had forgotten all about the Bassets: one does not remember people who
live in the East, only the places that are striking, and the things
seen or heard of that may become profitable in one way or another.
I thought of my friend, because he might be able to help me, but he
was away in another part of the province and I had to journey alone.
Officials are useful on their own ground, and even when they are not
personal friends, they are, in the East at any rate, ready enough to
be hospitable. The advantage of “entertaining angels unawares” is,
however, all on their side, and guests so soon recognise this fact,
that they feel under no obligation to their hosts, and seldom wish
to remember them if they meet them in Europe. This is specially the
case with English notabilities, who seem to think that they have a
prescriptive right, not only to waste a man’s time, but also to use
his house, stables, and servants, as at an hotel where the visitor
exercises every privilege except that of making payment. Unfortunately
for me, I had to go beyond the region of even occasional civilians,
those isolated exiles whose houses the stranger occupies, whether the
master is present or absent, and for some days I had to put up with the
Dâk Bungalow and the chicken of happy despatch.
It was the very hottest time of the morning when I arrived at such a
bungalow in a small mining village. I had been riding since dawn, and
was glad enough to turn into that weedy compound and get off my pony.
Whew! the heat of it! The two or three sinewy hens, which by-and-by
would be slaughtered to make the traveller’s holiday, were sitting
half-buried and wallowing in the dust, with their wings spread out
and their mouths open, gasping for breath. It was a day when solids
liquefy, when inanimate objects develop an extraordinary faculty for
sticking to each other, and when water no longer feels wet. There
was not a sign of any human being anywhere, and I went round to the
back premises to try and find the caretaker. After a diligent search I
discovered him, fast asleep of course, and, while he went to prepare
a room, I unsaddled the pony and put it in the stable. Then I went
into the house and told the servant to get me some food while I had a
bath. The process of catching the hen and cooking her was a long one,
and I was sleeping in a chair when the man came to tell me the feast
was ready. I had an idea that I was not alone in the house, and, when
I questioned the caretaker, he said that there was a lady who had
arrived the night before and had not appeared that morning. Our means
of conversation was limited to a few words, and I could not make out
who the lady was, or even whether he knew her; but it seemed to me a
curious thing that a white woman should be there, and I supposed she
came from one of the big ruby mines; but even then it was strange that
she should be alone. I made further inquiries about the neighbourhood,
and learned that I was not more than a day’s journey from Phatmah.
I knew it was somewhere about, but had not thought it so near; it was
not on the line of my objective, and I was not interested in its
exact position. Then some of my bearers arrived with luggage, and I
deliberately settled myself for a siesta.
It was late afternoon when I awoke, and I determined to push on to
another small place, which I could just reach before darkness made
further progress impossible. Even a short stage by night would be
preferable to the frightful heat and the oppressive atmosphere of this
lonely house, in its neglected and overgrown garden, where one lean
chicken now scratched alone. Just then the caretaker came to me and
asked my advice about the other guest. He had seen and heard nothing of
her for the whole day, and was afraid there must be something amiss.
That, I felt, was extremely likely, especially when he told me he had
knocked at the door of her room and received no answer. I did not at
all like the mission, but there was nothing for it but to go and see
what was the matter. A few steps took us to the door of the lady’s
room, and I knocked, first gently, then loudly, but no sound broke
the ominous silence. Then I turned the handle, only to find that the
door was locked. As I could not force it open without making a great
clatter, I went outside to try the windows. There were two of these
some height from the ground, and it was difficult to get at them. The
first was fast, and from my insecure footing I could not force it; but
with the second I was more fortunate, and as a half-shutter sprang
open, and a stream of light poured into the dark room, I saw the form
of a girl, or woman, lying on the bed, in an attitude that somehow did
not suggest sleep. I shouted at her, but she never moved, and then
I climbed into the room. I noticed instantly that there was hardly
anything lying about the ill-furnished room, but, on a small table
near the bed, was an almost empty brandy bottle and a glass. The woman
was dressed in a blouse and skirt, the only things she had taken off
being apparently her hat and shoes. She had her back towards me, and
the sunlight centred on a mass of fair hair and gave it a deeper tinge.
