Part 10

“No sooner had we crossed the dividing line than, with a crash, a great rock suspended above the entrance like a door fell and shut us off from sight of the island and the glittering wave that rolled thundering on. There was no retreat. There was nothing to do but to go on. I had come from the darkness and I was plunged back into it again. Neither light nor sound reached us. Impenetrable night surrounded us. The air however was fresh, as if it had connection with the outside. Beneath my feet a smooth roadway of stone led downward, the declivity being sharp.

“A change had taken place in Asra, which the excitement of the first few moments had prevented me from noticing. Her body had become light as air, and cold and stiff. I dreaded to confront the fact and acknowledge to myself what had happened. It was no longer the body of a woman. It was no longer my beloved, no longer Asra, whom I held in my arms. It was the opal which I had first seen between the moon’s ivory horns. What a grief was this! What sorrow filled my soul! It was useless to cry out or remonstrate. The change which I had seen upon the night of my arrival had taken place again. I consoled myself by thinking that, with day-light and the earth’s surface regained, she would be herself once more. If it had not been for this thought, I could not have gone on. I should not have tried for life. What would there have been to live for! Why could I not reasonably expect this? I had seen it happen before. Almost beneath my eyes the miracle had taken place.

“Lifting the mammoth opal to my shoulder, the easier to carry it, I sped swiftly down the smooth stone way, hoping every moment for a ray of light to give promise of an exit, however far away. When I reached the bottom of the declivity and found level stone beneath my feet, there was still no sign of light, and I was so weary that I put my burden down and slept. When I awoke, I ate some of the food in the hamper and went on.

“I must have been deep within the heart of the earth. No sound nor scent of living thing came here. Yet the air was fresh and free from the damp smell of prisoned places. This was the thing that gave me hope. Somewhere, not far away, it had met an outer current and purified itself. The wind blew in my face. It seemed to come from the direction in which I was going. It was not my own motion that caused it. When I paused, I could still feel it blowing gently in my face. That gave me heart, and was the one foundation for hope. Somewhere in the darkness there was an exit through which the fresh air came.

“My other journey beneath the earth was as nothing in point of time in comparison with this. Had it not been for the plentiful supply of food within the hamper, I must have perished before I reached the surface. As it was, I suffered greatly. I was exhausted. My feet were blistered with walking on unyielding stone, and my arms were stiff with the strain of holding securely that strange burden. Hope was still high in my heart that I should see the miracle wrought anew and Asra rise from her opal sleep. Otherwise I should have cared for nothing. Life would not have been worth the saving.

“It was night when I came to the surface of the earth, or, at least, darkness had fallen. I found myself upon a tiny island, no larger than a dot upon the water, evidently a coaling station in the South Pacific. There was but one building, a keeper’s cottage, and over it floated the flag of France.

“The evening was not old, for the tide, which indications proved to have been low that day, was creeping in. I did not pause to think or to be thankful for my safety. I thought only of Asra. I was in a fever of excitement to find out if my hope was to be realized. Would she awake from her sleep and speak to me? Would our old life go on as before? Carefully I deposited the precious burden upon the ground. The moon was a slender sickle of gold and lent but little light. However, there was a luster that came from the water, and the southern stars were bright. By their aid I hoped to see.

“Asra was wrapped in a thick white tissue. I remembered that it had the same billowy whiteness as the covering that slipped and fell down at her feet like foam on the night of my arrival, when I first saw her standing by the moon’s ivory horns. I thrust it aside, tearing it in my haste. Before me lay a radiant opal. From it colors spouted like jets of water in a wonder-park.

“The quick interchange of colors blinded me. I could distinguish nothing, peer as I might. I knelt down and put my face close to the stone in the endeavor to see. Then it was as if a rain of light sprayed my face. It was useless. I could make out nothing. Yet the great stone preserved perfectly the contour of her body. Surely I should be able to see her when that play of color called up by the light combinations of the night subsided. As I stood bravely fortifying my soul with hope, defiant in face of discouragement, the glamour of the old island life we had led together touched me vividly, and for an instant’s space swung me to the heights of joy. The stone grew pale and white. I knelt beside it. Then, plainly in its depth, I saw Asra asleep, in her gold corselet with its little pink gems and giant rubies.

“‘Asra!’ I called. ‘Awake! We are safe now. Awake and speak to me.’

“Peering closely, I saw her smile, else some ray of restless light touched her.

“In memory I saw once more the silk-hung chamber with its golden phantoms, and I grieved to think that I might never see it again.

“‘Asra! The white wave is gone. There is no sign of it anywhere. We are safe. Awake!’

