of the hall. He saw nothing, heard nothing. + +His fingers went their own way over the keyboard. Finally, following +some latent impulse, they began to shape the opening measures of +Chopin's Second Ballade, the one of the enigmatic tonalities, sometimes +called _The Lake of the Mermaids_. It began with the chanting, childish +refrain, a Lithuanian fairy-tale of old, and as its naive, drowsy, +lulling measures--the voices of wicked, wooing sirens--sang and sank in +recurrent rhythms, Pobloff heard--this time he was sure--the regular +reverberation of distant footsteps. It was as if the monotonous beat of +the music were duplicated in some sounding mirror, some mirror that +magnified hideously, hideously mimicked the melody. Yet these footfalls +murmured as a sea-shell. Every phrase stood out before the pianist, +exquisitely clear; his brain had only once before harboured such an +exalted mood. There was the expectation of great things coming to pass; +dim rumours of an apocalyptic future, when the glory that never was on +sea or land should rend the veil of the visible and make clear all that +obscures and darkens. The transfiguration which informs the soul of one +taken down in epileptic seizure possessed him. Every cranny of his being +was flooded with overmastering light--and the faint sound of footsteps +marking sinister time to his music, drew closer, closer. + +Shaking off an insane desire to join his voice in the immortal choiring +of the Cherubim, Pobloff dashed into the passionate storm-scream of the +music, and like a pack of phantom bloodhounds the footsteps pressed him +in the race. He played as run men from starving wolves in Siberian +wastes. To stop would mean--God! what would it mean? These were no +mortal steps that crowded upon his sonorous trail. His fingers flew +over the keys as he finished the scurrying tempests of tone. Again the +first swaying refrain, and Pobloff heard the invisible multitude of feet +pause in the night, as if waiting the moment when the Ballade would +cease. He quivered; the surprises and terrors were telling upon his +well-seasoned nerves. + +Still he sped on, fearing the tremendous outburst at the close, where +Chopin throws overboard his soul, and with blood-red sails signals the +hellish _Willis_, the Lamias of the lake, to his side. Ah, if Pobloff +could but thus portion his soul as hostage to the infernal host that now +hemmed him in on all sides! Riding over the black and white rocks of his +keyboard, he felt as if in the clutches of an unknown force. He +discerned death in the distance--death and the unknown horror--and was +powerless to resist. Still the galloping of unseen feet, horrible, naked +flesh, that clattered and scraped the earth; the panting, hoarse and +subdued, of a mighty pack, whose thirst for destruction, for revenge, +was unslaked. And always the same trampling of human feet! Were they +human? Did not resilient bones tell the tale of brutes viler than men? +The glimmering lights seemed cowed, as they sobbed in vacuity and slowly +expired. + +Pobloff no longer asked himself what it meant; he was become a maniac, +pursued by deathless devils. He could have flown to the end of the +universe in this Ballade; but, at last, his heart cracking, head +bursting, face livid, overtaken by the Footsteps of the Missing, he +smashed both fists upon the keys and fell forward despairingly.... + + * * * * * + +... The gigantic, noseless negro, the grand vizier himself, sternly +regarded the prince, who stood, torch in hand, near the shattered +pianoforte. The dumb spoke:-- + +"Let us hope, Exalted Highness, that your masquerades and mystifications +are over forever. To-day's prankish sport may put us to trouble for a +satisfactory explanation." He waved his hand vaguely in the direction of +the prostrate composer. "And hasheesh sometimes maddens for a lifetime!" +He lightly touched the drugged Pobloff with his enormous foot. + +The youthful runaway ashamedly lowered his head--in reality he adored +music with all the fulness of his cruel, faunlike nature. + + + + +XV + +THE CURSORY LIGHT + + +To this day Pinton could never explain why he looked out of that pantry +window. He had reached his home in a hungry condition. He was tired and +dead broke, so he had resolved to forage. He had listened for two or +three, perhaps five, minutes in the hall of his boarding-house; then he +went, soft-footed, to Mrs. Hallam's pantry on the second floor. He was +sure that it was open, he was equally sure that it contained something +edible on its hospitable shelves. Ah! who has not his bread at midnight +stolen, ye heavenly powers, ye know him not! + +Pinton, however, knew one thing, and that was a ravenous desire to sink +his teeth into pie, custard, or even bread. He felt with large, eager +hands along the wall on the pantry side. With feverish joy he touched +the knob--a friendly knob, despite its cold, distant glaze--of the door +he sought. + +Pinton gave a tug, and then his heart stopped beating. The door was +locked. Something like a curse, something like a prayer, rose to his +lips, and his arms fell helplessly to his side. + +Mrs. Hallam, realizing that it was Saturday night--the predatory night +of the week--had secured her pastry, her confitures, her celebrated +desserts; and so poor Pinton, all his sweet teeth furiously aching, his +mouth watering, stood on the hither side of Paradise, a baffled peri in +pantaloons! + +After a pause, full of pain and troublous previsions of a restless, +discontented night, Pinton grew angry and pulled at the knob of the +door, thinking, perhaps, that it might abate a jot of its dignified +resistance. It remained immovable, grimly antagonistic, until his +fingers grew hot and cold as they touched a bit of cold metal. + +The key in the lock! In a second it was turned, and the hungry one was +within and restlessly searching and fumbling for food. He felt along the +lower shelves and met apples, oranges, and sealed bottles containing +ruined, otherwise miscalled preserved, fruit. He knelt on the dresser +and explored the upper shelf. Ah, here was richness indeed! Pies, pies, +cakes, pies, frosted cakes, cakes sweating golden, fruity promises, and +cakes as icy as the hand of charity. Pinton was happy, glutton that he +was, and he soon filled the pockets of his overcoat. What Mrs. Hallam +might say in the morning he cared not. Let the galled jade wince, his +breakfast appetite would be unwrung; and then he started violently, lost +his balance, and almost fell to the floor. + +Opposite him was the window of the pantry, which faced the wall of the +next house. Pinton had never been in the pantry by daylight, so he was +rudely shocked by the glance of a light--a cursory, moving light. It +showed him a window in the other house and a pair of stairs. It +flickered about an old baluster and a rusty carpet, it came from below, +it mounted upward and was lost to view. + +The burglar of pies, the ravisher of cakes, was almost shocked by this +unexpected light. He watched it dancing fantastically on the discoloured +wall of the house; he wondered--ill at ease--if it would flash in his +face. His surmise was realized, for a streak of illumination reached the +narrow chamber in which he cowered, and then he was certain some one was +looking at him. He never budged, for he was too frightened. Suddenly the +light vanished and a head was dimly silhouetted in the window opposite. +It nodded to Pinton. Pinton stared stupidly, and the head disappeared. +The hungry man, his appetite now gone, was numb and terrified. + +What did it mean, who was the man? A detective, or a friend of Mrs. +Hallam's in a coign from which the plunderers of her pantry could be +noted? Beady repentance stood out on Pinton's forehead. + +And the light came back. This time it was intelligible, for it was a +lantern in the hand of a young man of about thirty. His face was open +and smiling. He wore his hair rather long for an American, and it was +blond and curling. + +He surveyed Pinton for a moment, then he said, in a most agreeable +voice:-- + +"What luck, old pal?" + +Pinton dropped his pies, slammed the window, and got to his bedroom as +fast as his nervous legs could carry him. He undressed in a nightmare, +and did not sleep until the early summer sun shot hot shafts of heat +into his chamber. + +With a shamed Sabbath face he arose, dressed, and descended to his +morning meal. Mrs. Hallam was sitting in orotund silence, but seemed in +good humour. She asked him casually if he had enjoyed his Saturday +evening, and quite as casually damned the wandering cats that had played +havoc in her pantry. She remarked that leaving windows open was a poor +practice, even if hospitable in appearance, and nervous Mr. Pinton drank +his coffee in silent assent and then hurried off to the church where he +trod the organ pedals for a small salary's sake. + +The following Friday was rehearsal night, and the organist left his +choir in a bad humour. His contralto had not attended, and as she was +the only artiste and the only good-looking girl of the lot, Pinton took +it into his head to become jealous. She had not paid the slightest +attention to him, so he could not attribute her absence to a personal +slight; but he felt aggrieved and vaguely irritated. + +Pinton's musicianship was not profound. He had begun life as an organ +salesman. He manipulated the cabinet organ for impossible customers in +Wisconsin, and he came to New York because he was offered a better +chance. + +The inevitable church position occurred. Then came Zundel voluntaries +and hard pedal practice. At last Mendelssohn's organ sonatas were +reached and with them a call--organists, like pastors, have calls--to a +fashionable church. The salary was fair and Mr. Pinton grew +side-whiskers. + +He heard Paderewski play Chopin, and became a crazy lover of the piano. +He hired a small upright and studied finger exercises. He consulted a +thousand books on technic, and in the meantime could not play Czerny's +velocity studies. + +He grew thin, and sought the advice of many pianists. He soon found that +pressing your foot on the swell and pulling couplers for tone colour +were not the slightest use in piano playing. Subtle finger pressures, +the unloosening of the muscles, the delicate art of _nuance_, the art +unfelt by many organists, all were demanded of the pianist, and Pinton +almost despaired. + +He grew contemptuous of the king of instruments as he essayed the C +major invention of Bach. He sneered at stops and pedals, and believed, +in his foolish way, that all polyphony was bound within the boards of +the Well-Tempered Clavichord. Then the new alto came to the choir, and +Pinton--at being springtide, when the blood is in the joyful +mood--thought that he was in love. He was really athirst. + +This Friday evening he was genuinely disappointed and thirsty. He turned +with a sinking heart and parched throat into Pop Pusch's dearly beloved +resort. Earlier in his life he had often solaced himself with the free +lunch that John, the melancholy waiter, had dispensed. Pinton's mind was +a prey to many emotions as he entered the famous old place. He sat down +before a brown table and clamoured for amber beer. + +He was not alone at the table. As Pinton put the glass of Pilsner to his +lips he met the gaze of two sardonic eyes. He could not finish his +glass. He returned the look of the other man and then arose, with a +nervous jerk that almost upset the table. + +"Sit down, old pal; don't be crazy. I'll never say a word. Sit down, you +fool; don't you see people are looking at you?" + +The voice was low, kindly in intonation, but it went through Pinton like +a saw biting its way into wood. + +He sat down all in a heap. He knew the eyes; he knew the voice. It was +the owner of the dark lantern--the mysterious man in the other house of +that last Saturday night. Pinton felt as if he were about to become ill. + +"Lord, but you are a nervous one!" said the other, most reassuringly. +"Sit still and I'll order brandy. It will settle your stomach." + +That brought Pinton to his senses at once. + +"No, no, I'll be all right in a moment," he said rather huskily. "I +never drink spirits. Thank you, all the same." + +"Don't mention it," said the man, and he tossed off his Wuerzburger. Each +man stealthily regarded the other. Pinton saw the stranger of the +lantern and staircase. Close by he was handsome and engaging. His hair +was worn like a violin virtuoso's, and his hands were white, delicate, +and well cared for. He spoke first. + +"How did you make out on that job?