CHAPTER XVI.

DEATH AGAIN BECOMES SERIOUS.

If Tito had not already seen so much that was wonderful, during his aerial voyage; if his remembrance of Elena had not so completely absorbed his imagination, and if the desire to know where Death was taking him had not disturbed his saddened spirit, the position in which he found himself, would, at least, have been a very enviable one in which to study, and solve, the greatest of geographical problems—the form and position of the poles of the earth. The mysterious limits of the continents, and of the Polar sea, lost in eternal ice; the protrusion or depression which, according to different opinions, must mark the position of the true axis upon which our globe turns; the appearance of the celestial dome, in which one could distinguish all the stars that light the skies of the northern hemisphere; the fiery centre of the Aurora Borealis, and in fact so many other phenomena which science has vainly investigated for centuries at the cost of thousands of illustrious navigators who have perished in those perilous regions, would have been as clear and manifest to our hero as the light of day, and we would have been able to explain them to our readers.

But as Tito made no such observations, neither will we be able to consider anything which bears no relation to the story. The human race must remain in its ignorance regarding the pole, and we will continue this narrative.

In reminding our readers that the season was that of the first days of September, they will comprehend that the sun still shone in that heaven, where there had been no night for five months.

By its pale and oblique light our travellers descended from the chariot, and Death, taking Tito by the hand, said to him with gracious courtesy:

“This is thy house. Let us enter.”

A colossal mountain of ice rose before his eyes, in the middle of which, frozen in snows as old as the world, was a sort of long, narrow opening which scarcely permitted a man to pass.

“I will show thee the way,” said Death, passing before.

The Duke of Verity stopped, not daring to follow his companion. But what could he do? Where fly in that infinite desert? What direction take, in those interminable, icy plains?

“Tito, art thou not coming?” asked Death.

He cast one last and hopeless glance toward the pale sun, and entered the ice.

A winding stairway, carved in the same congealed material, conducted him by tortuous turns to a vast, square room, without furniture or ornaments; all of ice. It reminded one of the great salt mines of Polonia, or the marble rooms of the baths of Ispahan and Medina.

Death had muffled himself up and was sitting down in Oriental fashion in a corner.

“Come hither, sit at my side and we will talk,” said he to Tito.

The youth obeyed, mechanically.

So profound a silence reigned that one could have heard the breathing of a microscopical insect, if in that region there might exist anything which did not rely upon the protection of Death.

Words could not express that terrible cold.

Imagine a total absence of heat; a complete annihilation of life; the absolute cessation of all motion; death, as a form of being; and even then you could not conceive an idea of that dead world, or more than dead, as it neither corrupted, transformed nor gave pasture to the worms, manure to the plants, elements to the minerals, nor gases to the atmosphere.

It was chaos.

It was _nothing_, under the appearance of everlasting snows.

Nevertheless, Tito endured it, thanks to the protection of Death.

“Tito,” exclaimed he, in quiet and majestic accent, “the hour has arrived in which truth shines before thine eyes in all its magnificent nudity: I will review in a few words the history of our relations and reveal to thee the mystery of thy destiny.”

“Speak!” murmured Tito, resolutely.

“It is undeniable that thou wishest to live; that all my power, all my arguments, and all that I reveal to thee each moment are useless to extinguish the love of life in thy heart.”

“The love of Elena, you mean,” interrupted the youth.

“Love! love!” replied Death. “Love is life and life is love. Do not mistake that. And if not, think of a thing which thou mayst have comprehended perfectly in thy glorious career as a physician, and during the voyage that we have just made. What is man? Thou hast seen him sleep from sun to sun, and dream, sleeping. In the intervals of this dream he possessed twelve or fourteen hours of wakefulness which he knew not how to employ. On one side, thou foundest him in arms against his fellow-creatures; on the other, thou hast seen him crossing the seas to exchange products. There are those who toil to dress themselves in this or that color; and those who pierce the earth to extract metals with which to adorn themselves. Here hanging one; there blindly obeying another. On one side, virtue and justice consist in such and such a thing; while on the other, they consist in the reverse. These judge as truth, what those hold to be error. The same beauty will appear to thee conventional and imaginary, according as thou art Caucasian, Mongolian, African or Indian. It will be apparent to thee also, that science is a shallow experiment to obtain the nearest results, or an illogical conjecture of the most recondite causes; and that glory is an empty name, attached by accident (nothing but accident) to the name of this or that corpse.