“For answer I heard the sea’s undying pagan laughter. Asra faded away. The stone’s brilliancy revived. The mad dance of spouting colors began. I knew I could not call her back. I flung myself down beside her and buried my face in the sand. In a frenzy of grief I determined to watch until morning. Then, surely, the change I longed for would come. I could not give up hope. Hope meant life. The day would settle it, and as I wished. I lay down beside her and waited for the sun.

“What a night was that! It was the longest I ever knew. At times weariness over-powered me, and I slept to wake with strung nerves. It seemed as if the day would never come. I thought the stars of a dozen nights rose and set. I thought the magic in which I was entangled had hindered the old rotation of day and night. Every change in the night sky was reflected in the stone, as if it were the pulse of night. A wisp of clouds across the zenith, and it was malevolently somber; a freshening breeze swept them away, and fire darted from it.

“The day came, gray and chill, with a pallid mist. I was drenched to the skin, and shivering with cold. Fear, born of weariness, assailed me. The earth-grief fell upon me like a cloak. I ached in every limb. In what a fever of hope and fear did I hang over the stone, waiting for the light to clear sufficiently to see. When it did, I could no longer see the face of Asra, only her gemmed costuming and the dim outlines of her body.

“Then the fear that she would fade away forever all but drove me mad. I forgot hunger, weariness, everything, in the endeavor to see again the face I loved. As I watched in such anxiety as they know who have loved deeply, trembling the while, as if from fever, the sun sent its first level rays across the sea. The light penetrated the stone. There was nothing to hinder me now. I could delude myself no longer. I could see plainly. Asra was not there.

“Beneath the snowy surface I could distinguish a mingled brightness and the long gold lines where her body had been. While I was looking, these, too, melted away in a dance of color. Doubt and fear had killed her. She had warned me, too. She had told me that the result would be something undreamed of.

“If for an instant hope sprang glowing in my heart, I could see her dimly, but when it passed she melted away in a jeweled mist and left me alone. In one telescopic flash of mind I realized the gloom, the barrenness, of the years that were to come. I realized then, in the flower of my youth, that the best of life lay behind me. From what I had known, the paths of life must lead downward.

“Leaving her concealed in the reeds, I went to the house. I had been correct in my supposition that it was a French coaling-station. The keeper was greatly surprised at the presence of a stranger. When I explained how I came, he was more surprised and shook his head doubtfully. He declared that he had never heard of the Opal Isles. He could not explain my presence in any satisfactory way, however, since the only steamer which had been expected for weeks was due that day. When I told him more of the islands, with their twelve white cities, he no longer contradicted me. He said nothing, but he looked at me strangely. He thought that I was mad and feared lest opposition arouse my fury. I knew then that it would be useless to tell of my experience to any one. No one would believe it.

“I saw that the keeper would be relieved to be rid of me. When I asked him for a loan to defray my expenses to Melbourne on the expected steamer, giving only my word in pledge of refunding, he assented readily. He showed a like willingness to oblige me when I asked for a certain wooden chest, some six feet in length, which I had seen out-doors beneath one of the windows, and for which I had no ostensible use. He was willing to do anything to have me off his hands.

“The first thing I did when I reached Melbourne was to cable for money to my attorneys in Paris. When the answer came, I proceeded to hire a steamer and to equip it for a cruise of indefinite length. After procuring the most trustworthy seamen that port afforded, I set out on my quest of the Opal Isles. The captain, an old man whose life had been spent upon southern seas, said that in his youth he had heard of wonderful cities of white marble beyond the last known land. Likewise he said that he had heard that no one could land there, because they floated always out of reach. Others affirmed that they were merely icebergs drifting northward from the polar circle.

“I was glad to leave the low, yellow, sun-baked shores of Australia. I longed for the open sea. After we had steamed out of port and gone some distance, sand blown by a furious wind from that blistering upland desert which makes its interior, fell upon us and dotted the sea like rain.

“Straight to southward we steamed, past Tasmania. As we neared it, I remembered that it was spring in the southern seas--November. Tasmania was pink with orchard bloom. After we passed it and looked back--so different is its southern coast--there was nothing to be seen but towering columns of black basalt.

“Now the roll of the long waves struck us, sweeping always from west to east. Tremendous waves they are, whose length no one may measure. On and on they sweep, unhindered and unchecked, until somewhere to southward they girdle the earth.

“Five days later we sighted New Zealand--a row of white mountains whose bases are buried in yellow gorse. When we came nearer, we saw the cherry blossoms and the dog-roses of an English garden. Then again to southward and out into the long wash of the Australasian waves. Here our steamer disturbed and put to flight a myriad sea-fowl resting idly upon the surface of the water; down-white albatross with wings of jet, and Cape pigeons with checker-board backs. Land was definitely left behind with all that we had known. Before us, like a magic pathway enticing us to follow, stretched the long, shining roadstead of the wind. Swiftly we slipped down it and away toward the Polar seas. At night the Southern Cross flamed bright. At night we saw the vari-tinted stars of a southern zone. We were in a strange world, with a strange sky above us. The sea, too, was strange. Sometimes it was so clear by some little island’s side that we could see the mysteries of the deep. Some times we saw algæ as delicate and finely lined as carven cameos, and sometimes kelp so long it mocked the sea-serpent in its length.