--I don't fancy there was much in it. +Boarding-houses, you know!" + +Pinton, every particle of colour leaving his flabby face, asked:-- + +"What job?" + +The stranger looked at him keenly and went on rather ironically:-- + +"You are the most nervous duck I ever ran across. When I saw you last +your pocket was full of the silver plate of that pantry, and I can thank +you for a fright myself, for when I saw you, I was just getting ready to +crack a neat little crib. Say! why didn't you flash your glim at me or +make some friendly signal at least? You popped out of sight like a +prairie rabbit when a coyote heaves in view." + +Pinton felt the ground heave beneath him. What possible job could the +man mean? What was a "glim," and what did the fellow suggest by silver +plate? Then it struck him all of a sudden. Heavens! he was taken for a +burglar by a burglar. His presence in the pie pantry had been +misinterpreted by a cracksman; and he, the harmless organist of Dr. +Bulgerly's church, was claimed as the associate of a dangerous, perhaps +notorious, thief. Pinton's cup of woe overflowed. + +He arose, put on his hat, and started to go. The young man grasped his +arm, and said in a most conciliatory fashion:-- + +"Perhaps I have hurt your sensitive nature. It was far from my intention +to do so. I saluted you at first in the coarse, conventional manner +which is expected by members of our ancient and honourable craft, and if +I have offended you, I humbly beg your pardon." + +His accent was that of a cultivated gentleman. Pinton, somewhat assured, +dropped back in his seat, and, John passing by just then, more beer was +ordered. + +"Hear me before you condemn me," said the odd young man. "My name is +Blastion and I am a burglar by profession. When I saw you the other +night, at work on the premises next door to me, I was struck by your +refined face. I said to myself: 'At last the profession is being +recruited by gentlemen, men of culture, men of refinement. At last a +profitable, withal risky, pursuit is being dignified, nay, graced, by +the proper sort of person.' And I saluted you in a happy, haphazard +fashion, and then you flew the coop. Pardon my relapse into the +vernacular." + +Pinton felt that it was time to speak. + +"Pardon me, if I interrupt you, Mr. Blastion; but I fear we are not +meeting on equal ground. You take me for a--for a man of your +profession. Indeed, sir, you are mistaken. When you discovered me last +Saturday night I was in the pantry of Mrs. Hallam, my boarding-house +keeper, searching for pie. I am not a burglar--pardon my harsh +expression; I am, instead, an organist by profession." + +The pallor of the burglar's countenance testified to the gravity of his +feeling. He stared and blushed, looked apprehensively at the various +groups of domino players in the back room, then, pulling himself +together, he beckoned to melancholy John, and said:-- + +"Johann, two more beers, please. Yes?" + +Pinton became interested. There was something appealing in the signal +the man flashed from his eyes when he realized that he had unbosomed +himself to a perfect stranger, and not to a member of his beloved guild. +The organist put his hand on the man's arm and said--faint memories of +flatulent discourses from the Reverend Bulgerly coming to his aid: "Be +not alarmed, my friend. I will not betray you. I am a musician, but I +respect art ever, even when it reveals itself in manifold guises." + +Pinton felt that he was a man of address, a fellow of some wit; his +confidential and rather patronizing pose moved his companion, who slyly +grimaced. + +"So you are an organist and not a member of the noble Knights of the +Centrebit and Jimmy?" he asked rather sarcastically. + +"Yes," admitted Pinton, "I am an organist, and an organist who would +fain become a pianist." The other started. + +"I am a pianist myself, and yet I cannot say that I would like to play +the organ." + +"You are a pianist?" said Pinton, in a puzzled voice. + +"Well, why not? I studied in Paris, and I suppose my piano technic stood +me in good stead in my newer profession. Just look at my hands if you +doubt my word." + +Aghast, the organist examined the shapely hands before him. Without +peradventure of a doubt they were those of a pianist, an expert pianist, +and one who had studied assiduously. He was stupefied. A burglar and a +pianist! What next? + +Mr. Blastion continued his edifying remarks: "Yes, I studied very hard. +I was born in the Southwest, and went to Paris quite young. I had good +fingers and was deft at sleight-of-hand tricks. I could steal a +handkerchief from a rabbi--which is saying volumes--and I played all the +Chopin etudes before I was fifteen. At twenty-one I knew twenty-five +concertos from memory, and my great piece was the _Don Juan Fantasy_. +Oh, I was a wonder! When Liszt paid his last visit to Paris I played +before him at the warerooms of the Pleyels. + +"Monsieur Theodore Ritter was anxious for his old master to hear such a +pupil. I assure you there must be some congenital twist of evil in me, +for I couldn't for the life of me forbear picking the old fellow's +pockets and lifting his watch. Now don't look scandalized, Mr. ---- eh? +Oh! thank you very much, Mr. Pinton. If you are born that way, all the +punishments and preachments--excuse the alliteration--will not stand in +your way as a warning. I have done time--I mean I have served several +terms of imprisonment, but luckily not for a long period. I suffered +most by my incarceration in not having a piano. Not even a dumb keyboard +was allowed, and I practised the Jackson finger exercises in the air and +thus kept my fingers limber. On Saturdays the warden allowed me, as a +special favour, to practise on the cabinet organ--an odious +instrument--so as to enable me to play on Sundays in chapel. Of course +no practice was needed for the wretched music we poor devils howled once +a week, but I gained one afternoon in seven for study by my ruse. + +"Oh, the joy of feeling the ivory--or bone--under my expectant fingers! +I played all the Chopin, Henselt, and Liszt etudes on the miserable +keyboard of the organ. Yes, of course, without wind. It was, I assure +you, a truly spiritual consolation. You can readily imagine if a man has +been in the habit of practising all day, even if he does 'burgle' at +night, that to be suddenly deprived of all instrumental resources is a +bitter blow." + +Pinton stuttered out an affirmative response. Then both arose after +paying their checks, and the organist shook the burglar's hand at the +corner, after first exacting a promise that Blastion should play for him +some morning. + +"With pleasure, my boy. You're a gentleman and an artist, and I trust +you absolutely." And he walked away, whistling with rare skill the D +flat valse of Chopin. + +"You can trust me, I swear!" Pinton called after him, and then went +unsteadily homeward, full of generous resolves and pianistic ambitions. +As he intermittently undressed he discovered, to his rage and amazement, +that both his purse and watch had disappeared. The one was well filled; +the other, gold. Blastion's technic had proved unimpeachable. + + + + +XVI + +AN IRON FAN + + +Effinghame waited for Dr. Arn in the study, a small chamber crowded with +the contents of the universe--so it seemed to the visitor. There was a +table unusual in size, indeed, big enough to dissect a body thereon. It +was littered with books and medical publications and was not very +attractive. The walls were covered with original drawings of famous +Japanese masters, and over the fireplace hung a huge fan, dull gray in +colouring, with long sandalwood spokes. Not a noteworthy example of +Japanese art, thought Effinghame, as he glanced without marked curiosity +at its neutral tinting, though he could not help wondering why the +cunning artificers of the East had failed to adorn the wedge-shaped +surfaces of this fan with their accustomed bold and exquisite +arabesques. + +He impatiently paced the floor. His friend had told him to come at nine +o'clock in the evening. It was nearly ten. Then he began to finger +things. He fumbled the papers in the desk. He examined the two Japanese +swords--light as ivory, keen as razors. He stared at each of the prints, +at Hokusai, Toyokimi, Kuniyoshi, Kiyonaga, Kiosai, Hiroshighe, Utamaro, +Oukoyo-Ye,--the doctor's taste was Oriental. And again he fell to +scrutinizing the fan. It was large, ugly, clumsy. What possessed Arn to +place such a sprawling affair over his mantel? Tempted to touch it, he +discovered that it was as silky as a young bat's wing. At last, his +curiosity excited, he lifted it with some straining to the floor. What +puzzled him was its weight. He felt its thin ribs, its soft, paper-like +material, and his fingers chilled as they closed on the two outermost +spokes. They were of metal, whether steel or iron he could not +determine. A queer fan this, far too heavy to stir the air, and-- + +Effinghame held the fan up to the light. He had perceived a shadowy +figure in a corner. It resolved itself into a man's head--bearded, +scowling, crowned with thorns or sunbeams. It was probably a Krishna. +But how came such a face on a Japanese fan? The type was Oriental, +though not Mongolian, rather Semitic. It vaguely recalled to Effinghame +a head and face he had seen in a famous painting. But where and by whom? +It wore a vile expression, the eyes mean and revengeful; there was a +cruel mouth and a long, hooked, crafty nose. The forehead was lofty, +even intellectual, and bore its thorns--yes, he was sure they were +thorns--like a conqueror. Just then Dr. Arn entered and laughed when he +saw the other struggling with the fan. + +"My _Samurai_ fan!" he exclaimed, in his accustomed frank tones; "how +did you discover it so soon?" + +"You've kept me here an hour. I had to do something," answered the +other, sulkily. + +"There, there, I apologize. Sit down, old man. I had a very sick patient +to-night, and I feel worn out. I'll ring for champagne." They talked +about trifling personal matters, when suddenly Effinghame asked:-- + +"Why _Samurai_? I had supposed this once belonged to some prehistoric +giant who could waft it as do ladies their bamboo fans, when they brush +the dust from old hearts--as the Spanish poet sang." + +"That fan is interesting enough," was the doctor's reply. "When a +_Samurai_, one of the warrior caste Japanese, was invited to the house +of a doubtful friend, he carried this fan as a weapon of defence. +Compelled to leave his two swords behind a screen, he could close this +fighting machine and parry the attack of his hospitable enemy until he +reached his swords. Just try it and see what a formidable weapon it +would prove." He took up the fan, shut it, and swung it over his head. + +"Look out for the bottles!" cried Effinghame. + +"Never fear, old chap. And did you notice the head?" + +"That's what most puzzled me." + +"No wonder. I too was puzzled--until I found the solution. And it took +me some years--yes, all the time you were in Paris learning how to +paint and live." He paused, and his face became gloomy. + +"Well--well?" + +"There is no well. It's a damned bad fan, that iron one, and I don't +mind saying so to you." + +"Superstitious--you! Where is your Haeckel, your Wundt, your Weismann? +Do you still believe in the infallibility of the germ-plasm? Has the fan +brought you ill-luck? The fact is, Arn, ever since your return from +China you've been a strange bird!" It was Effinghame's turn to laugh. + +"Don't say another word." The doctor was vivacious in a moment and +poured out wine. They both lighted cigars. Slowly puffing, Arn took up +the fan and spread it open. + +"See here! That head, as you must have noticed, is not Japanese. It's +Jewish. Do you recall the head of Judas painted by Da Vinci in his Last +Supper? Now isn't this old scoundrel's the exact duplicate--well, if not +exact, there is a very strong resemblance." Effinghame looked and +nodded. + +"And what the devil is it doing on a fan of the _Samurai_? It's not +caprice. No Japanese artist ever painted in that style or ever expressed +that type. I thought the thing out and came to the conclusion--" + +"Yes--yes! What conclusion?" eagerly interrupted his listener. + +"To the conclusion that I could never unravel such a knotty question +alone." Effinghame was disappointed. + +"So I had recourse to an ally--to the fan itself," blandly added Arn, as +he poured out more wine. + +"The fan?" + +"Precisely--the fan. I studied it from tip to tip, as our bird-shooting +friends say, and I, at last, discovered more than a picture. You know I +am an Orientalist. When I was at Johns Hopkins University I attended the +classes of the erudite Blumenfeld, and what you can't learn from +him--need I say any more? One evening I held the fan in front of a vivid +electric light and at once noticed serried lines. These I deciphered +after a long time. Another surprise. They were Chinese characters of a +remotely early date--Heaven knows how many dynasties back! Now what, you +will ask, is Chinese doing on a _Samurai_ fighting fan! I don't know. I +never shall know. But I do know that this fan contains on one side of it +the most extraordinary revelation ever vouchsafed mankind, particularly +Christian mankind." Excited by his own words, Arn arose. + +"Effinghame, my dear fellow, I know you have read Renan. If Renan had +seen the communication on this iron fan, he would have never written his +life of the Messiah." His eyes blazed. + +"Why, what do you mean?" + +"I mean that it might have been a life of Judas Iscariot." + +"Good God, man, are you joking?" ejaculated Effinghame. + +"I mean," sternly pursued Arn, "that if De Quincey had studied this +identical fan, the opium-eater would have composed another gorgeous +rhetorical plea for the man preelected to betray his Saviour, the +apostle who spilt the salt." He sat down and breathed heavily. + +"Go on! Go on!" + +"Shall I relate the history upon the fan?" And without waiting for an +answer he began at the left of the fan and slowly read to the right:-- + + I who write this am called Moa the Bonze. What I write of I + witnessed in a walled city of Judea. I travelled there attracted by + the report of miraculous happenings brought about by the magic art + of a youthful barbarian called Ieshua. The day I arrived in the + city they had sentenced the wise man to death by crucifixion. I was + disappointed. I had come many moons and many leagues from the + Yellow Kingdom to see something rare. I was too late. The magician, + whom his disciples called a god, had been executed. I tarried a few + days in the city. After many questions put to beggars and outcasts, + I heard that a certain woman of rank had a portrait of Ieshua. I + called and without hesitation asked her to show me this picture. + She was an exalted soul. She wept bitter tears as she drew from a + secret cabinet a scarf upon which was imprinted a bloody image. She + continued to weep as I made a copy of the head. I confess I was not + impressed. The face was bearded and ugly. The new god was said to + have been as fair as the sun. And I told the woman this. She only + wept the more. + + "If he were a god," I asked, "where are outward evidences?" She + became frantic. + + "The real man!" she cried; "_this_ one died for the man he + betrayed," and again fell to lamenting. Seeing I could gain nothing + more from her, I left, wondering at the strange heretics I had + encountered. I went back to my country and after weaving this tale + and painting the head, there awaited the fifth Buddha, the + successor to Siddartha, whose coming has been predicted. + +Arn's voice ceased. There was silence in the chamber. Then Effinghame +started up and fiercely growled:-- + +"What do _you_ make of it, Arn?" + +"Isn't it clear enough? There's been a frightful error somewhere, one of +incalculable consequences. A tremendous act of heroism has been +committed by a man whose name has been universally execrated through the +ages. Perhaps he repented at the eleventh hour and by some means +impersonated his betrayed friend; perhaps--" + +"But that _other_ body found in the blasted field of Aceldama!" +demanded the agitated Effinghame. Dr. Arn did not answer. + +After a lugubrious pause, he whispered:-- + +"There's more to follow. You haven't heard the worst." + +"What--more! I thought your damnable old Bonze died in the odour of +sanctity over there in his Yellow Kingdom." + +"True. He died. But before he died he recorded a vision he had. It is +inscribed on the other side of the fan." + +Effinghame's features lengthened. + +"Still the same fan." + +"The same. Here is what it prophesies." Reversing the clumsy fan, Arn +again read:-- + + Before I pass over into Nirvana I must relate what I saw in the + country of the Christians. It was not a dream. It was too real. And + yet it is to be, for it has not yet happened. The Campagna was now + become a shallow lake from the sea almost to the Sabine Mountains. + What had been Rome was a black waste spot, full of stones and + weeds. And no two stones stood together. Ah! our war with the white + races had been successful. We had not used their fighting machines, + as did that nation of little brown men, the Japanese. The Chinese + were too sage. They allowed the Christians to exterminate the + Japanese; but when they attacked us and attempted to rob us of our + land, we merely resorted to our old-time weapon--the Odour-Death. + With it we smothered their armies, sunk their navies, swept through + their countries like the simoon. The awful secret of the + Odour-Death is one that has been ours from the beginning of time. + Known only to the College of Bonzes, it was never used except in + extreme peril. Its smell is more revolting in its consequences than + the Black Plague. It ravaged the earth. + + I sat in a flat-bottomed boat, enjoying the soft melancholy Italian + evening. Not a human did I see; nor had I encountered one on my + slow voyage from the Middle Seas. In meditation I pondered the + ultimate wisdom of Confucius and smiled at the folly of the white + barbarians who had tried to show us a new god, a new religion. At + last they, too, had succumbed like the nations before their era. + The temple of Jupiter on the Capitol had fallen, so had the holy + temple of Jerusalem. And now St. Peter's. Their central religion + had been destroyed, and yet prophecies of the second coming of + their divinity had not been accomplished. When the last Pope of + Rome dies, so it was said, then time would be accomplished. The + last Pope _had_ died. Their basilica with its mighty dome was a + desert where scorpions and snakes abounded. The fifth Buddha would + appear, not the second Christos. Suddenly I saw before me in a puny + boat a beautiful beardless youth. He was attired in some symbolical + garments and upon his head a triple tiara. I could not believe my + aged eyes. He sat upright. His attitude was hieratic. His eyes + were lifted heavenwards. He clasped his hands and prayed:-- + + "O Lord, remove thy servant. The time is at hand foretold by thy + slaughtered saints. I am the last Pope and the humblest of thy + servants. Though the heathen hath triumphed upon the earth, I go to + thy bosom, for all things are now accomplished." And he tumbled + forward, dead. The last Pope! I had seen him. Nothing could happen + after that. + + And as I turned my boat in the direction of the sea a moaning came + upon the waters. The sky became as brass. A roar, like the rending + asunder of the firmament, caused my soul to expand with horror and + joy. Yes, time _was_ accomplished. The last Pope had uttered the + truth. Eternity was nigh. But the Buddha would now prove to the + multitudes awakened from their long sleep that _He_, not other + gods, was the true, the only God. In a flare of light sounded the + trumpets of destiny; eternity unrolled before me, and on the vast + plain I saw the bones of the buried dead uniting, as men and women + from time's beginnings arose in an army, the number whereof is + unthinkable. And oh! abomination of desolation, the White Horse, + not _Kalki_ the tenth incarnation of Vishnu, but the animal + foretold in _their_ Apocalypse, came through the lightnings, and in + the whirlwinds of flame and thunder I saw the shining face of Him, + the Son of Man! Where our Buddha? Alas! the last Pope spake truth. + I, Moa the Bonze, tell you this ere it be too late to repent your + sins and forswear your false gods. The Galilean is our master.... + +"_Farceur!_ Do you know what I would do with that accursed fan? I'd +destroy it, sell it, get rid of it somehow. Or else--" Effinghame +scrutinized the doctor, whose eyes were closed--"or else I would return +to the pious practices of my old religion." No smile crossed the face of +his friend as he firmly held the fighting fan, the iron and mystical fan +of the _Samurai_. + + + + +XVII + +THE WOMAN WHO LOVED CHOPIN + + +I + +When Marco Davos left Ischl on the midday train, that picturesque, +huddled Austrian watering-place was stuffy. He was surprised then most +pleasantly by the coolness of Aussee, further down the line in the +direction of Vienna. Ischl is not a bad place, but it lies, as the +natives say, smothered in a kettle. He rode over from the station to the +stadt park, where the band was playing. There he dismounted, for he was +going further--Aussee is not very interesting, but it principally serves +as a good starting-point for trips to many of the charming lakes with +which Styria is dotted. After asking his way, Davos passed the swimming +baths, and keeping on the left bank of a tiny stream, he presently found +himself walking through an earthly paradise. Since his advent in Ischl, +where he drank the waters and endeavoured to quiet his overtaxed nerves, +he had made up his mind to visit Alt-Aussee; several Viennese friends +had assured him that this hamlet, beneath a terrific precipice and on +the borders of a fairy-like lake, would be well worth the while. + +It was a relief to breathe the thinner mountain air, and the young +artist inhaled it with satisfaction, his big hat in hand, his long curly +black hair flowing in the gentle breeze. He found himself in tunnels of +verdure, the sunlight shut off by the heavy leafage; then the path +debouched into the open and, skirting closely the rocky wall, it widened +into an island of green where a shady pagoda invited. He sat down for a +few minutes and congratulated himself that he had escaped the intimate +discomforts of the omnibus he discerned on the opposite bank, packed +with stout people. This was the third week of his vacation, one enforced +by a nerve specialist in the Austrian capital, and for the first time +Davos felt almost cheerful. Perhaps the absolute hush of the country and +the purity of the atmosphere, with its suggestion of recent rain,--the +skies weep at least once a day in the Salzkammergut region,--proved a +welcome foil to fashionable Ischl, with its crowds, its stiffness, its +court ceremonial--for the emperor enjoys his _villegiatura_ there. And +Davos was sick and irritable after a prolonged musical season. He had +studied the pianoforte with Rosenthal, and his success, from his debut, +had been so unequivocal that he played too much in public. There was a +fiery particle in his interpretations of Chopin, Schumann, and Liszt +that proclaimed the temperament, if not the actual possession, of +genius. Still in his early manhood--he was only twenty--the maturity of +his musical intelligence and the poetry of his style created havoc in +impressionable hearts. With his mixed blood, Hungarian and Italian, +Marco Davos' performance of romantic composers was irresistible; in it +there was something of Pachmann's wayward grace and Paderewski's +plangency, but with an added infusion of gypsy wildness which evoked for +old concert-goers memories of Liszt the brilliant rhapsodist. + +But he soon overpaid the score presented by the goddess Fortune--his +nerves were sadly jangled. A horror of the human face obsessed his +waking and sleeping hours; he dreamed of colossal countenances with +threatening eyes, a vast composite of the audiences he nightly faced. As +his popularity increased the waning of his self-respect told him that he +must go into retreat, anywhere out of the musical world--else would his +art suffer. It did suffer. The nervous diffidence, called stage-fright, +which had never assailed his supreme self-balance, intruded its +unwelcome presence. Marco, several months after he had discovered all +these mischievous symptoms, the maladies of artistic adolescence, was +not assured when the critics hinted of them--the public would surely +follow suit in a few weeks. Then came the visit to the learned Viennese +doctor and the trip to Ischl. A few more months of this appalling +absorption in his own personality, this morbid marriage of man to his +own image, and he suspected that his brain would be irretrievably +injured. + +He was a curious student of matters psychologic as well as musical. A +friendly laboratory had inducted him into many biologic mysteries. +Particularly fascinating to him was the tactile sense, that sense of +touch wherewith man acquaints himself with this earth-clot swimming in +space. Davos contemplated the tips of his fingers as he sat in the +grateful cool, his ten voices as he named them. With them he sang, +thundered, and thought upon the keyboard of his grand piano-forte. A +miracle, indeed, these slender cushions of fat, ramified by a network of +nerves, sinews, and bones as exquisite in their mechanism as the motion +of the planets. If hearing is a miracle, so is touch; the ear is not a +resonator, as has been so long maintained, but an apparatus which +records variations of pressure. This makes it subservient to the laws of +sensation; touch and hearing are akin. It aroused the pride of Davos +after he had read the revolutionary theories of Pierre Bounier regarding +the touch. So subtle could the art of touch be cultivated, the pianist +believed, that the blind could _feel_ colour on the canvas of the +painter. He spent weeks experimenting with a sensitive manometer, +gauging all the scale of dynamics. No doubt these fumblings on the edge +of a new science temporarily hurt his play. With a dangerous joy he +pressed the keys of his instrument, endeavouring to achieve more +delicate shadings. He quarrelled with the piano manufacturers for their +obstinate adherence to the old-fashioned clumsy action; everything had +been improved but the keyboard--that alone was as coldly unresponsive +and inelastic as a half-century ago. He had fugitive dreams of wires +that would vibrate like a violin. The sounding-board of a pianoforte is +too far from the pianist, while the violinist presses his strings as one +kisses the beloved. Little wonder it is the musical monarch. A new +pianoforte, with passionately coloured overtones, that could sob like a +violoncello, sing like a violin, and resound with the brazen clangours +of the orchestra--Liszt had conceived this synthesis, had by the sheer +force of his audacious genius compelled from his instrument ravishing +tones that were never heard before or--alas!