Part 23

“I have been desolate, Achilles,” said the old man with the plaintiveness of age; “I have been desolate. But I knew, O Achilles, that thou wouldst return.”

A brave fire was burning upon the hearth, the candles, also, were bright of lustre in the little room.

The young man stretched his wounded hands to the warmth, and then, with a kind of composed passion, he spread them out before his father.

“Dost thou see, my father?” he said. “Earth, my mother, has given the strength to my right hand. I think now, my father, I shall be among the English authors.”

As he spoke the secret and beautiful smile crept across his wan lips.

“Thou wilt write in the Book, O Achilles?” said the old man, pointing to the table where the mighty tome lay open.

“First, I must write my little treatise upon human life, my father,” said the returned wayfarer in the simple accents of his childhood. “And, perchance, my father, when that is written, if the strength is still given to my right hand, I may, or I may not, write in the Book.”

“I myself have not yet written in it, O Achilles,” said the aged man, his father, with a look of despair. “And I begin to fear that it may not be given to me to write therein. I am old, Achilles; I am old.”

The young man appeared hardly to heed the words of his aged father.

“I will eat,” he said, “and then until midnight is told upon the clocks I will repose, and then I will write my little treatise upon human life.”

Half-naked and unkempt and bare-footed as he was, the returned wayfarer ate and drank; and he then fell asleep in a chair at the side of the bright hearth with his feet stretched out before the embers.

While the returned wayfarer slept profoundly, the aged man, his father, heaped up the fire with coals. Then he went forth into the shop, and took from its recesses the materials for writing.

As the old man was conveying these articles, with every precaution that he might not disturb the sleeper, to the table of the little room, he heard a stealthy knocking, with which he had grown familiar, upon the outer shutters of the shop.

Therefore, as soon as the old man had discharged his burdens, he went to the door of the shop and opened it. Upon the outer threshold was a small, wizened man with a shrewd countenance and a short, bristling moustache.

“Has he come back?” asked the man with an eager whisper.

“Yes, he has returned,” said the old man; “but he now sleeps.”

“Let me see him,” said the other in a voice of anguish. “I will not disturb his sleep, and I will not try to cross the threshold of your little room.”

“You may follow,” said the old man, leading the way through the shop to the threshold of the little room, “but I would entreat you not to proceed beyond this.”

“Yes, I will bear it in mind,” said the other in a voice of curious excitement.

When the man from the street came to stand upon the threshold of the little room, and to peer within at him who lay there asleep, the cry of joy that he could not repress was mingled with an intense consternation.

“Why, where has he been?” he whispered in tones of horror. “See--see, he is all in rags! His feet are bruised and cut and quite bare. And his hair hangs down upon his shoulders like a mane. And his ragged shirt exposes his chest. And his fingers are all covered with dried blood. Tell me, why has he returned like this?”

“He is about to communicate the story of his wanderings,” said the old man, pointing to the materials for writing that were spread upon the table of the little room. “He is about to make them into a treatise; when the clocks tell the hour of midnight he will commence author. Therefore does it not behove us to be patient? When his task is accomplished, I doubt not that we shall be privileged to learn all that has befallen him.”

“Ah, yes, I remember,” said the man from the street. “I always suspected that one day he might set up on his own account as an author. He has a lot of out-of-the-way knowledge. He looks in a dreadful state to-night, and I shouldn’t wonder if he didn’t write the better for it. He’s evidently been out and seen a bit of life; and you’ve got to see a bit of life to be an author. At least, Murtle says so; and Murtle ought to know.”

“Yes, yes,” said the old man softly. “We shall doubtless be informed of all that has befallen him when he comes to take the pen in his right hand.”

The man from the street bade good-night to the old man, and begged to be allowed to return the next evening to the threshold of the little room, that he might have speech with him who slept.

