Chapter 25

IN WHICH BROOKE SINGS AND TALKS IN A LIGHT AND TRIFLING MANNER.

Brooke and Talbot had thus emerged from the Valley of the Shadow of Death, but that shadow still rested upon them. Their sudden deliverance had left them both alike overwhelmed; and as they stood apart, not speaking, not even looking at one another, there was a struggle in the mind of each which made it hard indeed for them to regain any kind of self-control. The vision of death which had been before them had disclosed to each the inmost soul of the other, and had led to revelations of feeling that might not have been made under any other circumstances. They had both alike expected death; they had said to one another their last and truest words; they had given expression to their most secret and sacred confidences; they had bidden their most solemn and most tender farewells; but the moment which had threatened to be the last of life, had passed away leaving them still in the land of the living--leaving them together as before, bound by the new and imperishable tie of a common memory, for neither could forget all that had been said, and felt, and done by the other.

After the events of the morning, Lopez had gone away with the greater part of his followers, leaving behind a guard of about half a dozen, as before. The noise of these movements had aroused the two prisoners, and they had gone to the window to look out, seeking rather to distract their thoughts than to satisfy anything like curiosity. From this window they had watched these proceedings in silence, standing close beside each other, with their eyes turned to the scene outside, but with thoughts wandering elsewhere. At length all had gone except the guard, and the last of the band had been swallowed up by the intervening hills. There was nothing more to be seen outside or to serve as a pretence for keeping their looks from following their thoughts.

Their eyes met. It was a deep and an eloquent look, full of unuttered meaning, which each turned upon the other; and each seemed to read in the eyes of the other all the secrets of the heart; and standing thus they looked into one another's hearts.

It was Brooke who spoke first.

"I wonder," said he, in a low, gentle voice--"I wonder, Talbot, if you had that look when you placed yourself in front of me and faced their levelled rifles. If so, Talbot, lad, I don't wonder that the soldiers paused; for they say that the calm eye of man can tame the wild beast or the fury of the maniac; and so your eyes tamed the madness of these fierce ruffians. Was your look then, Talbot, as calm and as firm as it is now?"

"It was fixed," said Talbot, in a gentle voice, "unalterably. But it was not their rifles that I saw; it seemed then as though I saw the other world."

A short silence followed, and then Brooke spoke again, in a voice which was very weak and tremulous.

"And you, Talbot, stood before their bullets, offering your life for mine!"

The accents of his voice seemed to quiver with suppressed passion and infinite tenderness.

"It was only a fair exchange," said Talbot, slowly; and her voice thrilled, as she spoke, through the heart of Brooke as he went over to her to listen; "for you were giving up your own life for me."

There was silence now for some time, during which their eyes were fastened upon one another. At length Brooke drew a long breath and turned away. Then he began abruptly to sing one of his droll songs. His voice was faint at first, but grew stronger as he went on:

"Billy Taylor was a gay young rover, Full of mirth and full of glee; And his mind he did discover To a maid of low degree. Rite follalol-lol-lol-lol-lido, Rite follalol-lol-lol-lol-lay."

"You see," continued he, "my way is to sing while I can. There are too many times in life when you can't sing 'Billy Taylor.' Then you may retire to your corner, and wear sackcloth and ashes. Such a time is coming, Talbot, lad, when the strain of 'Billy Taylor' shall be heard no more. But so long as I can I'll sing:

"'But this maiden had a parient, Who was very stern to she. "Fly, oh, fly, my dearest darter, From the wiles of your Billee!" Rite follalol-lol-lol-lol-lido, Rite follalol-lol-lol-lol-lay.'"

During this little diversion of Brooke's Talbot said nothing. It was, as he said, his way, and Talbot had grown accustomed to it. A long silence followed, after which Brooke once more addressed her.

"Talbot," said he, "we have been acquainted only two or three days, and we have told one another all that is in our hearts. So it seems as if we had been friends for a long time. Yes, Talbot; if I were to count over all the friends of all my life, I could not find one like you--no, not one. And now, if we both escape and you go back to your people, how strange it will be never to meet again."

"Never to meet again!" repeated Talbot; and an expression as of sharp and sudden pain flashed over her face. "You do not mean to say that you will never come to me?"