--since. + +Even the antique harpsichord had its compensations; not so powerful in +its tonal capacity, it nevertheless gave forth a pleading, human quality +like the still small angelic voice. Davos pondered these problems, +pondered Chopin's celestial touch and the weaving magic of his many-hued +poems; Chopin--Keats, Shelley, and Heine battling within the walls of a +frail tender soul. + +The sound of footsteps and voices aroused him. He shivered with disgust. +More people! Two men, well advanced in life, followed by two women, +barely attracted his notice, until he saw that the little creature who +waddled at the rear of the party was a Japanese in European clothes. +Notwithstanding her western garb, she resembled a print of Utamaro. +Beside her walked a tall, grave girl, with dark hair and gray eyes, +attired in the quaint garb of some early nineteenth-century epoch--1840 +or thereabouts. As old-fashioned as she looked, a delicate girlish +beauty was hers, and when she indifferently gazed at Davos, straightway +he heard humming in his head the "glance motive" from Tristan and +Isolde. They passed on, but not leaving him as he was before; a voice +whispered in the secret recesses of his being: "You love! Follow! Seek +her!" And under the sudden impulsion of this passion he arose and made a +few steps toward the curve of the path around which the girl and her +companions had disappeared. The absurdity of this hasty translation into +action of his desire halted him. Yes, his nerves must be in a bad way if +a casual encounter with a pretty woman--but was she pretty? He did not +return to his seat. He continued his stroll leisurely. Pretty! Not +exactly pretty--distinguished! Noble! Lovely! Beautiful! He smiled. Here +he was playing the praises of the unknown in double octaves. He did not +overtake her. She had vanished on the other side of the bridge, and in a +few minutes he found himself entering Alt-Aussee. It wore a bright +appearance, with its various-coloured villas on the lake shores, and its +church and inn for a core. The garden of this hotel he found to be +larger than he had imagined; it stretched along the bank and only +stopped as if stone and mortar had been too lazy to go farther. + +Again he hesitated. The garden, the _restauration_--full of people: +women knitting, children bawling, men reading; and all sipping coffee to +a background of gossip. He remembered that it was the sacred hour of +_Kaffeeklatsch_, and he would have escaped by a flight of steps that led +down to the beach, but he was hailed. A company of a half-dozen sat at a +large table under the trees, and the host was an orchestral conductor +well known to Davos. There was no alternative. He took a chair. He was +introduced as the celebrated pianoforte-virtuoso to men and women he had +never seen before, and hoped--so rancorous was his mood--never to see +again. A red-headed girl from Brooklyn, who confessed that she thought +Maeterlinck the name of some new Parisian wickedness, further bothered +him with questions about piano teachers. No, he didn't give lessons! He +never would! She dropped out of the conversation. Finally by an effort +he swore that his head was splitting, that he must return to Ischl. He +broke away. When he discovered that the crowd was also bound for the +same place, he abruptly disappeared. It took him just two hours to +traverse the irregular curves of the lake on the Franz Carl Promenade, +and he ate his dinner in peace at the inn upon a balcony that projected +over the icy waters. + +Davos decided, as he smoked a mild cigarette, that he would remain at +Alt-Aussee for the night. The peace of the landscape purified his soul +of its irritability, though he wished that the Dachstein would not +dominate so persistently the sky-line--it was difficult to avoid the +view of this solitary and egotistic peak, the highest in Styria. He was +assigned a comfortable chamber, but the night was too fine for bed. He +did not feel sleepy, and he went along the road he had come by; the +church was an opaque mass, the spire alone showing in the violet +twilight, like some supernatural spar on a ship far out at sea. He +attempted to conjure to his tired brain the features, the expression, of +the girl. They would not reappear; his memory was traitorous. + +The murmur of faint music, piano music, made his ears wince--how he +hated music! But afar as were these tonal silhouettes, traced against +the evening air, his practised hearing told him that they were made by +an artist. He languidly followed the clue, and soon he was at the gate +of a villa, almost buried in the bosk, and listening with all his +critical attention to a thrilling performance--yes, thrilling was the +word--of Chopin's music. What! The last movement of the B flat minor +sonata, the funeral march sonata, but no more like the interpretation he +had heard from others--from himself--than--than.... + +But, good heavens! _Who_ was playing! The unison passages that mount and +recede were iridescent columns of mist painted by the moonlight and +swaying rhythmically in the breeze. Here was something rare. No longer +conscious of the technical side of the playing, so spiritualized was it, +so crystalline the touch, Davos forgot his manners and slipped through +the gateway, through the dark garden, toward an open window in which +burned a solitary candle. The mystery of this window and the quicksilver +dartings of the music--gods, what a touch, what gossamer delicacy!--set +his heart throbbing. He forgot his sick nerves. When the trumpet blows, +the war-horse lusts for action--and this was not a trumpet, but a horn +of elf-land. He moved as closely as he dared to the window, and the +music ceased--naturally enough, the movement had concluded. His ears +burned with the silence. _She_ came to the window. Arrested by the +vision--the casement framed her in a delicious manner--he did not stir. +She could not help seeing this intruder, the light struck him full in +the face. She spoke:-- + +"Dear Mr. Davos, won't you come into the house? My father and my uncle +will be most happy to receive you." + + * * * * * + +She knew him! Stunned by his overstrung emotions, he could only bow his +head. + + +II + +He received the welcome of a king. The two men he had seen earlier in +the day advanced ceremoniously and informed him that the honour of his +presence was something they had never hoped for; that--as news flies +swiftly in villages--they had heard he was at Alt-Aussee; they had +recognized the _great_ Marco Davos on the road. These statements were +delivered with exaggerated courtesy, though possibly sincere. The elder +of the pair was white-whiskered, very tall and spare, his expression a +sadly vague one. It was her father. The other an antique person, a +roly-poly fellow who chuckled and quavered, was her uncle. Davos sat in +a drawing-room containing a grand pianoforte, a few chairs, and couches. +The floor was stained, and when a cluster of lights was brought by the +uncle, he noticed that only Chopin portraits hung on the walls. He +apologized for his intrusion--the music had lured him from the highroad. + +"We are very musical," said the father. + +"I should say so," reiterated his brother-in-law. + +"Musical!" echoed Davos. "Do you call it by such an everyday phrase? I +heard the playing of a marvellous poet a moment ago." The two men looked +shyly at each other. She entered. He was formally presented. + +"Monsieur Davos, this is Constantia Grabowska, my daughter. My name is +Joseph Grabowski; my late wife's brother, Monsieur Pelletier." Davos +was puzzled by the name, Constantia Grabowska! She sat before him, +dressed in black silk with crinoline; two dainty curls hung over her +ears; her profile, her colouring, were slightly Oriental, and in her +nebulous gray eyes with their greenish light there was eternal youth. +Constantia! Polish. And how she played Chopin--ah! it came to him before +he had finished his apologies. + +"You are named after Chopin's first love," he ejaculated. "Pardon the +liberty." She answered him in her grave, measured contralto. + +"Constantia Gladowska was my grandmother." The playing, the portraits, +were now explained. A lover of the Polish composer, Davos knew every +incident of his biography. + +"I am the son of that Joseph Grabowski, the Warsaw merchant who married +the soprano singer, Constantia Gladowska, in 1832," said the father, +smilingly. "My father became blind." + +"Chopin's _Ideal_!" exclaimed Marco. He was under the spell of the +girl's beauty and music. He almost stared at her, for the knowledge that +she was a great artiste, perhaps greater than himself, rather dampened +his passion. She was adorable as she returned without coquetry his +ardent gaze; but she was--he had to admit it--a rival. This composite +feeling he inwardly wrestled with as the conversation placidly +proceeded. They only spoke of Poland, of Chopin. Once the name of +Emilia Plater, the Polish Joan of Arc, was mentioned--she, too, was a +distant connection. The young pianist hinted that more music would be +agreeable, but there was no response. He was quite alone with +Constantia, and they talked of Poland's tone-poet. She knew much more of +Chopin than he did, and she recited Mickiewicz's patriotic poems with +incomparable verve. + +"Do you believe in heredity?" he cried, as the father entered with the +tea. "Do you believe that your love of Chopin is inherited? Chopin +composed that wonderful slow movement of the F minor concerto because of +his love for your grandmother. How I wish I could have seen her, heard +her." + +The girl, without answering him, detached from her neck a large brooch +and chain. Davos took it and amazedly compared the portrait with the +living woman. + +"You _are_ Constantia Gladowska." She smiled. + +"Her love of Chopin--she must have loved her youthful adorer--has been +transmitted to you. Oh, please play me that movement again, the one +Rubinstein called 'the night wind sweeping over the churchyard graves.'" +Constantia blushed so deeply that he knew he had offended her. She had +for him something of the pathos of old dance music--its stately +sweetness, its measured rhythms. After drinking a cup of tea he drifted +to the instrument--flies do not hanker after honey as strongly as do +pianists in the presence of an open keyboard. A tactful silence ensued. +He began playing, and, as if exasperated at the challenge implied by her +refusal, he played in his old form. Then he took the theme of Chopin's E +flat minor Scherzo, and he juggled with it, spun it into fine fibres of +tone, dashed it down yawning and serried harmonic abysses. He was +magnificent as he put forth all the varied resources of his art. +Constantia, her cheeks ablaze, her lips parted, interposed a fan between +her eyes and the light. There was something dangerous and passionate in +her regard. In all the fury of his play he knew that he had touched her. +Once, during a pause, he heard her sigh. As he finished in a thunderous +crash he saw in the doorway the figure of the Japanese maid--an ugly, +gnarled idol with slitted eyes. She withdrew when he arose to receive +the unaffected homage of his hosts. He was curious. Monsieur Pelletier, +who looked like a Brazilian parrot in beak and hue, cackled:-- + +"That's Cilli, our Japanese. She was born in Germany, and is my niece's +governess. Quite musical, too, I should say so. Just look at my two +Maltese cats! I call them Tristan and Isolde because they make noises in +the night. Don't you _loathe_ Wagner?" + +It was time to go. Enamoured, Davos took his leave, promising to call +the next forenoon before he went back to Ischl. He held her fingers for +a brief moment and longed to examine their tips,--the artist still +struggled to subdue the man,--but the pressure he received was so +unmistakable that he hurried away, fearing to betray his emotion. He +hovered in the vicinity of the house, longing for more music. He was +disappointed. For a full hour he wandered through the dusty lanes in the +faded light of an old moon. When he reached his chamber, it was long +past one o'clock; undaunted, his romantic fervour forced him to the +window, and he watched the shining lake. He fell asleep thinking of +Constantia. But he dreamed of Cilli, the Japanese maid with the hideous +eyes. + + +III + +Not only that morning, but every morning for two weeks, did Marco Davos +visit Alt-Aussee. He came down from Ischl on the earliest train, and +some nights he stopped at the hotel near his new friends. After a few +visits he saw little of the father and uncle, and he was not sorry--they +were old bores with their archaic anecdotes of dead pianists. Two +maniacs on the subject of music, Davos wished them to the devil after he +had known them twenty-four hours. His passion had reached the acute key. +He could not eat or drink in normal fashion, and no sooner had he left +the girl than the sky became sombre, his pulse weakened, and he longed +to return to her side to tell her something he had forgotten. He did +this several times, and hesitated in his speech, reddened, and left her, +stumbling over the grass like a lame man. Never such a crazy wooer, +never a calmer maiden. She looked unutterable sentiment, but spoke it +not. + +When he teased her about her music, she became a statue. She was too +timid to play before artists; her only master had been her father. Once +more he had heard the piano as he returned unexpectedly, and almost +caught her; he saw her at the instrument, but some instinct must have +warned her that she was being spied upon. She stopped in the middle of a +phrase from a Mendelssohn song, and even to his prejudiced ears her +touch had seemed commonplace. Yet he loved her all the more despite her +flat refusal to play. The temptation to his excited artistic temperament +was removed. He played, often, gloriously. His nerves were steel. This +was a cure his doctor had not foreseen. What did it matter, anyhow?--he +was near Constantia daily, and the sunshine was royal. Only--why did her +relatives absent themselves so obstinately! She told him, with her +secret smile, that she had scolded them for talking so much; but when he +played they were never far away, she assured him. Nor was the Japanese +woman, Cilli--what a name! A nickname given by Constantia in her +babyhood. Cilli was a good soul. He hoped so--her goodness was not +apparent. She had a sneering expression as he played. He never looked up +from the keyboard that he did not encounter her ironical gaze. She was +undoubtedly interested. Her intensity of pose proved it; but there was +no sympathy in her eyes. And she had a habit of suddenly appearing in +door or window, and always behind her mistress. She ended by seriously +annoying him, though he did not complain. It was too trivial. + +One afternoon he unfolded his novel views on touch. If the action of the +modern pianoforte could be made as sensitive in its response as the +fingerboard of a fiddle.... Constantia listened with her habitual +gravity, but he knew that she was bored. Then he shifted to the subject +of fingers. He begged to be allowed the privilege of examining hers. At +first she held back, burying her hand in the old Mechlin lace flounce of +her sleeves. He coaxed. He did not attempt to conceal his chagrin when +he finally saw her fingers. They were pudgy, good-humoured, fit to lift +a knife and fork, or to mend linen. They did not match her cameo-like +face, and above all they did not reveal the musical soul he knew her to +possess. For the first time since he met her she gave evidence of ill +humour. She sharply withdrew her hand from his, and as she did so a +barbaric croon was heard, a sort of triumphant wailing, and Constantia, +without making an excuse, hurriedly left the room. The singing stopped. + +"It's that devil of a Japanese woman," he muttered testily. He waited +for nearly an hour, and in a vile temper took up his hat and stick and +went away. Decidedly this was his unlucky day, he grumbled, as he +reached the water. He saw Grabowski and Pelletier, arm in arm, trudging +toward the villa, but contrived to evade them. In ten minutes he found +himself spying on the house he had quitted. He skirted a little private +way back of the villa, and to his amazement father, uncle, and +Constantia came out and hailed the omnibus which travelled hourly to +Aussee. Davos was furious. He did not risk following them, for he +realized he had been treated shabbily. His wrath softened as he +reflected; perhaps Constantia, agitated by his rudeness,--had he been +rude?