Chapter 21

So Jurgen went on down the aisle between the rows of benches wherefrom Thragnar's warriors had glared at Jurgen when he was last in this part of the cave. At the end of the aisle was a wooden door painted white. It was marked, in large black letters, "Office of the Manager--Keep Out." So Jurgen opened this door.

He entered into a notable place illuminated by six cresset lights. These lights were the power of Assyria, and Nineveh, and Egypt, and Rome, and Athens, and Byzantium: six other cressets stood ready there, but fire had not yet been laid to these. Back of all was a large blackboard with much figuring on it in red chalk. And here, too, was the black gentleman, who a year ago had given his blessing to Jurgen, for speaking civilly of the powers of darkness. To-night the black gentleman wore a black dressing-gown that was embroidered with all the signs of the Zodiac. He sat at a table, the top of which was curiously inlaid with thirty pieces of silver: and he was copying entries from one big book into another. He looked up from his writing pleasantly enough, and very much as though he were expecting Jurgen.

"You find me busy with the Stellar Accounts," says he, "which appear to be in a fearful muddle. But what more can I do for you, Jurgen?--for you, my friend, who spoke a kind word for things as they are, and furnished me with one or two really very acceptable explanations as to why I had created evil?"

"I have been thinking, Prince--" begins the pawnbroker.

"And why do you call me a prince, Jurgen?"

"I do not know, sir. But I suspect that my quest is ended, and that you are Koshchei the Deathless."

The black gentleman nodded. "Something of the sort. Koshchei, or Ardnari, or Ptha, or Jaldalaoth, or Abraxas,--it is all one what I may be called hereabouts. My real name you never heard: no man has ever heard my name. So that matter we need hardly go into."

"Precisely, Prince. Well, but it is a long way that I have traveled roundabout, to win to you who made things as they are. And it is eager I am to learn just why you made things as they are."

Up went the black gentleman's eyebrows into regular Gothic arches. "And do you really think, Jurgen, that I am going to explain to you why I made things as they are?"

"I fail to see, Prince, how my wanderings could have any other equitable climax."

"But, friend, I have nothing to do with justice. To the contrary, I am Koshchei who made things as they are."

Jurgen saw the point. "Your reasoning, Prince, is unanswerable. I bow to it. I should even have foreseen it. Do you tell me, then, what thing is this which I desire, and cannot find in any realm that man has known nor in any kingdom that man has imagined."

Koshchei was very patient. "I am not, I confess, anything like as well acquainted with what has been going on in this part of the universe as I ought to be. Of course, events are reported to me, in a general sort of way, and some of my people were put in charge of these stars, a while back: but they appear to have run the constellation rather shiftlessly. Still, I have recently been figuring on the matter, and I do not despair of putting the suns hereabouts to some profitable use, in one way or another, after all. Of course, it is not as if it were an important constellation. But I am an Economist, and I dislike waste--"

Then he was silent for an instant, not greatly worried by the problem, as Jurgen could see, but mildly vexed by his inability to divine the solution out of hand. Presently Koshchei said:

"And in the mean time, Jurgen, I am afraid I cannot answer your question on the spur of the moment. You see, there appears to have been a great number of human beings, as you call them, evolved upon--oh, yes!--upon Earth. I have the approximate figures over yonder, but they would hardly interest you. And the desires of each one of these human beings seem to have been multitudinous and inconstant. Yet, Jurgen, you might appeal to the local authorities, for I remember appointing some, at the request of a very charming old lady."

"In fine, you do not know what thing it is that I desire," said Jurgen, much surprised.

"Why, no, I have not the least notion," replied Koshchei. "Still, I suspect that if you got it you would protest it was a most unjust affliction. So why keep worrying about it?"

Jurgen demanded, almost indignantly: "But have you not then, Prince, been guiding all my journeying during this last year?"

"Now, really, Jurgen, I remember our little meeting very pleasantly. And I endeavored forthwith to dispose of your most urgent annoyance. But I confess I have had one or two other matters upon my mind since then. You see, Jurgen, the universe is rather large, and the running of it is a considerable tax upon my time. I cannot manage to see anything like as much of my friends as I would be delighted to see of them. And so perhaps, what with one thing and another, I have not given you my undivided attention all through the year--not every moment of it, that is."