“Perhaps thou wilt have comprehended that all which man does is mere child’s-play with which to pass the time; that his greatness and his miseries are relative; that his civilization, social organization and most serious interests, lack common-sense; that fashions, customs, hierarchies, are powder, smoke, vanity of vanities. But what do I say? vanity! less, even! They are playthings with which thou entertainest the leisure of life; the deliriums of fever; the hallucinations of a maniac. Children, the aged, nobles, plebeians, wise, ignorant, beautiful, deformed, kings, slaves, rich and poor, all are the same to me: handfuls of dust, which dust, my breath unmakes. And still thou clamorest for life! And still thou tellest me thou desirest to remain in the world; still thou lovest that perishable creation.”

“I love Elena,” replied Tito.

“Ah, yes,” continued Death; “life is love, life is desire. But the ideal of this love, and of this desire, should not be a thing of mortal clay. It is the deluded who mistake the near for the remote. Life is love; life is sentiment; but the great, the noble, that which reveals life, is the tear of sadness which courses down the cheek of the newly born and of the dying; the melancholy complaint of the human heart, which feels the desire of life and pain of existence; and the sweet hope of another life, or the pathetic remembrance of another world. The worry and unhappiness, the doubt and the anxiety of those great souls who are not satisfied with the vanities of the earth, are but presentiments of another world, of a higher mission than that of science and power; of something, in fact, more infinite than the temporal greatness of men and the transitory graces of women. We will confine ourselves, however, to thee and to thy history, which thou dost not know. We will enter into the mystery of thy anomalous existence, and explain the reasons of our friendship.

“Tito, thou hast said, that of all the supposed felicities which life offers, thou desirest one alone—the possession of one woman. I have therefore gained great victories in thy soul. Neither power nor riches, honor nor glory, nothing, tempts thy imagination. Thou art, then, a consummate philosopher, a perfect Christian, and to this point I have desired to lead thee. Now tell me, if this woman were dead, wouldst thou feel her loss?”

Tito rose, uttering a frightened cry.

“What! Elena?”

“Calm thyself,” continued Death, “thou wilt find Elena as thou leftst her. We speak in hypotheses—so answer me.”

“Before killing Elena, take _my_ life! You have my answer.”

“Magnificent!” replied Death, “and tell me: if thou knewest that Elena was in heaven awaiting thee, wouldst thou not die tranquil, content, blessing God, and dedicating thy soul to Him?”

“Oh, yes! death would then be resurrection.”

“So, that with Elena at thy side,” continued the terrible personage, “thou wouldst ask nothing more?”

“Nothing.”

“Well, then, know all. In the Christian world this is not the second of September, 1724, as perhaps thou mayst imagine. Thou and I have been friends many more years.”

“Heavens! what do you tell me? In what year am I then?”

“The eighteenth century has passed, the nineteenth, twentieth and even more. To-day is the feast of San Antonio, the year 2316.”

“Then I am dead.”

“As thou hast been for nearly six hundred years.”

“And Elena?”

“Died when thou didst, and thou didst die the night we met.”

“What? I drank the vitriol?”

“To the last drop, and Elena died of grief when she heard of thy unhappy end. She and thou have been in my power for seven centuries.”

“Impossible!” exclaimed Tito.

“Listen,” replied Death, “and thou wilt know all that I have done in thy favor. Thou and Elena died on the day I said; Elena, destined on the Day of Judgment to ascend to the angels; and thou, meriting all the punishments of Hell. She, for her innocence and purity; thou, for having lived forgetful of God and entertaining vile ambitions. To-morrow the Day of Judgment commences, when three in the afternoon shall have struck at Rome.”

“Oh, my God! It is then the end of the world,” exclaimed Tito.

“It is time,” replied the formidable being. “Finally I may rest.”

“The end of the world!” muttered Tito, with indescribable fear.

“It is of no consequence to thee. Thou hast nothing to lose. So listen. Knowing that the Day of Judgment was approaching, I, who have always cared for thee, as I told thee the first time we met, and Elena, who loves thee as much in heaven as she did on earth, prayed to the Eternal that thy soul might be saved.”

“I should do nothing for the suicide,” answered the Creator; “but I will confide his spirit to thee for one hour. Improve it if thou canst.”

“Save him,” said Elena to me.

“I promised, and went down into the sepulchre to find thee, where thou hadst slept six centuries. I sat there at the head of thy coffin making thee dream of life. Our meeting, thy visit to Philip V., thy adventures at the Court of Louis I., thy marriage with Elena, all was a dream in the tomb. _Thou believedst that three days of life passed in one hour, as six centuries of death elapsed in a single instant._”

“Ah, no! it was not a dream!” exclaimed Tito.

“I understand thy astonishment,” replied Death. “It appeared as existence to thee.... But such is life, the dreams are realities and the realities dreams. Elena and I have triumphed. Science, experience and philosophy have purified thy heart, have ennobled thy spirit, have made thee see the magnificence of earthly grandeur in all its repugnant vanity; that fleeing from death, as thou didst yesterday, thou fledst only from the world; and that begging for eternal love as thou dost to-day, thou askest for immortality. Thou art redeemed!”