--persuaded her family to follow him to Ischl. The sky cleared. +That was the solution--Marco Davos straightened himself--his pride was +no longer up in arms. Poor child--she was so easily wounded! How he +loved her! + +His body trembled. He could not believe he was awake. Incredible music +was issuing from behind the closed blinds of the villa. Music! And the +music he had overheard that first night. But Constantia had just gone +away; he had seen her. There must be some mistake, some joke. No, no, by +another path she had managed to get back to the house. Ay! but what +playing. Again came that purling rush of notes, those unison passages, +as if one gigantic hand grasped them--so perfect was the tonal accord. +He did not hesitate. At a bound he was in the corridor and pushed open +the door of the drawing-room.... + +At first the twilighted room blinded him. Then to his disgust and terror +he saw the apelike features of the squat Japanese governess. She sat at +the piano, her bilious skin flushed by the exertion of playing. + +"You--you!" he barely managed to stammer. She did not reply, but +preserved the immobility of a carved idol. + +"You are a wonderful artiste," he blurted, going to her. She stolidly +answered:-- + +"The Japanese have the finest sense of touch in the world. I was once a +pupil of Karl Tausig." Involuntarily he bowed his head to the revered +name of the one man he had longed to hear. Then his feelings almost +strangled him; his master passion asserted itself. + +"Your fingers, your fingers--let me see them," he hoarsely demanded. +With a malicious grin she extended her hands--he groaned enviously. Yes, +they were miracles of sculpture, miracles of colour and delicacy, the +slender tips well-nigh prehensile in their cunning power. And the +fingers of Constantia, of his love, of the woman who loved Chopin--that +Chopin whose first passion was for her grandmother, the opera singer +Constantia Gladowska! + +The knowledge of her cruel deception crept into his consciousness. He +was chilled for several seconds. Grief at his lost love, implacable +anger at her trickery, crowded into his unhappy brain. But he only bowed +to Cilli, and summoning all his will he politely said:-- + +"It is quite true that when the Japanese choose to play the piano, we +Europeans must shut up shop." He hurried out to the road and walked +desperately.... + +The next morning, as he nervously paced the platform of the Ischl +railway station, he encountered his old friend Alfred Bruenfeld, the +jovial Viennese pianist. + +"Hullo!" + +"Hullo!" + +"Not going back to Vienna?" + +"Yes--I'm tired of the country." + +"But, man, you are pale and tired. Have you been studying up here after +your doctor bade you rest?" The concern in Bruenfeld's voice touched +Davos. He shook his head, then bethought himself of something. + +"Alfred, you are acquainted with everybody in Europe. How is it you +never told me about that strange Grabowski crowd--you know, the +granddaughter of Chopin's first love?" Bruenfeld looked at him with +instant curiosity. + +"You also?" he said. The young man blushed. After _that_ he could never +forgive! The other continued:-- + +"Granddaughter, fiddlesticks! They are not Poles, those Grabowskis, but +impostors. Their real name is--is--" Davos started. + +"What, you have met them?" + +"Yes, the stupid father, the odious uncle, the fair Constantia--what a +meek saint!--and that diabolical Japanese, who plays the piano like a +house on fire." Tears came to the eyes of Marco Davos. + +"Did they--I mean, did _she_ take you in, too?" + +"Here, at Ischl, last summer," was the grim reply. + + + + +XVIII + +THE TUNE OF TIME + + +Ferval returned to Rouen after a fatiguing trip down the Seine as far as +Croisset, the old home of Gustave Flaubert. Here he viewed, not without +a dismal sense of fame and its futility, the little garden-house in +which the masterpieces of the great Frenchman had been conceived in joy +and executed in sorrow. He met the faithful Colange, one-time attendant +of Flaubert, and from him learned exacerbating details of the novelist's +lonesome years; so he was in a mood of irritation as he went ashore near +the Boieldieu Bridge and slowly paced toward his hotel. He loved this +Norman Rouen, loved the battered splendour of Notre-Dame Cathedral, +loved the church of Saint-Ouen--that miracle of the Gothic, with its +upspringing turrets, its portal as perfect as a Bach fugue. And in the +Solferino Garden he paid his tribute of flowers at the monuments of +Maupassant and Flaubert. Ferval was modern in his tastes; he believed +nothing in art was worth the while which did not date from the +nineteenth century. + +Deplorably bored, he passed his hotel on the Quai and turned into the +Rue Jeanne d'Arc, which led by the facade of the Palais de Justice. He +had studied it carefully, and it did not, this dull afternoon in +September, hold his interest long; he sauntered on, not feeling strong +enough to light a cigarette. Decidedly, Rouen was become tiresome. He +would go back to Paris by the evening train--or to Dieppe, thence to +London, on the morning boat. Presently he found himself nearing the +Porte de la Grosse Horloge. Through its opening poured vivacious working +girls and men in blouse and cap, smoking, chattering, gesticulating. It +was all very animated, and the wanderer tried to enjoy the picture. Then +over against the crenellated wall, under the tablet bearing the quaint +inscription picked out in choice Latin, Ferval saw a tall girl. Her bare +head would not have marked her in a crowd where motley prevailed; it was +her pose that attracted him,--above all, her mediaeval face, with its +long, drooping nose which recalled some graven image of Jean Goujon. Her +skin was tanned; her hair, flame-coloured, was confined by a classic +fillet; her eyes, Oriental in fulness, were light blue--Ferval had +crossed to the apparition and noted these things. She did not return his +stare, but continued to gaze at the archway as if expecting some one. +Young, robust, her very attitude suggested absolute health; yet her +expression was so despairing, her eyes so charged with misery, that +involuntarily he felt in his pocket for money. And then he saw that in +her hand she held a tambourine. She wore a faded uniform of the +Salvation Army. + +Suddenly an extraordinary noise was heard; music, but of such a peculiar +and excruciating quality that the young man forgot his neighbour and +wondered what new pain was in store for his already taut nerves. The +shops emptied, children stopped their games, and the Quarter suspended +its affairs to welcome the music. Ferval heard rapturous and mocking +remarks. "Baki, Baki, the human orchestra!" cried one gossip to another. +And the reverberating music swelled, multifarious and amazing as if a +military band from piccolo to drum were about to descend the highway. A +clatter and bang, a sweet droning and shrill scraping, and then an old +man proudly limped through the gateway of the Great Clock. This was the +conjurer, this white-haired fellow, who, with fife, cymbals, bells, +concertinas,--he wore two strapped under either arm,--at times fiddler, +made epileptic music as he quivered and danced, wriggled, and shook his +venerable skull. The big drum was fastened to his back, upon its top +were placed cymbals. On his head he wore a pavilion hung with bells that +pealed when he twisted or nodded his long, yellow neck. He carried a +weather-worn fiddle with a string or two missing, while a pipe that +might have been a clarinet years before, now emitted but cackling tones +from his thin lips, through which shone a few fanglike teeth. By some +incomprehensible cooerdination of muscular movements he contrived to make +sound simultaneously his curious armoury of instruments, and the +whistling, screeching, scratching, drumming, wheezing, and tinkling of +metal were appalling. But it was rhythmic, and at intervals the edge of +a tune could be discerned, cutting sharply through the dense cloud of +vibrations, like the prow of a boat cleaving the fog. Baki, his face red +and swollen by his exertions, moved to the spot where waited the girl. + +"_Ai_, Debora!" cried a boy, "here's the old man. Pass the plate, pass +the plate!" To his amazement, though he could give no reason for the +feeling, Ferval saw the girl go from group to group, her tambourine +outstretched, begging for coppers. Once she struck an insulting youth +across the face, but when she reached Ferval and met his inquiring look, +she dropped her eyes and did not ask for alms. A red-headed Sibyl, he +thought discontentedly, a street beggar, the daughter of an old ruffian. +And as he walked away rapidly he remembered her glance, in which there +lurked some touch of antique pride and wrath. + + +II + +Rouen lay below him, a violet haze obscuring all but the pinnacles of +its churches. The sinking sun had no longer power to pierce this misty +gulf, at the bottom of which hummed the busy city; but Ferval saw +through rents in the twirling, heat-laden atmosphere the dim shapes of +bridges mirrored by the water beneath him; and once the two islands +apparently swept toward him, a blur of green; while at the end of the +valley, framed by hills, he seemed to discern the odd-looking +Transbordeur spanning the Seine. + +For twenty-four hours he had not ceased thinking of the girl with the +tambourine, of her savage, sullen grace, her magnificent poise and +strange glance. He had learned at his hotel that she was called "_Debora +la folle_," and that she was the daughter of the still crazier Baki. Was +she some sort of a gypsy, or a Continental version of Salvation Army +lass? No one knew. Each year, at the beginning of autumn, the pair +wandered into Rouen, remained a few weeks, and disappeared. Where? +Paris, perhaps, or Italy or--_la bas!_ The shoulder-shrugging proved +that Baki and his daughter were not highly regarded by reputable +citizens of Rouen, though the street people followed their music and +singing as long as it lasted. Singing? queried Ferval; does the woman +sing? + +He became more interested. His visits to the country where Pissarro +painted and Flaubert wrote revealed other possibilities besides those +purely artistic ones in which this amateur of fine shades and sensations +delighted. He did not deny, on the esplanade where behind him stood +Bonsecours and the monument of Jeanne d'Arc, that souvenirs of the girl +had kept his eyelids from closing during the major portion of the night. +To cool his brain after the midday breakfast he had climbed the white, +dusty, and winding road leading to the Monumental Cemetery wherein, true +Flaubertian, he had remained some moments uncovered at the tomb of the +master. Now he rested, and the shade of the trees mellowed the slow dusk +of a Rouen evening. + +A deep contralto voice boomed in his ears. As he had seen but a scant +half-dozen persons during the afternoon on the heights, Ferval was +startled from his dreams. He turned. Sitting on a bank of green was the +girl. Her hands were clasped and she spoke carelessly to her father, +who, unharnessed from his orchestra, appeared another man. Rapidly +Ferval observed his striking front, his massive head with the long, +white curls, the head of an Elijah disillusioned of his mission. He, +too, was sitting, but upright, and his arm was raised with a threatening +gesture as if in his desolating anger he were about to pronounce a +malediction upon the vanishing twilighted town. Ferval moved +immediately, as he did not care to be caught spying upon his queer +neighbours. He was halted by their speech. It was English. His surprise +was so unaffected that he turned back and went up to the two and bade +them good-day. At once he saw that the girl recognized him; the father +dropped his air of grandeur and put on the beggar's mask. What an actor! +thought Ferval, at the transformation. "Would the good gentleman +please--?" + +The girl plucked at her father's arm imploringly. With her grave, cold +expression she answered the other's salutation and fixed him with her +wonderful eyes so inquiringly that Ferval began a hasty explanation. +"English was rarely spoken here ... and then the pleasure of the music!" +The old man burst into scornful laughter. + +"The music!" he exclaimed. "The music!" echoed his daughter. Ferval +wished himself down in Rouen. But he held his position. + +"Yes," he continued, "your music. It interested me. And now I find you +speaking my own tongue. I must confess that I am curious, that my +curiosity has warrant." Thus was he talking to beggars as if they were +his social equals. Unconsciously the tone he adopted had been forced +upon him by the bearing of his companions, above all by their accent, +that of cultivated folk. Who and what were they? The musician no longer +smiled. + +"You are a music-lover, monsieur?" he asked in a marked French _patois_. + +"I love music, and I am extremely engaged by your remarkable combination +of instruments," answered Ferval. Baki regarded his wretched orchestra +on the grass, then spoke to his daughter. + +"Debora," he said in English, and his listener wondered if it were +Celtic or Scotch in its unusual intonations, "Debora, you must sing +something for the gentleman. He loves our art,"--there was indescribable +pathos in this phrase,--"so sing something from