"Come to you!" repeated Brooke, and he gave that short laugh of his. "Oh yes--I'll come, of course, and I'll leave my card; and perhaps you'll be 'not at home,' or perhaps I'll be asked to call again, or perhaps--"

Talbot smiled, and Brooke, catching her eye, smiled also, and stopped abruptly.

Then followed another silence, which, however, unlike most of such periods, was not at all embarrassing.

"Have you noticed," said Talbot, at length, "that they have left the same small guard which they left before?"

"Oh yes; but what of that?"

"Don't you think that now, after what has happened, they might be far less strict, and be open to a moderate bribe?"

"Bribe? And why?" asked Brooke.

"Why? why?" repeated Talbot, in surprise. "Why, to escape--to get our freedom."

"But suppose I don't want my freedom?" said Brooke.

"Not want it? What do you mean? Do you suppose that I may not be strong enough for the journey? Don't be afraid of that. I feel strong enough now for any effort. I'll fly with you--anywhere, Brooke."

"Fly?" said Brooke; "fly? What, and take you to your friends? And then what? Why, then--a long good-bye! Talbot, I'm too infernally selfish. I'll tell you a secret. Now that the worst is over--now that there doesn't seem to be any real danger--I'll confess that I enjoy this. I don't want it to end. I feel not only like singing, but like dancing. I want to be always living in a tower, or an old windmill, or anywhere--so long as I can look up and see you, I don't want anything more in the world. And when I look up and see Talbot no more--why, then I'll stop singing. For what will life be worth then, when all its sunlight, and bloom, and sweetness, and joy are over, and when they are all past and gone forever? Life! why, Talbot, lad, I never began to know what life could be till I saw you; and do you ask me now to put an end to our friendship?"

This was what Brooke said, and then he turned off into a song:

"Then this maiden wiped her eyelids With her pocket-handkerchee; Though I grow a yaller spinster I will stick to my Billee! Rite follalol-lol-lol-lol-lido, Rite follalol-lol-lol-lol-lay."

After this there followed another prolonged silence. Talbot was now the first to speak.

"Brooke," said she, in her low, soft, tremulous voice, which had died down almost to a whisper, "we know the secrets of one another's hearts. Oh, Brooke! Brooke! why have we never met before? Oh, Brooke! how strangely we have drifted together! How much we have learned about each other! Is Fate so bitter as to make us drift away, after--after--"

Her voice died away altogether, and she turned her face aside and bowed down her head.

Brooke looked at her for a moment, and seemed about to take her hand, but he conquered this impulse and resolutely averted his eyes.

"Don't know, I'm sure," said he, at last, with an affectation of airy indifference.

"It would take a man with a head as long as a horse to answer such a question as that. Talbot, lad, you shouldn't plunge so deep into the mysteries of being."

After this there was another silence, and then Talbot looked up at Brooke with her deep, dark glance, and began to speak in a calm voice, which, however, did not fail to thrill through the heart of Brooke as he listened.

"Brooke," said she, "you have your own way. Your way is to conceal a most tender and pitying heart under a rough or at least an indifferent manner--to hide the deepest feeling under a careless smile, and pretend to be most volatile and flippant when you are most serious. You can perform heroic actions as though they were the merest trifles, and lay down your life for a friend with an idle jest. You make nothing of yourself and all of others. You can suffer, and pretend that you enjoy it; and when your heart is breaking, you can force your voice to troll out verses from old songs as though your chief occupation in life were nonsense, and that alone. And this is the man," continued Talbot, in a dreamy tone, like that of one soliloquizing--"this is the man that I found by chance in my distress; the man that responded to my very first appeal by the offer of his life; that went into the jaws of death merely to bring me food; the man that gave up all the world for me--his duty, his love, his life; the man that has no other purpose now but to save me, and who, when his whole frame is quivering with anguish, can smile, and sing, and--"

"Well, what of it?" interrupted Brooke, harshly. "What of it, oh, thou searcher of hearts? And, moreover, as to nonsense, don't you know what the poet says?

"'A little nonsense now and then Is relished by the wisest men.'

Moreover, and, yea, more, as to smiles and laughter, don't you know what another poet says?--Shakspeare, for instance:

"''Tis better to laugh than be sighing;'

or, as Lord Bacon, or Plato, or somebody else says, 'Laugh and grow fat.' And didn't John Bunyan prefer the House of Mirth to the House of Mourning?