XLVI

The returned wayfarer, ragged, bare-footed, and dishevelled, continued in his profound sleep by the side of the fire. Not a sound escaped him, not once did he change his posture; and as the hour of midnight approached, the old man, his father, began to have a fear that he would not waken again. But at the first stroke of the clocks, as they told the midnight hour, the wanderer opened his eyes to the full, and, rising immediately from his chair, without pain, and without weariness, sat down exactly as he was before the materials for writing that were spread upon the table, and commenced author.

At first, as he dipped the pen in the ink, and it sought the virgin sheets of white paper, his face was calm and untroubled, and about his lips was a happy smile of peace. Lightly, easily, deftly at first, his right hand, that was now so strong, ran across the paper, without a moment of hesitation, without a single pause, or any kind of uncertainty.

Page upon page was traversed by his strong right hand. Not once did it falter, no fault did it commit; and neither blot, nor erasure, nor substitution of one word for another, defiled the fair copy that grew, minute by minute, under the slender, blood-stained fingers. Hour after hour passed; and the aged man, his father, sat by the side of the fire with his dim and incredulous eyes fixed upon him who wrote. In them was a kind of entrancement.

The beams of the morning stole through the top of the shutters of the little room, but the author did not look up an instant from his labours, and not once did he change the attitude in which he wrote. Neither did he ask to have the shutters thrown back, and the bright lamp removed, even when it was twelve o’clock in the day. From time to time the old man plied the hearth with fuel, and also he procured a second lamp, newly replenished with oil.

In the afternoon the old man went forth of the little room, and making no sound, so that his movements might not be regarded, he penetrated, candle in hand, to a deep cellar below the shop.

In a corner of this chill vault, all covered with cobwebs and grime, was a bottle of a great and aged wine. This the old man removed from the place it had occupied full many years, and bore it, with a care as nice as a woman bears a sleeping infant, up the dark stairs to the little room.

The old man placed the wine near to him who wrote; but, as though unconscious of the action, the returned wayfarer pursued his labours.

The old man, his father, then returned to his place beside the bright hearth. The hours passed. All that day the shutters were not taken down from the shop, which was shrouded in complete darkness in the broad light; while in the room behind it a lamp was burning continually, even when the sun was high at noon.

As page upon page was traversed by the strong right hand of him who wrote, and they began to form a delicately-written heap on the table before him, the mood of the author, which at first was so serene and of such a calm assurance, began to change. In those large and bright eyes, whose lustre seemed to vie with that of the ever-burning lamp, the inward fire, the controlled passion, the noble self-possession, began, towards afternoon, to yield to the hue of terror. The large and bright eyes began to roll in a strange kind of frenzy. Great beads of perspiration came upon the forehead of the author; they rolled in a stream down his cheeks.

Not once, however, did he pause in those labours which added steadily to the pile of his writings. Although the author appeared to be suffering a more than mortal agony, and that even as he wrote he sought the merciful respite of death, he never once faltered, nor looked up, nor refrained an instant from his task.

Towards the hour of eight in the evening, the listening ears of the aged man, his father, heard a loud tapping upon the shutters of the shop. He rose at once from his place beside the hearth and went forth of the little room, and opened very softly, yet with a kind of despair as he did so, the outer door of the shop.

“Who is he who beats upon the ears of us in our little room?” he asked of him who stood out upon the threshold of the night.

“Has he awakened?” asked the anxious visitor. “I have been fearing all day lest he should not wake any more.”

“He is awake and he is writing his treatise,” said the old man devoutly.

“I must see him,” said the man from the street. “You must let me see him. I will not go beyond the shop. And I will not disturb him as I walk across it.”

“He is writing his treatise,” said the old man in a tone that would seem to deny him.

“Oh!” cried the man from the street piteously, “I must see him, if only for a moment, now that he is awake.”

And so great were the entreaties of the man from the street, that the old man, enjoining many earnest restrictions upon him, led him at last with infinite caution through the dark shop, to look upon the face of him who wrote.

