THE BIRD-CAGE.
As Catharine sat pondering over these thoughts, full of happiness and
thanksgiving, the door was softly opened, and Elsie Ford stole in
cautiously, like a timid child that had gone wilfully astray.
Catharine sat buried in the easy-chair with her back to the light, which
lay full upon the two pictures. Languid from the emotions through which
she had just passed, and held in thrall by the very quiet with which
Elsie had entered, she sat motionless, watching the poor creature as she
glided through the room.
The crimson drapery had been drawn over the arch of the window, falling
a little apart in the centre, through which came a column of light upon
the portraits, leaving the remainder of the library bathed, as it were,
in the gloom of a warm twilight.
For a moment Elsie looked around as if bewildered. She had flung aside
her crimson robe after one elaborate toilet, and now appeared in a plain
morning-dress of pure white, loose from the shoulders down. A band of
scarlet chenille, twisted lightly together, gathered up the long tresses
of her hair, which she had arranged in fantastic waves and masses back
of her head, as we find it in antique statues. In truth, all Elsie’s
fantasies in dress had a classic grace about them, which perhaps sprung
from some early taste, brightened into the picturesque by insanity.
Thus, in her cloud-like white dress, and with the glowing scarlet in her
hair, she moved across the room, pausing every step or two, and
listening as if she feared that some one might follow her.
A gleam of sharp intelligence shot across her face as she saw the
bird-cage, and darting toward it, she opened the door, chirping softly
with her lips, as if to call the bird forth. But the jar that she had
given to the cage, and the air set in motion by her drapery, took up the
heap of plumage that she had taken for a bird, and sent it floating
through the room.
Elsie dropped her hand from the cage-door, and drooping downward in sad
despondency, turned her head from side to side, gazing with a woe-begone
countenance at the feathers as they quivered from her sight and settled
down like soft gleams of gold in the dusky corners.
“Gone, gone; all alike, all alike,” she muttered, in a low, tearful
voice. “So it is always, always; everything that loves me
dies—everything that I love melts into air, or turns into some wicked
creature and stings me. My poor bird, my pretty canary, why did I come?
Why did I let these wicked hands touch his cage? they have driven him
off, turned him into a wasp that will sting, sting, sting, oh!”
She shrunk back from the light, and held out her hands with the palms
outward, as if warding off the insects that she fancied herself to have
created.
“I can’t help it—how can I? If these cruel things start to life with a
touch of my finger, it is his fault, not mine; he drained the life from
my soul and filled it with this wickedness. If it kills all beautiful
things, and turns them into vipers and stinging insects that come back
upon me for food, eating and biting at my temples day and night, how can
I help it?”
The poor woman uttered these wild words with a low cry of anguish,
fighting the air with one hand, and gathering the folds of her white
robe up over her face with the other, as if to protect it from harm.
At last she looked up fearfully and with a shudder. What she deemed the
swarm of yellow wasps no longer flew across the light, for the feathers
had settled upon the floor, and their absence seemed to give her relief.
As the drapery fell from her face, it was clasped again between her
folded hands, while a dull stillness fell upon her. She was looking at
her own picture.
Catharine held her breath, for she was awe-stricken by the changes that
swept over that pale face. Never, in all the vagaries of her insanity,
had she seen that expression on Elsie’s features till now.
At first the face took an expression of dull surprise, mingled with an
undercurrent of contempt, as if she fancied that some one were
attempting to impose upon her. She drew a step nearer, holding her
breath, advancing timidly as if she expected it to fly away at her
approach, as the bird had done. When she saw that it remained crowned
with light and smiling upon her, the poor women stole closer, and at
last touched it with her fingers.
A look of wild amazement swept over her face. It had not disappeared
with her touch. It smiled upon her yet. No venomous thing had sprung
from those parted and smiling lips. It was herself gazing upon herself.
She was there—and it was there—oh! how that poor brain worked and toiled
to solve the question of its double self. Was she, the creature of pain,
with her temples full of fire, which had no power to melt the snow from
her hair, an evil growth from the loveliness before her, and that
perfect still? After wandering so many years, with age upon her limbs,
and a curse at her heart, had she come back upon her own young self to
be met with smiles and pleasant looks, as if no wickedness had ever
crept between them?
How was it that this beautiful woman, Elsie Ford, Elsie,—no, no, she
would not speak or think the name that would wound the beautiful young
creature, for the world she wouldn’t do it,—she who knew so well what
pain was, and how sharp a pang the sound of that name had been before
her own heart became so clouded and heavy. No, she would be very kind to
the poor young creature; it would be a pity to drive that smile away,
and see those red lips growing pale and blue with such lurid words as
she could utter, but would not.
But how came Elsie Ford there, surrounded by so many beautiful objects,
and with the sunlight dancing and sparkling over her hair, as she had
seen it playing upon the neck of a raven? She remembered well that these
long tresses had been cut off, and the dress of amber brocade taken
away. In its place—oh, she remembered that with a cry of anguish—in
place of that robe they had bound her arms under a hempen garment, so
strong, and scant, and coarse.
Oh! she remembered more, a thousand times more! but it was all so
confused, flame, smoke, tears, cries breaking around her as she had seen
(for Elsie had climbed the fiery mountain) Vesuvius, clad in ashes, and
crowned with clouds of smoky flame.
But how was all this? How had Elsie Ford come out from this fiery
furnace so beautiful, so pleasant to look upon? It troubled her poor
brain to make it all out. Ah! now she had it once more: Elsie had not
been into the valley and shadow of death. It was herself only, the evil
growth cast off by the beautiful one, who had been so full of trouble.
He had not killed Elsie, only herself; not even that. Death would have
been very pleasant at his hands; that was perhaps why he had let her
suffer so much, but not die.
Poor Elsie! Some gleams of reason were struggling through all this wild
talk, and this confusion of thoughts, and every ray of consciousness was
a pang.
She turned from the picture at length, shaking her head wearily, as if
the struggle for memory had worn her out. Then her eyes fell upon the
other portrait, the handsome, bright-looking man who had left so strange
an impression upon Catharine.
Her eyes grew larger; her lips parted, and with a long, breathless gaze
she sunk slowly to the floor, like a snow-wreath touched by the sun.
Catharine arose and bent over the prostrate woman.
“Elsie, dear Elsie, speak to me!”
There was a movement of the white drapery, and a low moan.
“They are together; they two together yet, and I, oh, me—oh, me!”
She did not lift her head again, but went trembling and drooping from
the library, moaning all the way.