“We coasted past unknown islands, where bright sea-growths blazed on coral reefs. We saw palms that looked as if they sprang from the water, so slender was their foothold in the soil. At times all that we knew of an island was a whiff of fragrance that blew across our faces while we slept, or we rose to find a feathery greenness in the day. Or at dawn we coasted near enough to land to catch a phrase drawled in dull semi-tones, or to see the sun gild sharply the bare body of a woman with black and floating hair. Then we came to barren water where no islands were, turquoise blue and chill, upon whose outer edge the ice-fields lay. Then back to northward. Round and round we swung. Thus we scoured the seas. We became known to every merchantman, to every sailor. At first they thought that ours was a like occupation. When they found out the difference, they looked upon us with disfavor. Stories were circulated. They said we brought misfortune and foul weather. Wrecks and sea tragedies were laid at our door. They confused us with the Flying Dutchman. Gloom settled down upon us. No one escaped it. Even I was losing heart. I found that we may not live other than our fellows. The punishment for being different is not slight.

“Days and days I sat on deck and scanned the horizon with my glass. When weariness overpowered me, a sailor took my place. Nor at night was the watch relaxed. Then, too, a sailor sat ready to lift his glass at call of a ray of light and sweep the sea. Each night when I went to bed, it was with the hope of finding myself beside the blessed islands when I awoke. That failing, I consoled myself with the possibilities of day. My life trembled between hope and disappointment. These were the poles of my narrowed world.

“There was one room in the steamer especially arranged for Asra. No one entered there except myself. It was lighted with brilliancy, that no material aid might be lacking in reading the great stone’s heart. There, after the nerve-racking day on deck, I spent a part of the night, peering into the long gem which lay upon a couch of white.

“It was rarely now, and only under mental stress, that I was able to glimpse the dear face. To do so it was necessary to shut myself off for days from contact with my fellow men and by imaginative effort and strong stimulants key myself to a fictitious joy. Then, for one moment, the fair body in its golden corselet would be visible in all its beauty, and the face smile as if ready to awake from sleep. Nor was this consolation of great duration. It was not long before the strongest and headiest wines failed to have any effect upon me, and I took to drugs. The moments of vision were of slighter duration, the body less distinctly seen, less real, and, it seemed sometimes, less lovely. It was all going from me, all that I had loved. I watched it, but I was powerless to hinder.

“The effect of the drugs failed altogether. There was nothing now that could lift me for an instant to the old height of joy where Asra and I had lived and loved. The strain was telling upon my health. Physical weakness helped to make the moments of vision rarer. Never again, Titan-like, could I live with Asra upon the heights. Weariness and weakness and impotence fell upon me. The earth called me, and held me bound. I could only look at the opal with its heart of flame and dream sadly of what had been. I could see Asra now only in the dream recesses of my brain. And I knew, too, that this power would not last. Old age would blot it out. There was nothing that I could hold and call my own.

“The years of cruising had been futile. They had brought disappointment to my hopes and to my heart the certainty that I should never find the delectable isles. My strength was exhausted. I was worn out with the fruitless quest. I gave it up and came here.

“That room there,” indicating with a wave of his hand an upper wing of the house, “I built for Asra. It is arranged and furnished like the room in which I found her. There she has lain for fifty years and, as I told you, I do not know whether she is alive or dead. That part of the house, as you may have noticed, fronts the sea, that she may hear always what she loved--the undying laughter of the pagan gods.

“It is years and years now since I have seen her. I am old and I have not the strength. I shall never see her again. But I know that she is there--asleep.”

* * * * *

A year later, in a distant city, I picked up a paper and this head-line caught my eye: “The Strangest Will Ever Filed.” It was an account of how one Gustav Berençy, a nobleman of the south of France, had left his wealth to a gigantic opal, which was shaped like a woman’s form.

FOOTNOTES:

[9] From “Rime di tre gentil donne.”

THE HOUSE OF GAUZE

A MOZART FANTASY

_C’est quelque part en des pays du nord--le sais-je? C’est quelque part sous des pôles aciéreux, Où les blancs ongles de la neige Griffent des pans de roc nitreux._

EMILE VERHAEREN.

“Good evening, my Lord of Mozart.”

The voice was sweet and so was the title. He looked up in surprise. Midnight had sounded. He had thought that he was the only one awake in the old house in the Rauhensteingasse with its myriad rooms, of which he rented three. His wife and children were abed. Their clothing littered the room in which he sat and added to its disorder.