However, no sooner had the man from the street looked upon the face of him he had craved to see than he uttered a suppressed cry of dismay and terror. For the face of the returned wayfarer seemed to be convulsed with a mortal agony.

Creeping away with the silence in which he had come to the threshold, without revealing his presence to the returned wayfarer, or causing him once to refrain from his labours, the man from the street returned in a kind of despair to that outer element of darkness out of which he had emerged.

“Oh,” he muttered, as the scalding tears sprang out of his eyes as he traversed the inhospitable pavements of the streets; “I wish now that I had not seen him. It is just as I thought it would be.”

Yet the next evening at the same hour the man from the street tapped upon the shutter again; and again his summons was answered by the old man within.

“How is he now?” asked the visitor breathlessly. “I hope there is no change for the worse.”

“You may enter and look upon him,” said the old man.

“I don’t think I want to do that,” said the visitor with fear in his eyes. “I think I would rather not do so.”

“Perhaps,” said the old man, “you may find a change for the better.”

“No, I don’t think I will come in,” said the man with weak tremulousness; but this he seemed suddenly to discard in a kind of disgust, and he followed the old man through the darkness of the shop.

As he came to stand again upon the threshold of the little room he saw that the returned wayfarer had scarcely changed his posture from the previous evening, and was writing still. The mass of papers before him, covered in a fine and delicate writing, were an ever-increasing pile. Yet the man from the street hardly dared to look at the face of the writer. At last, however, he summoned the courage to do so, and in the act of beholding it almost revealed his presence by a cry of surprise. For the face was no longer transfigured with terror: it was as calm, serene, and peaceful as that of Nature upon an evening of summer.

Again the man from the street returned to his element; and this time in lieu of his previous despair was a sort of bewildered gladness. The face he had looked upon that evening was one of such wisdom and beauty, that even eyes such as his own could not misread its meaning. “Oh, how beautiful he is! How beautiful he is!” he exclaimed as he walked along.

The next evening the visitor returned once more and knocked upon the shutter; again he was received by the old man who led him within. The returned wayfarer still sat at the table writing his treatise. Again he appeared scarcely to have changed his posture. The pile of writing had grown greater and greater. In mute bewilderment the man from the street gazed upon him. The worn and haggard countenance of him who wrote was convulsed with tears. Yet although they dripped upon the white paper, even as the pen traversed it, he refrained not an instant from his task.

As the unhappy man from the street again sought the outer darkness, he said with a sinking heart: “When he stops writing I am sure he will die!”

On the next evening he presented himself at the shutter for the fourth time.

“How is he now?” he cried to the old man. “Does he still live?”

“You may enter,” said the old man; and in the darkness the man from the street could not observe the secret smile that was about his lips.

Ever writing as before, the returned wayfarer had now a face that was radiant with joy. As he continued to fill one page upon another, his lips began to move in a kind of low crooning chant. When the watcher from the threshold caught the first sounds of his voice, he remembered with one of those pangs with which reason confronts that which lies beyond it, the day upon which he and his boon companions had taken him upon the sea in a boat.

“I don’t know how it will end, I don’t know how it will end!” cried the man as he entered the streets. His emotion was wrought so highly that he walked the streets until dawn.

Yet again on the evening of the fifth day he returned, and with secret, fearful steps he came to the threshold of the little room. He who sat there was writing still. His cheeks had now sunk into his jaws; his eyes that formerly were so large and bright lacked lustre; the slender fingers were moving painfully; the gaunt face had almost the composure of death.

The watcher crept forth again to the streets, and walked them in a kind of madness. “I begin to wish he would die,” he said as he took his way. “It is dreadful, it is dreadful! Yes, I wish he would die.”

Yet on the evening of the sixth day the man came again and knocked upon the shutter.

“I hope he is dead,” he said bitterly as the old man confronted him. “It is dreadful, it is dreadful!”

“He sleeps now,” said the old man simply. “Is it not wonderful that the strength should have been given to him to complete his task? But he now sleeps.”