"'John Bunyan was a tinker bold, His name we all delight in; All day he tinkered pots and pans, All night he stuck to writin'.

In Bedford streets bold Johnny toiled, An ordinary tinker; In Bedford jail bold Johnny wrote-- Old England's wisest thinker.

About the Pilgrims Johnny wrote, Who made the emigration; And the Pilgrim Fathers they became Of the glorious Yankee nation.

Ad urbem ivit Doodlius cum Caballo et calone, Ornavit plnma pilenm Et diiit:--Maccaroni!'

"Excuse me," he continued; "you don't understand dog-Latin, do you, Talbot?"

"No," said she, with a smile, "but I understand you, Brooke."

"Well," said Brooke, "but apart from the great question of one another which is just now fixing us on the rack, or on the wheel, or pressing us to any other kind of torment, and considering the great subject of mirthfulness merely in the abstract, do you not see how true it is that it is and must be the salt of life, that it preserves all living men from sourness, and decay, and moral death? Now, there's Watts, for instance--Isaac Watts, you know, author of that great work, 'Watts's Divine Hymns and Spiritual Songs for Infant Minds,' or it may have been 'Watts's Divine Songs and Spiritual Hymns for Infant Mind.' I really don't remember. It's of no consequence. Now, what was Watts? Why, on my side altogether. Read his works. Consult him in all emergencies. If anything's on your mind, go and find Watts on the mind. It'll do you good. And as the song says:

"'Oh, the Reverend Isaac Watts, D.D., Was a wonderful boy at rhyme; So let every old bachelor fill up his glass And go in for a glorious time. _Chorus_.--Let dogs delight To bark and bite, But we'll be jolly, my lads, to-night.'"

During this last little diversion Brooke never turned his eyes toward Talbot. She was close by his side; but he stood looking out of the window, and in that attitude kept rattling on in his most nonsensical way. It was only in this one fact of his careful manner of eluding the grasp, so to speak, of Talbot's eyes, that an observer might discern anything but the most careless gayety. To Talbot, however, there was something beneath all this, which was very plainly visible; and to her, with her profound insight into Brooke's deeper nature, all this nonsense offered nothing that was repellent; on the contrary, she found it most touching and most sad. It seemed to her like the effort of a strong man to rid himself of an overmastering feeling--a feeling deep within him that struggled forever upward and would not be repressed. It rose up constantly, seeking to break through all bounds; yet still he struggled against it; and still, as he felt himself grow weaker in the conflict, he sought refuge in fresh outbursts of unmeaning words. But amidst it all Talbot saw nothing except the man who had gone forth to die for her, and in all his words heard nothing except the utterance of that which proved the very intensity of his feelings.

"Oh yes," continued Brooke, "there are lots of authorities to be quoted in favor of mirthfulness. I've already mentioned Bunyan and Watts. I'll give you all the rest of the old divines.

"'Oh, Baxter is the boy for me, So fall of merriment and glee: And when I want a funny man, I turn to any old Puritan:-- A Puritan, A funny man, I read the works of a Puritan!

Among the Puritan divines Old Cotton Mather brightest shines, And he could be a funny man, Because he was a Puritan:-- A Puritan, A funny man, Old Mather was a Puritan!

The old Blue-Laws, of all the best, Od Calvin made in solemn jest; For fun he never could tolerate. Unless established by the State:-- A Puritan, A funny man, John Calvin was a Puritan!"

This eccentric song Brooke droned out in nasal tones and with a lachrymose whine to the strangest tune that ever was heard. At its close he heaved a sigh, and said:

"Well, it's dry work singing hymns all by myself, and you won't even 'jine' in the choruses, and so--I'll stop the machine."

Saying this, he turned away and went to the opposite side of the small loft, where he sat down with his head against the wall.

"Does any lady or gentleman present object to smoking?" said he, after a brief pause, as he drew forth his pipe and smoking materials. "Because I propose to take a smoke, and I should like to know, just out of curiosity."

To this Talbot made no reply, but sat down opposite Brooke, in the same attitude, and watched him as he smoked, which he proceeded to do without any further delay.

"You don't smoke, I believe, sir," said he, with all gravity.

Talbot said nothing.

"Well," said Brooke, "I wouldn't advise you to begin;" and with that he went on puffing away.