"Ah, Prince, I see that you are trying to spare my feelings, and it is kind of you. But the upshot is that you do not know what I have been doing, and you did not care what I was doing. Dear me! but this is a very sad come-down for my pride."

"Yes, but reflect how remarkable a possession is that pride of yours, and how I wonder at it, and how I envy it in vain,--I, who have nothing anywhere to contemplate save my own handiwork. Do you consider, Jurgen, what I would give if I could find, anywhere in this universe of mine, anything which would make me think myself one-half so important as you think Jurgen is!" And Koshchei sighed.

But instead, Jurgen considered the humiliating fact that Koshchei had not been supervising Jurgen's travels. And of a sudden Jurgen perceived that this Koshchei the Deathless was not particularly intelligent. Then Jurgen wondered why he should ever have expected Koshchei to be intelligent? Koshchei was omnipotent, as men estimate omnipotence: but by what course of reasoning had people come to believe that Koshchei was clever, as men estimate cleverness? The fact that, to the contrary, Koshchei seemed well-meaning, but rather slow of apprehension and a little needlessly fussy, went far toward explaining a host of matters which had long puzzled Jurgen. Cleverness was, of course, the most admirable of all traits: but cleverness was not at the top of things, and never had been. "Very well, then!" says Jurgen, with a shrug; "let us come to my third request and to the third thing that I have been seeking. Here, though, you ought to be more communicative. For I have been thinking, Prince, my wife's society is perhaps becoming to you a trifle burdensome."

"Eh, sirs, I am not unaccustomed to women. I may truthfully say that as I find them, so do I take them. And I was willing to oblige a fellow rebel."

"But I do not know, Prince, that I have ever rebelled. Far from it, I have everywhere conformed with custom."

"Your lips conformed, but all the while your mind made verses, Jurgen. And poetry is man's rebellion against being what he is."

"--And besides, you call me a fellow rebel. Now, how can it be possible that Koshchei, who made all things as they are, should be a rebel? unless, indeed, there is some power above even Koshchei. I would very much like to have that explained to me, sir."

"No doubt: but then why should I explain it to you, Jurgen?" says the black gentleman.

"Well, be that as it may, Prince! But--to return a little--I do not know that you have obliged me in carrying off my wife. I mean, of course, my first wife."

"Why, Jurgen," says the black gentleman, in high astonishment, "do you mean to tell me that you want the plague of your life back again!"

"I do not know about that either, sir. She was certainly very hard to live with. On the other hand, I had become used to having her about. I rather miss her, now that I am again an elderly person. Indeed, I believe I have missed Lisa all along."

The black gentleman meditated. "Come, friend," he says, at last. "You were a poet of some merit. You displayed a promising talent which might have been cleverly developed, in any suitable environment. Now, I repeat, I am an Economist: I dislike waste: and you were never fitted to be anything save a poet. The trouble was"--and Koshchei lowered his voice to an impressive whisper,--"the trouble was your wife did not understand you. She hindered your art. Yes, that precisely sums it up: she interfered with your soul-development, and your instinctive need of self-expression, and all that sort of thing. You are very well rid of this woman, who converted a poet into a pawnbroker. To the other side, as is with point observed somewhere or other, it is not good for man to live alone. But, friend, I have just the wife for you."

"Well, Prince," said Jurgen, "I am willing to taste any drink once."

So Koshchei waved his hand: and there, quick as winking, was the loveliest lady that Jurgen had ever imagined.

45.

The Faith of Guenevere

Very fair was this woman to look upon, with her shining gray eyes and small smiling lips, a fairer woman might no man boast of having seen. And she regarded Jurgen graciously, with her cheeks red and white, very lovely to observe. She was clothed in a robe of flame-colored silk, and about her neck was a collar of red gold. And she told him, quite as though she spoke with a stranger, that she was Queen Guenevere.