They stole together to the threshold, where this superhuman labourer, bare-footed and unkempt, and in his rags lay fast asleep. His face was buried amid the great bulk of his writings.

“Oh,” said the man from the street with a harsh sob; “he is dead at last.”

“Oh, no,” said the old man, “he breathes softly.”

“Can it be possible?” said the other. “Can he have done all this and yet remained alive? I must see for myself before I can believe it.”

The man from the street made as if he would cross the threshold of the little room.

“Beware,” said the old man almost sternly. “Did you not promise that you would not go beyond this?”

“Yes, I did,” said the other mournfully, “but I am sure he is dead.”

“Return to-morrow, my friend, at the same hour,” said the old man, “and be of good hope. He ate and drank before he slept and he promised to awaken.”

The next day the man came back again to the threshold of the little room, but the writer still slept with his face buried within his labours.

“He will never awaken, he will never awaken!” said the watcher.

“Be of good faith,” said the old man softly. “Return to-morrow again.”

The man did as he was bidden, but he who had laboured was still asleep.

“Why do you deceive me?” cried the man from the street, almost beside himself with his passion; “you know he will never wake again. And you dare not tell me the truth. I will enter and see for myself.”

The old man pushed him back with his feeble strength as he made to cross the threshold. His face had a tragic consternation too dreadful to behold.

“If you cross the threshold,” he said, “while he still sleeps he will never, never awaken.”

These words and the countenance of the old man convinced the man from the street that such was the truth.

“I will return to-morrow and see if he sleeps still,” said the man, returning to the street.

“This passes all understanding,” he muttered constantly as he took his way.

XLVII

On the following evening, when the man knocked again upon the shutter, and the door of the shop was opened by the old man, he was informed joyfully that the sleeper had awakened. And further, he was told that he had bathed, and had partaken of food, and that now in the little room he sat beside the hearth in the full enjoyment of his mind.

“Do you remain here while I ask him if you may approach the threshold of his little room,” said the old man in a glad voice.

The man from the street waited in joyfulness. In spite of his incredulity he seemed to know that the darkness of the night had passed.

“He desires to see you,” said the old man as he returned.

The man from the street, scarcely daring to breathe, followed the old man to the threshold of the inner room. Seated beside the hearth, which was ever brightly burning, was the frail figure of his friend, with the great pile of his writings clasped upon his knees. The lustre was extinguished from his worn and beautiful face; his eyes were no longer large and bright, his cheeks were sunken; yet all about him was a high and calm serenity, an inexpressible peace.

“Faithful one,” said a voice whose strange quality was hardly more than a reminiscence of that which had once been familiar to the ears of the man from the street, “now that my task is done I will reward your constancy. You shall cross the threshold of my little room. Will you not embrace me, honest friend?”

Speaking these words, the returned wayfarer stretched out his hands to his visitor. Thereupon the man from the street crossed the threshold of the little room and flung his arms about the form of him he had not hoped to clasp again.

XLVIII

The two friends sat long hours together, conversing of many things. William Jordan, now that his task was accomplished, had never seemed so accessible, so human, so near in sympathy and perception to those things that lay immediately about him. Jimmy Dodson, entranced by the new power and richness of his friend’s discourse, gave expression again and again to the delight that he felt.

“Luney,” he said, calling him again by that name with which he had always addressed him, “you have always been beyond me, but you have never seemed quite so far beyond me as you do now. Your actions prove you to be out of your mind, but the odd thing is that never in all the years I have known you, have you talked to me as you have talked to-night. You talk to me now, old boy, just as I should expect some of those wise old Greek Johnnies to talk to their pals. And yet you give yourself no airs of saying anything out of the common; and the way you listen to what I say to you and the way you draw me out, gives me the kind of feeling that I myself am a sort of chap like old What’s-his-name. Words have never come to me so easily as they have to-night; and as for my mind, I am sure it has never been half so bright. You seem to make me feel, old boy, that every word you use has a kind of inner meaning; and I understand enough of the meaning inside to know that there is still another meaning inside of that. I don’t know where you have been, or what you have done, but I am sure the change that has taken place in you is very wonderful.”