He remembered the beautiful face that was bending beside him. At sight of it the years rolled back to the days of his childhood. Now, as she stood in his miserable room and called him “My Lord of Mozart,” he jumped up in readiness for her behest.

“I have come for you. The carriage waits below.”

Something snapped in his head, and it seemed to him that he rushed through gray leagues of space. Then he mastered himself and followed in the direction in which his visitor had gone. He did not find her. She was not within the hall nor upon the street.

There, however, a carriage waited, its driver by the door. He jumped in and fell back among soft cushions. A whip curled in the air, and two horses dashed through the darkness. They left the city, and reached the country. The speed did not lessen. He saw in fleeting perspective black hills and bare trees against a dull silver sky, where pale green stars shone. After they had driven at this pace for a time, they came to a city. He did not care what city it was. He only knew that she lived here. At last he should know who she was. At last!

The driver dismounted and opened the door. With his whip he pointed to a gate ahead. Then he bowed, leaped to the box and was gone. There was an inscription upon the gate. When he came near, he read in strange and antique characters: “The Land of Music.” After he had passed through the gate, he turned to have another look at it. There was nothing to be seen of the gate through which he had entered, nor of the country beyond. In all directions rose the roofs and towers of an alien city.

He found himself in a square where a number of streets converged. He read their names, and one caught his fancy: “The Street of the Masters.” He turned into it.

“What wonderful dwellings there are in The Land of Music!” he exclaimed joyously, forgetting for the instant the one he sought. “I knew it! I knew it! Why could I not have come here sooner!” he added, his lips and chin trembling piteously.

“What dwellings the masters dwell in!” He looked rapturously down the vista before him. “Here are tone-palaces of an Assyrian magnificence, silverly translucent, of the most gracious symmetry and rising to unthinkable heights. How I love this land, through whose gateways I have just passed! How I love it! It is as if it were made for me. It is a world of crystal and silver and white onyx and pale ivory. I can see streets of dwellings whose harmonious lines make Grecian temples heavy; dwellings of such fabulously fragile beauty as the frost of northern nights paints on the windows. There are arches springing airily from arches, reproduced again and again in delicate, diminishing curves; façades of silver fretwork of the palpitating tenuity of a spider’s web; forests of fair columns, their capitals hung with leaves of light.”

Then it was that a strange inversion took place. This became the reality, and that sad other world the dream. He covered his face with his hands and gave way to a storm of tears, so greatly was he relieved to be rid of the dream where he had known only sorrow. The relief, the unspeakable relief, to know that it was a dream! His frail figure became erect and proud, as he walked along, recognizing the dwellings of his friends. “Here are the houses of Glück and Sebastian Bach and my dear, dear Haydn. But what is that--that structure just ahead? Beethoven? Yes, Beethoven.” He looked about. Nowhere could he see anything that out-topped it. “My little friend Beethoven! How kind is life in comparison with the hideousness of dreams!” Again tears dimmed his eyes. “And there dwells Händel! That is just such a temple as the saints would build. It is not altogether original, but it is the work of a mighty soul. If it does not stand for versatility, it stands for strength.”

After passing the stern home of Händel, it was some little distance to the next dwelling. When he came where he could see it plainly, he laughed long and wildly, just as madmen laugh. “Who ever heard of any one forgetting his own home! How could that black dream have lasted long enough for me to do that? Will it never cease to haunt me? The idea of forgetting my own home!” And he laughed as madly as before.

Ahead, upon a little eminence, not quite in a straight line with the other houses of the street, he saw a sumptuous Italian palace of the best days, built evidently for love and leisure.

It was just such a palace as Lorenzo the Magnificent dreamed of setting among the laureled hills of Tuscany. It was built of resonant crystal, turreted and pinacled, and provided with a myriad Venetian balconies and pillared porticos. It was not of such tremendous height as the dwelling of Beethoven, nor of such vast dimensions as that of Handel, and yet it might easily be called lovelier than either, because of its charm of design.

As he stormed up the steps impatiently, he noticed how well his blue satin court suit with its jeweled stars and orders and his curling golden hair suited the dwelling in which he lived. The doors swung open to receive him. Powdered footmen bent before him.

The guests were waiting. They were in their places ready for the dance. He bowed before his partner. Her mouth was a little red dot, and her eyes were two deep pools of love. They swung into the dance. The music uplifted them. As changing figures brought them together, he sensed pleasantly the delicacy of her flesh and the floating fragrance of her hair. As he bent in the dance’s slow salutes, his eyes embraced soft shoulders, white breasts upheld, flower-like, by stiff corsages, slim, jewel-clasped necks, and twinkling feet beneath lifted lace.