FINAL DREAM LAND.
Later still, when the elders had left the lovers to each other, Bart
found himself reclining on the sofa, with his head in Julia's lap. And
those little rosy tipped fingers toyed caressingly with that coveted
moustache, and were kissed for it, and went and did it again, and so
on; and then tenderly with the long light brown wavy curls.
"Julia, these blessed moments of love and rest, though they run into
days or weeks, will end."
"Arthur"--reproachfully.
"Time will not stand and leave us to float, and come and go on a sweet
shaded river of delight; sometime I must go out to show that I am not
unworthy of you, to find, and to make. You shall have your own sweet
way, and will, and yet you will also--will you not?--tell me when this
happiness shall be lost in the greater, merely that I may do my man's
part."
"Arthur, I take you at your word. My will is that for two blessed
months, of which this shall not be counted as one day, for it must
stand forever apart, you shall say nothing of books, or wanting them;
or of business, or cases, or location, but shall stay with us, our
mothers and father, with me, and run, and ride, and hunt, and fish,
and grow strong, and eat, and I will let you go, and alone, when you
wish; and at the end of two months, I will tell you when."
"And Arthur," stooping low over him, "a young girl's heart and ways
are curious, and not worth a man's knowing, or thought, perhaps. Let
me know you, let me be acquainted with you, and I would like you to
know me also, though it may not repay you; and let me grow to be your
wife. We have such funny notions, such weak girl ways and thoughts.
I have not had my lover a full day yet. A young girl wishes to be
courted and sought, and made believe that she is supreme; and she
likes to have her lover come at a set time, and sit and wait and think
the clock has been turned back, and that he won't come, and yet he
must come, at the moment; and she will affect to have forgotten it.
She likes to be wooed with music, and flowers, and poetry, and to
remain coy and only yield when her full heart had gone long before;
and then to be engaged, and wear her ring, and be proud of her
affianced, and to be envied--oh, it is a thousand, thousand times more
to us than to you. It is our all, and we can enjoy it but once, and
think what is lost out of the life of the young girl who has not
enjoyed it at all. See, Arthur, what poor, petty, weak things we are,
not worth the understanding, and not worth the winning, as we would be
won."
Arthur had started up, and glided to the floor, on his knees, had
clasped his hands about her slender waist, and was looking earnestly
and tenderly into her coy, half-averted face, as, half seriously and
half in badinage, she made her plaint.
"Oh, Julia!"
"Nay, Arthur, I like it as it is. It was in your nature to have known
me, and to have courted me in the old way; but it would have been poor
and tame, and made up of a few faded flowers and scraps of verses; and
think what I have had--a daring hero between me and a wild beast--a
brave, devoted and passionate lover, who, in spite of scorn and
rejection, hunted for me through night and tempest, to rescue me from
death, who takes me up in his strong arms, carries me over a flood,
and nourishes me back to life, and goes proudly away, asking nothing
but the great boon of serving me. Oh! I had a thousand times rather
have this! It is now a beautiful romance. But I am to have my ring,
and"--
"Be my sweet and blessed sovereign lady; to be served and worshipped,
and to hear music and poetry; whose word and wish is to be law in all
the realm of love."
"From which you are not to depart for two full months of thirty-one
days each."
Then she conducted him to the apartment in which we beheld her the
night before.
"This," pushing open the door, into the room, warm and sweet with the
odor of flowers, "is your own special room, to be yours, always."
"Always?" a little plaintively.
"Always--until--until--I--we give you another."
"Good night, Arthur."
"Good night, Julia."
She tripped down the hall, and turned her bright face to catch a kiss,
and throw it back.
With a sweet unrest in her full heart, the young maiden on her couch,
set herself to count up the gathered treasures of the wonderful day.
How was it? Did her riding skirt really get under her feet? Would
he have caught her in his arms if she had not fallen? She thought he
would.
And so she mused; and at last in slumber dreamed sweet maiden's dreams
of love and heaven.
And Bart found himself in a marvellous forest, wandering with Julia,
wondrous in her fresh and tender beauty, on through endless glades,
amid the gush of bird-songs, and the fragrance of flowers.
And there in the dream land whence I called them, I leave them. Why
should I awake them again? For them can another day so bright and
happy ever dawn? I who love them, could have kept them for a bright
brief space longer. I could have heard the sparkling voice of Bart,
and the answering laugh of Julia--and then I should listen and not
hear--look anxiously around and not see!
I part in real sorrow with these bright children of my fancy, sweet
awakeners of old time memories, placed amid far off scenes, to
win from others, tenderness and love if they may. And may they be
remembered as forever lingering in perennial youth and love, in the
land of dreams.