“The Giver of all good has at last given the light to your eyes and mine,” said William Jordan. “And speech to our lips, and hearing to our ears.”

“And the most wonderful thing about you, old boy,” said his friend, “is that with all your strangeness I know what you mean. You sit there talking for all the world as if nothing had happened to you. And yet if you don’t mind my saying it, a week ago you were up so high that I thought you could never come down again.”

“Perhaps it was,” said William Jordan, “that I was then besieged by strange spirits. Perhaps it was, Jimmy, that my little treatise could not have got itself written without their aid.”

“And now you have written it, old boy, or now, as you put it, it has got itself written, what do you intend to do with it?” asked Jimmy Dodson eagerly.

“It is my intention to give it to the world,” said William Jordan.

The calm assurance with which the author announced this intention appeared to startle his friend.

“Yes--of course,” said Jimmy Dodson nervously; “yes--of course.”

A sequel so natural to the strange labours of which he had been the witness, had, somewhat curiously, never shaped itself in his mind.

“Yes--of course,” he reiterated, “of course you will give it to the world. That is to say, you will have it published by somebody. Have you thought which firm you will try first?”

“It is my intention,” said William Jordan, “to place it in the good hands of our friends.”

“Indeed,” said Dodson; and then he added nervously, “Yes, I suppose so. What is it all about?”

“You may speak of it as a kind of treatise on human life,” said the author.

“A treatise,” said his friend. “I hope, old boy, it is not too scientific and not too long.”

“In some respects it is ‘scientific,’ I am afraid,” said the author. “You see, it was impossible to keep out ‘science’ altogether.”

“Oh, then,” said his friend with an air of relief, “the treatise as you call it is not all pure science. I hope, old boy,” he added anxiously, “you have had the forethought to cast it into the form of a novel.”

“Yes,” said the author, “you might almost say it is a kind of novel--and yet it is a kind of poem too.”

“Ah,” said his friend hopefully, “that is better. A treatise in the form of a novel may be all right, although much depends upon the length. And a novel in the form of a prose poem; that may be all right too, that is if it is not lacking in dramatic interest. I have heard Octavius lay it down as a fixed rule that in a prose poem you must have dramatic interest.”

“I think I may promise,” said the author, with a simplicity that passed beyond the understanding of his friend, “that it is not lacking in dramatic interest.”

“Good!” said Jimmy Dodson. “Things are shaping better than could have been expected. Yet you know, old boy--if I must tell the truth--I never quite thought you had it about you to write a really good novel. But you never know, old boy, do you? Some of the smartest writing chaps of the day don’t at all look the part. Yet I don’t quite know, old boy--you won’t mind my saying it--whether you have had quite enough experience of life. I’ve heard Murtle say that a chap wants enormous experience of life to write a really good novel. I’ve heard him say to Octavius that he couldn’t possibly have done what he has unless he had dined out every night in good society for twenty years. But the novel may be a romance. Of course that would make a difference. A fellow doesn’t have to know so much, Octavius says, to write a romance. Yet don’t forget, old boy, that other things being all right, grammar, style, dramatic interest and so on, much will depend upon the length. Whatever else it may be I hope it will not be more than eighty thousand words.”

“I am afraid,” said the author, “the question of ‘length’ has not occurred to me. But now you speak of it I should not say the length is great.”

“Good,” said Jimmy Dodson. “Well, I must leave you now, old boy,” he added, “to catch my train to Peckham. I can’t tell you what a relief it has been to find you quite well again. But I will come back to-morrow evening, and I will look at this novel of yours, and we will talk over the question of offering it to the firm, although if you do that, old boy, you will be obliged, you know, to adopt what they call a pseudonym.”

“I intend that the poem shall be published anonymously,” said the author.