"But Lancelot is turned monk, at Glastonbury: and Arthur is gone into Avalon," says she: "and I will be your wife if you will have me, Jurgen."

And Jurgen saw that Guenevere did not know him at all, and that even his name to her was meaningless. There were a many ways of accounting for this: but he put aside the unflattering explanation that she had simply forgotten all about Jurgen, in favor of the reflection that the Jurgen she had known was a scapegrace of twenty-one. Whereas he was now a staid and knowledgeable pawnbroker.

And it seemed to Jurgen that he had never really loved any woman save Guenevere, the daughter of Gogyrvan Gawr, and the pawnbroker was troubled.

"For again you make me think myself a god," says Jurgen. "Madame Guenevere, when man recognized himself to be Heaven's vicar upon earth, it was to serve and to glorify and to protect you and your radiant sisterhood that man consecrated his existence. You were beautiful, and you were frail; you were half goddess and half bric-à-brac. Ohimé, I recognize the call of chivalry, and my heart-strings resound: yet, for innumerable reasons, I hesitate to take you for my wife, and to concede myself your appointed protector, responsible as such to Heaven. For one matter, I am not altogether sure that I am Heaven's vicar here upon earth. Certainly the God of Heaven said nothing to me about it, and I cannot but suspect that Omniscience would have selected some more competent representative."

"It is so written, Messire Jurgen."

Jurgen shrugged. "I too, in the intervals of business, have written much that is beautiful. Very often my verses were so beautiful that I would have given anything in the world in exchange for somewhat less sure information as to the author's veracity. Ah, no, madame, desire and knowledge are pressing me so sorely that, between them, I dare not love you, and still I cannot help it!"

Then Jurgen gave a little wringing gesture with his hands. His smile was not merry; and it seemed pitiful that Guenevere should not remember him.

"Madame and queen," says Jurgen, "once long and long ago there was a man who worshipped all women. To him they were one and all of sacred, sweet intimidating beauty. He shaped sonorous rhymes of this, in praise of the mystery and sanctity of women. Then a count's tow-headed daughter whom he loved, with such love as it puzzles me to think of now, was shown to him just as she was, as not even worthy of hatred. The goddess stood revealed, unveiled, and displaying in all things such mediocrity as he fretted to find in himself. That was unfortunate. For he began to suspect that women, also, are akin to their parents; and are no wiser, and no more subtle, and no more immaculate, than the father who begot them. Madame and queen, it is not good for any man to suspect this."

"It is certainly not the conduct of a chivalrous person, nor of an authentic poet," says Queen Guenevere. "And yet your eyes are big with tears."

"Hah, madame," he replied, "but it amuses me to weep for a dead man with eyes that once were his. For he was a dear lad before he went rampaging through the world, in the pride of his youth and in the armor of his hurt. And songs he made for the pleasure of kings, and sword play he made for the pleasure of men, and a whispering he made for the pleasure of women, in places where renown was, and where he trod boldly, giving pleasure to everybody in those fine days. But for all his laughter, he could not understand his fellows, nor could he love them, nor could he detect anything in aught they said or did save their exceeding folly."

"Why, man's folly is indeed very great, Messire Jurgen, and the doings of this world are often inexplicable: and so does it come about that man can be saved by faith alone."

"Ah, but this boy had lost his fellows' cordial common faith in the importance of what use they made of half-hours and months and years; and because a jill-flirt had opened his eyes so that they saw too much, he had lost faith in the importance of his own actions, too. There was a little time of which the passing might be made not unendurable; beyond gaped unpredictable darkness; and that was all there was of certainty anywhere. Meanwhile, he had the loan of a brain which played with ideas, and a body that went delicately down pleasant ways. And so he was never the mate for you, dear Guenevere, because he had not sufficient faith in anything at all, not even in his own deductions."