Purcell, Brahms, or +Richard Strauss." + +These words were like the sting of hail; they seemed to drop from the +sky, so out of key were they with the speaker's ragged clothes and the +outlandish garb of his daughter. Purcell! Brahms! Strauss! What could +these three composers mean to such outcasts? Believing that he was the +victim of a mystification, Ferval waited, his pulses beating as if he +had been running too hard. The girl slowly moved her glorious eyes in +his direction; light as they were in hue, their heavy, dark lashes gave +them a fantastic expression--bright flame seen through the shadow of +smoke. He felt his own dilating as she opened her throat and poured out +a broad, sonorous stream of sound that resolved into Von ewiger Liebe by +Brahms. He had always loved deep-voiced women. Had he not read in the +Talmud that Lilith, Adam's first wife, was low of voice? And this +beggar-maid? Maybe a masquerading singer with a crazy father! What else +could mean such art wasted on the roads, thrown in the faces of a +rabble! Ferval kindled with emotion. Here was romance. Brahms and his +dark song under the bowl of the troubled blue sky strongly affected him. +He took the lean, brown hand of the singer and kissed it fervently. She +drew back nervously, but her father struck her on the shoulder +chidingly. + +"A trifle too dreary," he rumbled in his heavy bass. "Now, Purcell for +the gentleman, and may he open his heart and his purse for the poor." + +"Father," she cried warningly, "we are not beggars, _now_!" She turned +supplicatingly to the young man and made a gesture of dismissal. He +gently shook his head and pretended that he was about to leave, though +he felt that his feet were rooted in the earth, his power of willing +gone. + +"Ay, ay, my girl!" continued the musician, "you can sing as well as the +best of them, only you love your sinful old father so much that you have +laid aside your ambitions, to follow him in his pilgrimage of expiation +about this wicked globe. Ah, sir, if you but knew--I _will_ speak, +Debora, for he is a gentleman and a lover of music! If you but knew our +history, you would not be surprised at us. Have ye ever been in Wales?" + +Ferval stumbled in his answer. It was overlooked; the old man continued: +"If ye have, ye must have heard of the sin-eaters. I am one of them, I +am an eater of sin--" + +Again the girl exclaimed, this time piteously, "Oh, father, remember +your vow!" + +"Poor lass! Yes, I was a doer of evil, and I became an eater of sin. +Some day my sins will be forgiven--this is my penance." He pointed to +his instruments. Ferval kept silence. He feared a word would blow away +the cobweb foundations of the narrative. The girl had turned and was +watching a young tilted moon which with a single star made silvery dents +low in the western horizon. + +"I am an eater of sin. We still have a few such in Wales. They put a +piece of bread and cheese on the breast of a dead man and when the +sin-eater eats it, the sins of the dead are passed into the bread and +cheese and the soul of the dead is shrived of them. Ay, ay, but it's a +grave duty, my friend, to take upon your own soul the crime of another. +If you are free from sin yourself, you may walk through life a brave +creature; but ... I took his sins, sins, the sins of the wickedest +composer of our century, God rest his soul. And for the wicked things he +put into his symphonies I must march through life playing on this +terrible collection of instruments the Tune of Time--" His daughter +faced him. + +"Father, we must go; you are only keeping the gentleman." Again she +signalled Ferval, but he disregarded her warning. He would not stir. The +story and the man who told it, a prophet shorn of his heaven-storming +powers, fascinated him. + +"I took his sins to myself and they were awful. Once every night I play +the Tune of Time in which the wickedness of the dead man is spread out +like dry rot in a green field. This man kept his genius so long stagnant +that it decayed on his hands, and then into his pestilential music he +poured his poison, and would have made the world sick. Oh, for delivery +from the crushing transgressions of another! His name? Ah, but that is +my secret! I ate his sin, and truth, my son, is stranger than theology! +Listen!" + +Before his daughter could check him he had hastily donned his armament +of instruments and, tramping slowly the broad, smooth path, began +playing. Ferval, much disappointed, was about to disappear, for he +remembered the racking noises of the previous day. But this music, this +Tune of Time!... + + +III + +It was like the flare of lightning which illuminates strange regions +beyond the borders of the soul. Ferval no longer heard, he felt; he felt +no more, he saw. The white veil was torn asunder, and it showed him a +melodious thunder-pool wherein tapering tiny bodies swam, whose eyes +were the eyes of Debora. They split and coalesced into other creatures, +and to the drummings of spheric harmonies resolved themselves scaly and +monstrous. Never did they cease changing. As the music buzzed he saw the +great ladder of life, the lowermost rungs resting in lakes of melted +amber, the top threatening the remotest rims of the universe. And still +the Tune of Time whirred on, as facet after facet of the Infinite +wheeled toward creation. Numberless legions of crumpled nightmare shapes +modulated into new, familiar forms. Ferval saw plasmic dew become +anthropoidal apes, fiercely roaming primeval forests in search of prey. +The music mounted ever upward, for the Tune of Time is the Tune of +Love--love and its inseparable shadow, hate, fashion the firmament. The +solid, circular earth shivered like a mighty harp under this lyric +burden of love. The very stars sported in their orbits; and from the +fulgurating ovens of the Milky Way there shot forth streams of audible +light that touched the heart-strings of the hairy, erect primates and +set them chanting; thus were the souls born which crowned them men. This +space-bridging music ranged from sun to sun, and its supernatural +symphony had no beginning and never shall end. + +But the magician or devil who revealed this phantasmagoria of the +Cosmos--how had he wrested from the Inane the Tune of Time that in a +sequence of chromatic chords pictured the processes of the eternal +energy? Was this his sin, the true sin against the Holy Ghost? How had +he blundered upon the secret of the rhythmic engine which spun souls +through the ages? No man could live after this terrific peep at the +Ancient of Days. Debora's eyes peered into Ferval's, filled with the +music that enmeshes. And now sounded the apocalyptic trumpets even unto +the glittering edges of eternity.... + +Amid this vertiginous tempest of tones Debora danced the Dance of Space. +She revolved in lenten movement to the lilt of the music, her eyes +staring and full of broken lights. As her gaze collided with her +companion's he saw a disk of many-coloured fire; and then her languorous +gestures were transformed into shivering intensities. She danced like +the wine-steeped Noah; she danced as danced David before the Ark of the +Covenant. And she was Herodias pirouetting for the price of John's head, +and her brow was wreathed with serpents. Followed the convulsive +curvings of the Nautch and the opaque splendours of stately Moorish +slaves. Debora threw her watcher into a frenzy of fear. He crouched +under a sky that roofed him in with its menacing blackness; the orbs of +the girl were shot with crescent lightnings. Alien in his desolation, he +wondered if her solemn leaps, as the music dashed with frantic speed +upon his ear-drums, signified the incarnation of Devi, dread slayer of +men! The primal charmers affrighted his vision: Lilith, Ourania, +Astarte, Ashtaroth, Belkis, Ishtar, Mylitta, Cotytto, and many +immemorial figures from before the Flood streamed by and melted into the +woven paces of Debora--this new Jephtha's daughter dancing to her doom +as her father fingered the Tune of Time. In the whirling patterns of her +dance, Ferval discerned, though dimly, the Veil of Maya, the veil of +illusion called Space, on the thither side of which are embroidered the +fugacious symbols of Time.... + +... As the delirious music faltered and fainted, he watched the tragic +eyes of Debora yellowing cat-like. His senses and imagination had been +hypnotized by all this fracas and by the beauty of the girl. With such a +mate and such formidable music, he could conquer the earth! His brain +was afire with the sweetness of the odour that enveloped them, an odour +as penetrating as the music of the nocturnal Chopin. + +"Debora," he whispered, "you must never go away from me." She hung her +head. The old man was not to be seen; the darkness had swallowed him. +Ferval quietly passed his arm about the waist of the silent woman and +slowly they walked in the tender night. She was the first to speak:-- + +"You did not hear a madman's story," she asserted in her clear, candid +voice, which had for him the hue of a cleft pomegranate. "It is the +history of my father's soul. It is his own sin he expiates." + +"But you, you!" Ferval cried unsteadily. "Why must your life be +sacrificed to gratify the bizarre egotism of such a--" He cut short the +phrase, fearful of wounding her. He felt her body tremble and her arm +contract. They reached the marble staircase of the Jeanne d'Arc +memorial. She stopped him and burst forth:-- + +"Would you be willing to share his burden? Would you take upon your +shoulders his sin? He may have committed the one unpardonable sin, for +he discovered the true philosopher's stone, that can transmute metals, +make mountains nod, the stars to stop, and command the throne of +Jehovah--oh, what blasphemy has been his in his daring music! If he +could persuade one other soul besides mine to help him, he might be +released from his woe. Will you be that other?" + +She put this question as if she were proposing a commonplace human +undertaking. Ferval in his confusion fancied that she was provoking him +to a declaration. To grasp his receding reason he fatuously exclaimed:-- + +"Is this a Salvation Army fantasy?" + +With that she called out, in harsh resentment: + +"Not salvation for you!" + +She then thrust him from her so violently that he tumbled backward down +the steps to the very bottom, where, unnerved by the ferocity of the +attack and his head bruised by the fall, he felt his consciousness +escape like gas from a punctured balloon. When found the next morning, +he was barely covered by the old sin-eater's rags, while near by was +scattered the entire orchestra of that eloquent wizard. Shudderingly he +realized that it had been no dream; shudderingly he wondered if upon his +soul had been shifted the unknown crime of the fanatic! The witching, +enigmatic Debora haunted his memory; and with dismay he recalled the +blistering vision evoked by the music, through which she had glided like +some tremulous Lamia. Decidedly his imagination had carried him far. He +cursed his easy credulity, he reviled his love of the exotic.... + +Ferval made inquiry of the authorities, but received little comfort. +Salvation Army people they were not, this father and daughter; the +tambourine, assumed garb, and prophet's beard had deceived him. +Impostors! But of what incredible caliber, of what illusion-creating +power! For years he could not see a Salvation Army girl without a sense +of cerebral exaltation. If he could have met Debora again, he would have +forgiven her sibylline deceptions, her father's chicanery. And how did +they spin their web? Ferval, student of the occult, greedy of +metaphysical problems, at first set it down to Indian Yogi magic. But +the machinery--the hideously discordant human orchestra, the corybantic +dancing! No, he rejected the theory. Music is sometimes hypnotic, but +not such music; dancing is the most alluring of the spatial arts, and +Debora's miming was a delight to the eye; but could it have so obscured +his judgments as to paint upon the canvas of his fancy those prodigious +frescoes of time and space? + +In the iron solitude of his soul he tortured himself with these +questions. His stupor lasted for days--was it the abrupt fall or was it +the result of his absinthe-like dreams? He was haunted by an odour that +assailed his brain like one tune persistently played. The odour! Whence +did it come with its sickly sweetness? Perhaps therein lay the secret of +his hallucinating visions. Perhaps a drug had perverted his brain. But +within the week the dangerous perfume had become dissipated, and with it +vanished all hope of solving the riddle. Oh, to sense once more the +enchantments of its fragrance, once more revel in the sublimated +intoxication of mighty forces weaving at the loom of life! By the +cadences of what infernal art had he been vouchsafed a glimpse of the +profiles of the gods? Henceforth Ferval became a lover of shadows. + + + + +XIX + +NADA + + +The tenderness of the growing night disquieted the dying woman. + +"Aline!" she called. But it was only the name that reverberated within +the walls of her brain, harrowed by fever. A soft air rustled the drawn +curtains of lawn; and on the dressing table the two little lamps +fluttered in syncopated sympathy. One picture the room held. It was +after a painting by Goya, and depicted a sneering skeleton scrawling on +his dusty tomb, with a bony fore-finger, the sinister word, +_Nada_--nothing! The perturbation of the woman increased, though +physical power seemed denied her. "Aline, my child!" This time a +clucking sound issued from her throat. + +The girl went to the bedside and gently fanned. Her aunt wagged her head +negatively. "No, no!" she stuttered. Aline stopped, and kneeling, took +the sick hands in her own. Their eyes met and Aline, guided by the +glance, looked over at the picture with its sardonic motto. + +"Shall I take it away, Aunt Mary?" The elder woman closed