Brooke at last finished his smoke, after which he put his pipe in his pocket, and then, throwing his head back, sat with his eyes obstinately fixed on the ceiling.

Talbot remained in the same attitude, without moving. She had kept her eyes all this time fixed on Brooke, and knew that he was avoiding her glance. All the same, however, she continued watching him, and was waiting patiently till she should catch his eye. But Brooke, as though aware of her purpose, avoided her, and still locked away.

Thus these two sat in utter silence for a long time.

It was Talbot who first broke the silence.

"Brooke," said she, in a soft, low voice, which sounded like a sigh.

"Well, Talbot," said Brooke, in a voice which was strangely altered from the somewhat hard tones of forced gayety in which he had last been speaking.

"Brooke," said Talbot, "I am miserable."

Brooke was silent for a time. He made a movement, then checked himself, and then said,

"Are you? Odd, too, isn't it?"

"I am miserable," said Talbot again; "and it is strange, for your life has been saved, and we are out of immediate danger. Yet I am now more miserable than I was last night when your life was in danger. Can you tell me why it is so, Brooke?"

Again Brooke made a movement, which he checked, as before, by a strong impulse.

"Give it up," said he, shortly.

"I know," said Talbot. "I'll tell you. It was this," and her voice dropped as she spoke to a lower tone. "Last night I had made up my mind to die for you, Brooke."

Brooke drew a long breath. For an instant his eyes lowered. They caught the gaze which Talbot had fixed on him--deep, intense, unfathomable. It was but for a moment, and then it was as though he made a violent effort, and tore them away.

One of his hands caught at the other, and held it in a tight grip.

"Too much Talbot in that," he said at length, in a harsh voice. "If you go on dying for people, what'll become of you?"

"And now," continued Talbot, in a dreamy way--"now, when suspense and danger seem over, I am miserable--simply miserable, Brooke. Why should my mind have such strange alternations, feelings so contradictory, so unreasonable? I ought to be happy--why am I not?"

"Now," said Brooke, in the same harsh tone as before, "you're beginning to talk metaphysics, and I'm all at sea there."

Talbot was silent.

Brooke began to sing:

"How doth the little busy bee Improve the shining hour. But I prefer The caterpil-ler That feeds on the self-same flower. The bee he slaves for all his life;-- Not so the other one; For he soars to the sky, A butterfly, Ere half his days are done."

Silence now followed for a very long time. It was at length broken by Brooke.

"Talbot," said he, in a soft, low voice.

"Well, Brooke," said Talbot.

"Will you be silent if I say something?"

"Yes, Brooke."

"Not speak a word?"

"No, Brooke."

"Not move an inch?"

"No, Brooke."

"Well," said Brooke, on second thoughts, "I think I won't say it."

Talbot said nothing.

Brooke sat looking away, as usual, but now, at last, his eyes, which had so long avoided hers, sank down till they met her gaze. They rested there, and these two sat in silence, regarding one another with a strange, sad look of longing, as though there was between them a barrier over which they dared not pass. And that barrier arose there, invisible yet impassable--the pledge of honor and fidelity already given by each to another, at the thought of which they had now to crush down the surging passions within.

"Talbot," said Brooke once more.

"Well, Brooke," was the answer.

"Oh, Talbot! Talbot! Do you know what I wish to say?"

"Yes, Brooke," said Talbot. "I know it. I know it--all."

"Well, I will say it," said Brooke, "for I cannot keep it. Oh, Talbot! it is this--it is part of my Puritan education, perhaps. Oh, Talbot"--and his eyes rested on hers with a devouring gaze, and his voice trembled and died out into almost inaudible tones--"oh, Talbot, my younger brother Talbot! Very pleasant hast thou been unto me. Thy love to me is wonderful--passing the love of women!"

Talbot was true to her promise. She did not move an inch and she did not speak a word. But her eyes were fixed upon his; and in those eyes Brooke saw once again what he had seen before--the look of a love that had already shown itself stronger than life.

* * *

It was evening.

Suddenly there arose a noise outside. Brooke started up and went to the window, where he stood looking out. It was Lopez, with all his followers, who were returning.

Brooke, in his usual fashion, sang:

"Oh, little Jack he climbed so high, Up the beanstalk into the sky, And there he saw an ogre grim A comin' to make mince-meat of him. Singing fe-fi-fo-fum-- I smell the blood of nu Englishmun!"