Now said Queen Guenevere: "Farewell to you, then, Jurgen, for it is I that am leaving you forever. I was to them that served me the lovely and excellent masterwork of God: in Caerleon and Northgalis and at Joyeuse Garde might men behold me with delight, because, men said, to view me was to comprehend the power and kindliness of their Creator. Very beautiful was Iseult, and the face of Luned sparkled like a moving gem; Morgaine and Enid and Viviane and shrewd Nimuë were lovely, too; and the comeliness of Ettarde exalted the beholder like a proud music: these, going statelily about Arthur's hall, seemed Heaven's finest craftsmanship until the Queen came to her daïs, as the moon among glowing stars: men then affirmed that God in making Guenevere had used both hands. And it is I that am leaving you forever. My beauty was no human white and red, said they, but an explicit sign of Heaven's might. In approaching me men thought of God, because in me, they said, His splendor was incarnate. That which I willed was neither right nor wrong: it was divine. This thing it was that the knights saw in me; this surety, as to the power and kindliness of their great Father, it was of which the chevaliers of yesterday were conscious in beholding me, and of men's need to be worthy of such parentage; and it is I that am leaving you forever."

Said Jurgen: "I could not see all this in you, not quite all this, because of a shadow that followed me. Now it is too late, and this is a sorrowful thing which is happening. I am become as a rudderless boat that goes from wave to wave: I am turned to unfertile dust which a whirlwind makes coherent, and presently lets fall. And so, farewell to you, Queen Guenevere, for it is a sorrowful thing and a very unfair thing that is happening."

Thus he cried farewell to the daughter of Gogyrvan Gawr. And instantly she vanished like the flame of a blown out altar-candle.

46.

The Desire of Anaïtis

And again Koshchei waved his hand. Then came to Jurgen a woman who was strangely gifted and perverse. Her dark eyes glittered: upon her head was a net-work of red coral, with branches radiating downward, and her tunic was of two colors, being shot with black and crimson curiously mingled.

And Anaïtis also had forgotten Jurgen, or else she did not recognize him in this man of forty and something: and again belief awoke in Jurgen's heart that this was the only woman whom Jurgen had really loved, as he listened to Anaïtis and to her talk of marvelous things.

Of the lore of Thaïs she spoke, and of the schooling of Sappho, and of the secrets of Rhodopê, and of the mourning for Adonis: and the refrain of all her talking was not changed. "For we have but a little while to live, and none knows his fate thereafter. So that a man possesses nothing certainly save a brief loan of his own body: and yet the body of man is capable of much curious pleasure. As thus and thus," says she. And the bright-colored pensive woman spoke with antique directness of matters that Jurgen, being no longer a scapegrace of twenty-one, found rather embarrassing.

"Come, come!" thinks he, "but it will never do to seem provincial. I believe that I am actually blushing."

Aloud he said: "Sweetheart, there was--why, not a half-hour since!--a youth who sought quite zealously for the over-mastering frenzies you prattle about. But, candidly, he could not find the flesh whose touch would rouse insanity. The lad had opportunities, too, let me tell you! Hah, I recall with tenderness the glitter of eyes and hair, and the gay garments, and the soft voices of those fond foolish women, even now. But he went from one pair of lips to another, with an ardor that was always half-feigned, and with protestations which were conscious echoes of some romance or other. Such escapades were pleasant enough: but they were not very serious, after all. For these things concerned his body alone: and I am more than an edifice of viands reared by my teeth. To pretend that what my body does or endures is of importance seems rather silly nowadays. I prefer to regard it as a necessary beast of burden which I maintain, at considerable expense and trouble. So I shall make no more pother about it."

But then again Queen Anaïtis spoke of marvelous things; and he listened, fair-mindedly; for the Queen spoke now of that which was hers to share with him.

"Well, I have heard," says Jurgen, "that you have a notable residence in Cocaigne."