“But Elena,” murmured Tito.

“She prays with God. Think not of her; she does not nor ever has really existed. Elena was Beauty! the reflection of immortality. To-day, when the heavenly light of truth and justice resumes its splendor, Elena will be part of Him forever. To Him, then, thou shouldst address thy supplications!”

“It has been a dream!” exclaimed the youth with inexpressible anguish.

“And such will be the world in a few hours; a dream of the Creator.”

So saying, Death rose, uncovered his head and raised his eyes to heaven.

“Thou wilt awake in Rome!” he murmured. “The last day begins—Tito, farewell forever.”

“Oh! do not abandon me!” cried the unhappy boy.

“‘Do not abandon me!’ thou sayest to Death, and yesterday thou fledst from me.”

“Do not leave me here alone in this forsaken region. This is a tomb.”

“What!” said the black divinity, ironically, “hast thou fared so badly here, these past six hundred years?”

“What! have I lived here?”

“Lived! call it what thou pleasest. Here thou hast slept all that time.”

“Then this is my sepulchre?”

“Yes, my friend, and as soon as I disappear thou wilt be convinced. Then, alone, thou wilt feel the cold of this house.”

“Oh! I shall die instantly!” exclaimed Tito; “I am at the North Pole.”

“Thou wilt not die, because thou art already dead; but thou wilt sleep until three in the afternoon, then thou wilt wake with all past generations.”

“My friend!” exclaimed Tito, with indescribable bitterness, “do not leave me; or let me continue dreaming. I do not wish to sleep. This dreaming frightens me. This sepulchre suffocates me. Return me to the villa on the Guadarrama, where I imagined I saw Elena, and let the destruction of the universe surprise me there. I believe in God. I revere his justice, and I appeal to his mercy, but take me back to Elena!”

“What supreme love!” said the deity. “It has triumphed over life, and it is about to triumph over death. It scorned the earth and it will scorn heaven. It shall be as thou desirest, Tito; but do not forget thy soul.”

“Oh! my friend, I thank you! I see that you will carry me to Elena’s side.”

“No, I will not carry thee to her. Elena sleeps in her sepulchre. I will have her come to thee, that she may sleep the last hours of death by thy side.”

“We will one day be interred together! Ah! it is too much happiness! I may see her; hear her say that she loves me; know that she will remain forever at my side, on earth or in heaven, and the darkness of the tomb will be as nothing to me.”

“Come, then, Elena! I command it!” said Death, with cavernous accent, tapping on the floor with his foot.

Elena, to all appearances the same as when we left her in the garden of Guadarrama enshrouded in her white robes, but pale as alabaster, appeared in that room of ice, in which this scene had occurred.

Tito received her kneeling, his face wet with tears, his hands clasped. Turning, he cast a look of profound gratitude on the gentle countenance of Death.

“Good-bye, my friend,” exclaimed Death.

“Your hand, Elena!” whispered Tito.

“My love!” murmured the maiden, kneeling at her husband’s side.

And with clasped hands and eyes raised to heaven they sadly answered Death’s farewell.

Slowly, the black deity retired.

“Forever!” murmured the Friend of Man in the distance.

“Mine, forever!” exclaimed Elena, clasping Tito’s hands between her own. “God has pardoned thee and we may live together in heaven—”

“Forever,” replied the youth, with ineffable happiness.

Death disappeared.

A terrible cold invaded the apartment.—Tito and Elena, on their knees, their hands clasped, their eyes raised to Heaven, were instantly petrified, immovable in that religious attitude, like two magnificent mortuary statues.

CONCLUSION.

A few hours afterward the earth burst like a shell. The stars nearest it, attracted fragments of the destroyed mass, and assimilated with them, not however without causing tremendous cataclysms, such as deluges, and breakings away from its axis.

The moon, almost intact, became a satellite of either Venus or Mercury. In the mean time the Day of Judgment for the family of Adam and Eve had come to pass, and the souls of the wicked were transported to other planets, there to commence a new life.

What greater punishment!

Those who purified themselves in this second existence obtained the glory of returning to the bosom of God, when those planets disappeared.

But those who did not so purify themselves passed on to perhaps a hundred other worlds, where they wandered as we, in ours.

That afternoon, the spirits of Tito and Elena entered the Promised Land hand in hand, free, forever, from sorrow and penitence; saved and redeemed; reconciled with God, participants in His beatitude, heirs to his glory....

* * * * *

For the rest, I can end my story as is the custom with old people, saying: “I went, and I came but they told me nothing.”