her eyes as if +to shut out the ghoulish mockery. Then Aline saw the tabouret that stood +between the windows--it was burdened with magnolias in a deep white +bowl. + +"Do you wish them nearer?" + +"No, no," murmured her aunt. Her eyes brightened. She pushed her chin +forward, and the young girl removed the flowers, knowing that their +odour had become oppressive. She was not absent more than a few seconds. +As she returned the maid touched her arm. + +"The gentlemen are waiting below, miss. They won't leave until they see +you." + +"How can I go now? Send them away, send them away!" + +"Yes, miss; but I told them what you said this afternoon about the +danger of Holiest Mother--" + +"Hush! she is calling." Aline slipped into the room on hurried feet, her +eyes dilated, her hair in anxious disorder. But the invalid made no +signal. She lay with closed eyelids, the contraction of her nostrils a +faint proclamation of life. Again the niece took her place at the +headboard, and with folded fingers watched the whispering indications of +speedy flight. The maid soon beckoned her from a narrowed door. Aline +joined her. + +"They say that if you don't go down, they will come up." + +"Who says?" was the stern query. + +"The Second Reader and the Secretary. I think you had better see them; +they both look worried. Really I do, Miss Allie." + +"Very well, Ellen; but you must stay here, and if Holiest Mother makes +the slightest move, touch the bell. I'll not be gone five minutes." + +Without arranging her hair or dress, Aline opened the folding doors of +the drawing-room. Only the centre lamp was lighted, but she recognized +the two men. They were sitting together, and arose as she entered. The +burly Second Reader wore a dismayed countenance. His cheeks were flabby, +his eyes red. The other was a timid little man who never had anything to +say. + +"How is Holiest Mother?" asked the Reader. + +"Dying." + +"Oh, Sister Aline! Why such a blunt way of putting it? _She_ may be +exchanging her earthly garb for a celestial one--but die! We do not +acknowledge death in the Church of the New Faith." He paused and blandly +stroked his huge left hand, covered with red down. + +"Holiest Mother, my aunt, has not an hour to live," was the cool +response of the girl. "If you have no further question, I must ask you +to excuse me; I am needed above." She stepped to the door. + +"Wait a moment, sister! Not so fast. The situation is serious. Hundreds +of thousands of the faithful depend on our report of this--of this sad +event. We may tell them that the female pope of our great religion"--he +bent his big neck reverently--"was wafted to her heavenly abode by the +angels. But there are the officers of the law, the undertaker, the +cemetery people, to be considered. Shall we acknowledge that our founder +has died like any other human--in bed, of a fever? And who is to be her +successor? Has she left a will?" + +"Poor Aunt Mary!" muttered the girl. + +"It must be a woman, will or no will," continued the Second Reader, in +the tone of a conqueror making terms with a stricken foe. "Now Aline, +sister, you are the nearest of kin. You are a fervent healer. _You_ are +the Woman." + +"How can you stand there heartlessly plotting such things and a dying +woman in the house?" Aline's voice was metallic with passion. "You care +only for the money and power in our church. I refuse to join with you in +any such scheme. Aunt Mary will die. She will name her successor. Then +it will be time to act. Have you forgotten her last words to the +faithful?" She pointed to a marble tablet above the fireplace, which +bore this astounding phrase: "My first and forever message is one and +eternal." Nothing more,--but the men cowered before the sublime wisdom +uttered by a frail woman, wisdom that had started the emotional +machinery of two continents. + +"But, great God! Miss Aline, you mustn't go off and leave us in this +fix." Drops of water stood on the forehead of the Second Reader. His +hands dropped to his side with a gesture of despair. His companion kept +to the corner, a scared being. + +"You know as well as I do that _somebody_ has to take the throne seat +after--after your Aunt Mary dies--I mean, after Holiest Mother is +translated to eternity. Ask her, beg her, for some advice. We can't let +the great undertaking go to pieces--" + +"You have little faith, brother," replied Aline. "If that message means +anything, then the New Faith will take care of itself--" + +"Yes, yes, I know," was the testy interruption; "but the world is not so +easily led in matters of religion. The message, as you say, is divine; +but it may sound like meaningless twaddle to the world at large. If we +are to heal mankind and dispel the heresy of disease and death, why +can't Holiest Mother save herself? Mind you, I am looking at this thing +with the eyes of the sceptics--" + +"You are an unbeliever, a materialist, yourself," was the bold retort. +"Do as you please, but you can't drag me into your money calculations." +The swift slam of the door left them to their fears. + +Her aunt, sitting as upright as a candle, was conducting an invisible +orchestra when Aline returned. The frightened maid tried to hold the +lean, spasmodic arms as they traced in the air the pompous rhythm of a +march that moved on silent funereal pinions through the chamber. The +woman stared threateningly at the picture on the wall, the picture of +the skeleton which had come from nothingness to reveal nothingness to +the living. The now distraught girl, her nerves crisped by her doubts, +threw herself upon the bed, her fears sorely knocking at her heart. + +"Aunt, Aunt Mary--Holiest Mother, in Christ's name, in the name of the +New Faith, tell me before you go--tell me what is to become of our holy +church after you die--after you pass over to the great white light. Is +it all real? Or is it only a dream, _your_ beautiful dream?--What is the +secret truth? Or--or--is there no secret--no--" her voice was cracked by +sobs. The stately, soundless music was waved on by her aunt. Then +Holiest Mother fell back on her pillow, and with a last long glance at +the picture, she pointed, with smiling irony at the picture. + +_Nada, Nada ..._ + +The night died away in tender complicity with the two little lamps on +the dressing table, and the sweet, thick perfume of magnolias modulated +into acrid decay as day dawned. Below, the two men anxiously awaited the +message from the dead. And they saw again upon the marble tablet above +the fireplace her cryptic wisdom:-- + +"My first and forever message is one and eternal." + + + + +XX + +PAN + + For the Great God Pan is alive again. + + --DEAN MANSEL. + + +I + +The handsome Hungarian kept his brilliant glance fixed upon Lora Crowne; +she sat with her Aunt Lucas and Mr. Steyle at a table facing the +orchestra. His eyes were not so large as black; the intensity of their +gaze further bewildered the young woman, whose appearance that evening +at the famous cafe on the East Side was her initial one. The heat, the +bristling lights, the terrific appealing clamour of the gypsy band, set +murmuring the nerves of this impressionable girl. And the agility of the +_cymbalom_ player, his great height, clear skin, and piercing eyes, +quite enthralled her. + +"It is the gypsy dulcimer, Lora; I read all about it in Liszt's book on +gypsy music," said Aunt Lucas, in an airy soprano. + +Mr. Steyle was impressed. Lora paid no attention, but continued to gaze +curiously at the antics of the player, who hammered from his instrument +of wire shivering, percussive music. With flexible wrists he swung the +felt-covered mallets that brought up such resounding tones; at times +his long, apelike arms would reach far asunder and, rolling his eyes, he +touched the extremes of his _cymbalom_; then he described furious +arpeggios, punctuated with a shrill tattoo. And the crazy music defiled +by in a struggling squad of chords; but Arpad Vihary never lifted his +eyes from Lora Crowne.... + +The vibration ceased. Its withdrawal left the ear-drums buzzing with a +minute, painful sensation, like that of moisture rapidly evaporating +upon the naked skin. A battalion of tongues began to chatter as the +red-faced waiters rushed between the tables, taking orders. It was after +eleven o'clock, and through the swinging doors passed a throng of motley +people, fanning, gossiping, bickering--all eager and thirsty. Clarence +Steyle pointed out the celebrities with conscious delight. Over +yonder--that man with the mixed gray hair--was a composer who came every +night for inspiration,--musical and otherwise, Clarence added, with a +laugh. And there was the young and well-known decadent playwright who +wore strangling high collars and transposed all his plays from French +sources; he lisped and was proud of his ability to dramatize the latest +mental disease. And a burglar who had written a famous book on the +management of children during hot weather sat meekly resting before a +solitary table. + +The leader of the Hungarian band was a gypsy who called himself Alfassy +Janos, though he lived on First Avenue, in a flat the door of which +bore this legend: _Jacob Aron_. The rest of the band seemed gypsy. Who +is the _cymbalom_ player? That is not difficult to answer; the programme +gives it. + +"There you are, Miss Lora." + +She looked. "Oh, what a romantic name! He must be a count at least." + +"Lora, dear, gypsies never bear titles," remarked Aunt Lucas, +patronizingly. + +"How about the Abbe Liszt?" triumphantly asked her charge. + +Aunt Lucas laughed coldly. "Liszt was Hungarian, not Romany. But your +artist with the drumsticks certainly is distinguished-looking. If he +only would not wear that odious scarlet uniform. I wonder why he does +not sit down, like the rest of his colleagues." + +Arpad Vihary leaned against the panelled wall, his brow puckered in +boredom, his long black mustaches drooping from sheer discouragement. +His was a figure for sculpture--a frame powerfully modelled, a bisque +complexion. Thin as a cedar sapling, he preserved such an immovable +attitude that in the haze of the creamy atmosphere he seemed a carved, +marmoreal image rather than a young man with devouring eyes. + +The three visitors ate sandwiches and pretended to relish Munich beer +served in tall stone mugs. Aunt Lucas, who was shaped like a 'cello, +made more than a pretence of sipping; she drank one entirely, +regretting the exigencies of chaperonage: to ask for more might shock +the proper young man. + +"It's horrid here, after all," she remarked discontentedly. "So many +people--_such_ people--and very few nice ones. The Batsons are over +there, Lora; but then you don't care for them. O dear, I wish the band +would strike up again." + +It did. A vicious swirl of colour and dizzy, dislocated rhythms prefaced +the incantations of the Czardas. Instantly the eating, gabbling crowd +became silent. Alfassy Janos magnetized his hearers with cradling, +caressing movements of his fiddle. He waved like tall grass in the wind; +he twisted snakewise his lithe body as he lashed his bow upon the +screaming strings; the resilient tones darted fulgurantly from +instrument to instrument. After chasing in circles of quicksilver, they +all met with a crash; and the whole tonal battery, reenforced by the +throbbing of Arpad Vihary's dulcimer, swept through the suite of rooms +from ceiling to sanded floor. It was no longer enchanting music, but +sheer madness of the blood; sensual and warlike, it gripped the +imagination as these tunes of old Egypt, filtered through savage +centuries, reached the ears. Lora trembled in the gale that blew across +the Puzta. She imagined a determined Hungarian prairie, over which +dashed disordered centaurs brandishing clubs, driving before them a band +of satyrs and leaping fauns. The hoofed men struggled. At their front +was a monster with a black goat-face and huge horns; he fought fiercely +the half-human horses. The sun, a thin scarf of light, was eclipsed by +earnest clouds; the curving thunder closed over the battle; the air was +flame-sprinkled and enlaced by music; and most melancholy were the eyes +of the defeated Pan--the melancholy eyes of Arpad Vihary.... + +Aunt Lucas was scandalized. "Do you know, Lora, that the impudent +dulcimer virtuoso"--she prided herself on her musical terms--"actually +stared you out of countenance during the entire Czardas?" And she could +have added that her niece had returned the glance unflinchingly. + +Mr. Steyle noticed Lora's vacant regard when he addressed her and +insisted on getting her away from the dangerous undertow of this "table +d'hote music," as he contemptuously called it. He summoned the waiter. + +Lora shed her disappointment. "Oh, let's wait for the _cymbalom_ solo," +she frankly begged. + +Her aunt was unmoved. "Yes, Mr. Steyle, we had better go; the air is +positively depressing. These slumming parties are delightful if you +don't overdo them--but the people!" Up went her lorgnon. + +They soon departed. Lora did not dare to look back until she reached the +door that opened on the avenue; as she did so her vibrant gaze collided +with the Hungarian's. She determined to see him again. + + +II + +Nice Brooklyn girls always attend church and symphony concerts. This +dual custom is considered respectable and cultured. Lora's parents +during their lifetime never missed the Theodore Thomas concerts and the +sermons of a certain famous local preacher; but there were times when +the young woman longed for Carmen and the delights of fashionable +Bohemia. Carefully reared by her Aunt Lucas, she had nevertheless a +taste for gypsy bands and "Gyp's" novels. She read the latter +translated, much to the disedification of her guardian, who was a +linguist and a patron of the fine arts. This latter clause included +subscriptions to the Institute Course and several scientific journals. +If Lora were less romantic, all would be well. Once the