"But that is only a little country place, to which I sometimes repair in summer, in order to live rustically. No, Jurgen, you must see my palaces. In Babylon I have a palace where many abide with cords about them and burn bran for perfume, while they await that thing which is to befall them. In Armenia I have a palace surrounded by vast gardens, where only strangers have the right to enter: they there receive a hospitality that is more than gallant. In Paphos I have a palace wherein is a little pyramid of white stone, very curious to see: but still more curious is the statue in my palace at Amathus, of a bearded woman, which displays other features that women do not possess. And in Alexandria I have a palace that is tended by thirty-six exceedingly wise and sacred persons, and wherein it is always night: and there folk seek for monstrous pleasures, even at the price of instant death, and win to both of these swiftly. Everywhere my palaces stand upon high places near the sea: so they are beheld from afar by those whom I hold dearest, my beautiful broad-chested mariners, who do not fear even me, but know that in my palaces they will find notable employment. For I must tell you of what is to be encountered within these places that are mine, and of how pleasantly we pass our time there." Then she told him.

Now he listened more attentively than ever, and his eyes were narrowed, and his lips were lax and motionless and foolish-looking, and he was deeply interested. For Anaïtis had thought of some new diversions since their last meeting: and to Jurgen, even at forty and something, this queen's voice was all a horrible and strange and lovely magic. "She really tempts very nicely, too," he reflected, with a sort of pride in her.

Then Jurgen growled and shook himself, half angrily: and he tweaked the ear of Queen Anaïtis.

"Sweetheart," says he, "you paint a glowing picture: but you are shrewd enough to borrow your pigments from the day-dreams of inexperience. What you prattle about is not at all as you describe it. You forget you are talking to a widely married man of varied experience. Moreover, I shudder to think of what might happen if Lisa were to walk in unexpectedly. And for the rest, all this to-do over nameless delights and unspeakable caresses and other anonymous antics seems rather naïve. My ears are beset by eloquent gray hairs which plead at closer quarters than does that fibbing little tongue of yours. And so be off with you!"

With that Queen Anaïtis smiled very cruelly, and she said: "Farewell to you, then Jurgen, for it is I that am leaving you forever. Henceforward you must fret away much sunlight by interminably shunning discomfort and by indulging tepid preferences. For I, and none but I, can waken that desire which uses all of a man, and so wastes nothing, even though it leave that favored man forever after like wan ashes in the sunlight. And with you I have no more concern, for it is I that am leaving you forever. Join with your graying fellows, then! and help them to affront the clean sane sunlight, by making guilds and laws and solemn phrases wherewith to rid the world of me. I, Anaïtis, laugh, and my heart is a wave in the sunlight. For there is no power like my power, and no living thing which can withstand my power; and those who deride me, as I well know, are but the dead dry husks that a wind moves, with hissing noises, while I harvest in open sunlight. For I am the desire that uses all of a man: and it is I that am leaving you forever."

Said Jurgen: "I could not see all this in you, not quite all this, because of a shadow that followed me. Now it is too late, and this is a sorrowful thing which is happening. I am become as a puzzled ghost who furtively observes the doings of loud-voiced ruddy persons: and I am compact of weariness and apprehension, for I no longer discern what thing is I, nor what is my desire, and I fear that I am already dead. So farewell to you, Queen Anaïtis, for this, too, is a sorrowful thing and a very unfair thing that is happening."

Thus he cried farewell to the Sun's daughter. And all the colors of her loveliness flickered and merged into the likeness of a tall thin flame, that aspired; and then this flame was extinguished.

47.

The Vision of Helen

And for the third time Koshchei waved his hand. Now came to Jurgen a gold-haired woman, clothed all in white. She was tall, and lovely and tender to regard: and hers was not the red and white comeliness of many ladies that were famed for beauty, but rather it had the even glow of ivory. Her nose was large and high in the bridge, her flexible mouth was not of the smallest; and yet, whatever other persons might have said, to Jurgen this woman's countenance was in all things perfect. And, beholding her, Jurgen kneeled.

He hid his face in her white robe: and he stayed thus, without speaking, for a long while.

"Lady of my vision," he said, and his voice broke--"there is that in you which wakes old memories. For now assuredly I believe your father was not Dom Manuel but that ardent bird which nestled very long ago in Leda's bosom. And now Troy's sons are all in Adês' keeping, in the world below; fire has consumed the walls of Troy, and the years have forgotten her tall conquerors; but still you are bringing woe on woe to hapless sufferers."

And again his voice broke. For the world seemed cheerless, and like a house that none has lived in for a great while.