careful chaperon +had feared music and its disturbing influences; but after she had read +an article about its healing effect upon the insane she felt that it +could work no evil in Lora; indeed, it was an elevating art. She was +fond of music herself, and, as dancing was strictly tabooed, there +seemed little likelihood of the noble art of "sweet concordance"--Aunt +Lucas had picked this quotation up somewhere--doing mischief to her +impressionable niece. + +Nearly all dwelling-houses look alike in Brooklyn, even at midday. The +street in which the Crownes lived was composed of conventional +brown-stone buildings and English basements. Nielje, the Dutch maid, +stood at the half-opened door, regarding with suspicion the big, dark +man who had pulled the bell so violently. Aunt Lucas was in New York at +the meeting of a society devoted to Ethical Enjoyment. Though Nielje had +been warned secretly of an expected visitor, this wild-looking young man +with long black hair, wearing a flaring coat of many colours and baggy +Turkish trousers, gave her a shock. Why did he come to the basement as +if he were one of the cook's callers? She paused. Then the door was +shoved in by a muscular arm, and she was pushed against the wall. + +"Don't try that again, man," she protested. + +He answered her in gibberish. "Mees, Mees Lora," he repeated. + +"Ach!" she exclaimed. + +Arpad Vihary gloomily followed her into the dining-room, where Lora +stood trembling. This was the third time she had met the Hungarian, and +fearing Prospect Park,--after two timid walks there, under the +fiery-fingered leaves of early autumn,--she had been prevailed upon to +invite Arpad to her home. She regretted her imprudence the moment he +entered. All his footlight picturesqueness vanished in the cold, hard +light of an unromantic Brooklyn breakfast-room. He seemed like a clumsy +circus hero as he scraped his feet over the parquetry and attempted to +kiss her hand. She drew away instantly and pointed to a chair. He +refused to sit down; his pride seemed hurt. + +Then he gave the girl an intense look, and she drew nearer. + +"Oh, Arpad Vihary," she began. + +He interrupted. "You do not love me now. Why? You told me you loved me, +in the park, yesterday. I am a poor artist, that is the reason." + +This speech he uttered glibly, and, despite the extraordinary +pronunciation, she understood it. She took his long hand, the fingers +amazed her. He bent them back until they touched his wrist, and was +proud of their flexibility. He walked to the dining-table and tossed its +cover-cloth on a chair. Upon his two thumbs he went around it like an +acrobat. "Shall I hold you out with one arm?" he softly asked. Lora was +vastly amused; this was indeed a courtship out of the ordinary--it +pleased her exotic taste. + +"Hungarian gypsies are very strong, are they not?" she innocently asked. + +"I am not gypsy nor am I Hungarian; I am an East Indian. My family is +royal. We are of the Rajpoot tribes called Ranas. My father once ruled +Roorbunder." + +Lora was amazed. A king's son, a Rana of Roorbunder! She became very +sympathetic. Again she urged him to sit down. + +"My nation never sits before a woman," he proudly answered. + +"But I will sit beside you," she coaxed, pushing him to a corner. He +resisted her and went to the window. Lora again joined him. The man +piqued her. He was mysterious and very unlike Mr. Steyle--poor, +sentimental Clarence, who melted with sighs if she but glanced at him; +and then, Clarence was too stout. She adored slender men, believing that +when fat came in at the door love fled out of the window. + +"They put me in a circus at Buda-Pesth," remarked Arpad Vihary, as if he +were making a commonplace statement about the weather. + +She gave a little scream; he regarded her with Oriental composure. "In a +circus! You! Did you ride?" + +"I cannot ride," he said. "I played in a cage all day." + +"Because you were wild?" She then went into a fit of laughter. He was +such a funny fellow, though his ardent gaze made her blush. So blond and +pink was Lora that her friends called her Strawberry--a delicate +compliment in which she delighted. It was this golden head and radiant +face, with implacably blue eyes, that set the blood pumping into Arpad's +brain. When he looked at her, he saw sunlight. + +"Do you know, you absurd prince, that when you played the Czardas the +other night I seemed to see a vision of a Hungarian prairie, covered +with fighting centaurs and satyrs! I longed to be a _vivandiere_ among +all those fauns. You were there--in the music, I mean--and you were big +Pan--oh, so ugly and terrible!" + +"Pan! That is a Polish title," he answered quite simply. + +"Stupid! The great god Pan--don't you know your mythology? Haven't you +read Mrs. Browning? He was the god of nature, of the woods. Even now, I +believe you have ears with furry tips and hoofs like a faun." + +He turned a sickly yellow. + +"Anyhow, why did they put you in a cage? Were you a wild boy?" + +"They thought so in Hungary." + +"But why?" + +He stared at her sorrowfully, and was about to empty his soul; but she +turned away with a shudder. + +"I know, I know," she whispered; "your hands--they are like the hands +of--" + +Arpad threw out his chest, and Lora heard with a curiosity that became +nervous a rhythmic wagging sound, like velvet bruised by some dull +implement. It frightened her. + +"Do not be afraid of me," he begged. "You cannot say anything I do not +know already." He walked to the door, and the girl followed him. + +"Don't go, Arpad," she said with pretty remorse. + +The fire blazed in his eyes and with a single swift grasp he seized her, +holding her aloft like a torch. Lora almost lost consciousness. She had +not counted upon such barbarous wooing, and, frightened, cried out, +"Nielje, Nielje!" + +Nielje burst into the room as if she had been very near the keyhole. +She was a powerful woman from Holland, who did not fear an army. + +"Put her down!" she insisted, in her deepest gutturals. "Put her down, +you brute, or I'll hurt you." + +Lora jumped to the floor as Nielje struck with her broomstick at Arpad's +retreating back. To the surprise of the women he gave a shriek of agony +and ran to the door, Nielje following close behind. Lora, her eyes +strained with excitement, did not stir; she heard a struggle in the +little hall as the man fumbled at the basement entrance. Again he +yelled, and then Lora rushed to the window. Nielje, on her knees, was +being dragged across the grassy space in front of the house. She held +on, seemingly, to the coat-tail of the frantic musician; only by a +vigorous shove did he evade her persistent grasp and disappear. + +A policeman with official aptness went leisurely by. Nielje flew into +the house, locking and bolting the door. Her face was red as she rolled +on the floor, her hands at her sides. Lora, alarmed, thought she was +seriously hurt or hysterical from fright; but the laughter was too +hearty and appealing. + +"Oh, Meeslora! Oh, Meeslora!" she gasped. "He must be monkey-man--he has +monkey tail!" + +Lora could have fainted from chagrin and horror. + +Had the great god Pan passed her way? + + + + +BOOKS BY JAMES HUNEKER + + +What Maeterlinck wrote: + +Maurice Maeterlinck wrote thus of James Huneker: "Do you know that +'Iconoclasts' is the only book of high and universal critical worth that +we have had for years--to be precise, since Georg Brandes. It is at once +strong and fine, supple and firm, indulgent and sure." + +The _Evening Post_ of June 10, 1915, wrote of Mr. Huneker's "The New +Cosmopolis": + +"The region of Bohemia, Mr. James Huneker found long ago, is within us. +At twenty, he says, he discovered that there is no such enchanted spot +as the Latin Quarter, but that every generation sets back the mythical +land into the golden age of the Commune, or of 1848, or the days of +'Hernani.' It is the same with New York's East Side, 'the fabulous East +Side,' as Mr. Huneker calls it in his collection of international urban +studies, 'The New Cosmopolis.' If one judged externals by grime, by +poverty, by sanded back-rooms, with long-haired visionaries assailing +the social order, then the East Side of the early eighties has gone down +before the mad rush of settlement workers, impertinent reformers, +sociological cranks, self-advertising politicians, billionaire +socialists, and the reporters. To-day the sentimental traveller 'feels a +heart-pang to see the order, the cleanliness, the wide streets, the +playgrounds, the big boulevards, the absence of indigence that have +spoiled the most interesting part of New York City.' But apparently this +is only a first impression; for Mr. Huneker had no trouble in +discovering in one cafe a patriarchal figure quite of the type beloved +of the local-color hunters of twenty years ago, a prophet, though +speaking a modern language and concerned with things of the day. So that +we owe to Mr. Huneker the discovery of a notable truth, namely, that +Bohemia is not only a creation of the sentimental memory, but, being +psychological, may be located in clean and prosperous quarters. The +tendency has always been to place it in a golden age, but a tattered and +unswept age. Bohemia is now shown to exist amidst model tenements and +sanitary drinking-cups." + + +IVORY APES AND PEACOCKS + +_WITH FRONTISPIECE PORTRAIT OF DOSTOIEVSKY_ + +12mo. $1.50 net + + * * * * * + +NEW COSMOPOLIS + +12mo. $1.50 net + + * * * * * + +THE PATHOS _of_ DISTANCE + +A Book of a Thousand and One Moments + +12mo. $2.00 net + + * * * * * + +PROMENADES _of an_ IMPRESSIONIST + +12mo. $1.50 net + +"We like best such sober essays as those which analyze for us the +technical contributions of Cezanne and Rodin. Here Mr. Huneker is a real +interpreter, and here his long experience of men and ways in art counts +for much. Charming, in the lighter vein, are such appreciations as the +Monticelli, and Chardin."--FRANK JEWETT MATHER, JR., in _New +York Nation_ and _Evening Post_. + + * * * * * + +EGOISTS + +A Book of Supermen + +STENDHAL, BAUDELAIRE, FLAUBERT, ANATOLE FRANCE, HUYSMANS, BARRES, HELLO, +BLAKE, NIETZSCHE, IBSEN, AND MAX STIRNER + +_With Portrait and Facsimile Reproductions_ + +12mo. $1.50 net + + * * * * * + +ICONOCLASTS: + +A Book of Dramatists + +12mo. $1.50 net + +CONTENTS: Henrik Ibsen--August Strindberg--Henry +Becque--Gerhart Hauptmann--Paul Hervieu--The Quintessence of Shaw--Maxim +Gorky's Nachtasyl--Hermann Sudermann--Princess Mathilde's Play--Duse and +D'Annunzio--Villiers de l'Isle Adam--Maurice Maeterlinck. + +"His style is a little jerky, but it is one of those rare styles in +which we are led to expect some significance, if not wit, in every +sentence."--G.K. CHESTERTON, in _London Daily News_. + + * * * * * + +OVERTONES: + +A Book of Temperaments + +_WITH FRONTISPIECE PORTRAIT OF RICHARD STRAUSS_ + +12mo. $1.50 net + +"In some respects Mr. Huneker must be reckoned the most brilliant of all +living writers on matters musical."--_Academy, London_. + + * * * * * + +MEZZOTINTS IN MODERN MUSIC + +BRAHMS, TSCHAIKOWSKY, CHOPIN, RICHARD STRAUSS, LISZT, AND WAGNER + +12mo. $1.50 net + +"Mr. Huneker is, in the best sense, a critic; he listens to the music +and gives you his impressions as rapidly and in as few words as +possible; or he sketches the composers in fine, broad, sweeping strokes +with a magnificent disregard for unimportant details.... A distinctly +original and very valuable contribution to the world's tiny musical +literature."--J.F. RUNCIMAN, in _London Saturday Review_. + + * * * * * + +FRANZ LISZT + +_WITH NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS_ + +12mo. $2.00 net + + * * * * * + +CHOPIN: + +The Man and His Music + +_WITH ETCHED PORTRAIT_ + +12mo. $2.00 net + + * * * * * + +VISIONARIES + +12mo. $1.50 net + +CONTENTS: A Master of Cobwebs--The Eighth Deadly Sin--The Purse +of Aholibah--Rebels of the Moon--The Spiral Road--A Mock +Sun--Antichrist--The Eternal Duel--The Enchanted Yodler--The Third +Kingdom--The Haunted Harpsichord--The Tragic Wall--A Sentimental +Rebellion--Hall of the Missing Footsteps--The Cursory Light--An Iron +Fan--The Woman Who Loved Chopin--The Tune of Time--Nada--Pan. + +"In 'The Spiral Road' and in some of the other stories both fantasy and +narrative may be compared with Hawthorne in his most unearthly moods. +The younger man has read his Nietzsche and has cast off his heritage of +simple morals. Hawthorne's Puritanism finds no echo in these modern +souls, all sceptical, wavering and unblessed. But Hawthorne's splendor +of vision and his power of sympathy with a tormented mind do live again +in the best of Mr. Huneker's stories."--_London Academy_ (Feb. 3, 1906). + + * * * * * + +MELOMANIACS + +12mo. $1.50 net + +"It would be difficult to sum up 'Melomaniacs' in a phrase. Never did a +book, in my opinion at any rate, exhibit greater contrasts, not, +perhaps, of strength and weakness, but of clearness and +obscurity."--HAROLD E. GORST, in _London Saturday Review_. + + * * * * * + +CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS, NEW YORK + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Visionaries, by James Huneker + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VISIONARIES *** + +***** This file should be named 17922.txt or 17922.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/7/9/2/17922/ + +Produced by Ted Garvin, Taavi Kalju, and the Online +Distributed Proofreaders Europe at http://dp.rastko.net + + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +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 + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + +*** END: FULL LICENSE *** + diff --git a/17922.zip b/17922.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..8e42522 --- /dev/null +++ b/17922.zip 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..3982259 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #17922 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/17922) |