Before I put my hand on her cold fingers I felt certain she was dead,
and as I gently turned her head and recognised in the now grey features
the face of the only white woman in Phatmah, I don’t think I was very
much surprised, though I was terribly shocked. Held tightly in her
other hand was a small empty bottle that had once held chloral, and the
faint sickly smell of it hung in the heavy stifling atmosphere of that
bare and comfortless room. Poor lonely child, she had managed to “get
into mischief” after all.
XXXIV
OF LOVE--NOT IN FICTION
You have sent me the answer which I expected. Now tell me how to write
a love-letter that shall speak no word of love--a letter as full of
the passion, the boundless adoration, and the faith of love, as the
Chaurapanchâsika, those fifty distichs of Chauras that proclaimed
his forbidden worship of the lovely daughter of King Sundava. The
Brahman’s lament won the king’s heart and saved the poet’s life;
and I would learn of you how to win a heart, and perhaps save more
than one life from shipwreck. After all, our civilisation may, in its
comparative refinement, be more cruel than the unfettered caprice of an
Eastern king nineteen centuries ago. Tell me, tell me, you who know,
how can pen and ink be made to speak with the force and persuasion of
spoken words, when half the world divides the writer from the reader of
poor halting sentences that must, of necessity, leave unsaid all that
the heart yearns to utter?
When eye can look into eye, when the stretched-out hand meets a
responsive touch,--timid and uncertain, or confident with the knowledge
of passionate love passionately returned,--the words that are spoken
may be feeble, but the influence of a loved presence will carry
conviction, and one voice awaken in one heart the music of the spheres.
Then the dullest day is bright, the lovers’ feet tread on air, day
is a joy and night a gladness, or at least a dream of delight. Then
life is divided between anticipation and reality. No wonder the hours
fly on wings; no wonder the thoughts suggested by brief absences are
forgotten in the wonder and delight of briefer meetings, till the dread
moment of separation comes, and aching hearts too late realise the
appalling suddenness of the actual parting and the ceaseless regret
for opportunities lost. You understand that my thoughts are not of the
devout lover who is going through a short apprenticeship before signing
a bond of perpetual servitude or partnership, as the case may be. That
is a phase which, if it occasionally deserves sympathy, seldom receives
it; indeed, it hardly awakens interest, except in those who wish to
see the preliminaries concluded, that their interest in the principals
may either cease, and give themselves more freedom, or begin, and bring
them some profit. I appeal to you to tell me how to keep alive the
divine flame when oceans and continents divide two loving hearts; how
to tell of longing and bitter regret, of faith and love and worship,
when such words may not be written; how to make personal influence
felt across five seas and through many weary months; how to kill doubt
and keep strong and faithful a priceless love, against which the stars
in their courses may seem ready to fight; how, above all, to help one
who needs help, and warm sympathy, and wise advice, so that, if it
be possible, she may escape some of life’s misery and win some of
life’s joy.
Journeying through this weary old world, who has not met the poor
struggling mortal, man or woman, old or young, for whom the weal or
woe of life hangs in the balance, to turn one way or the other, when
the slightest weight is cast into either scale? Who has not been asked
for sympathy or advice, or simply to lend an ear to the voice of a
hopeless complaint? Some feel the iron in their souls far more keenly
than others. While the strong fight, the weak succumb, and the shallow
do not greatly mind, after they have gone through a short torture of
what seems to them profound emotion. But in their case sympathy is
rather wasted, for, however violent their grief, their tears are soon
dried, and it must have been written for them that “joy cometh with the
morning.”
You know what it is when the heart seems to struggle for more freedom,
because it is choking with a love it may not, or will not, express;
when, in the absence of one face, all other companionship is irksome,
all conversation stale and unprofitable; when daylight wearies and
night is cruelly welcome, because the struggle to play a part, and
pretend an interest one does not feel, is over, and one stretches out
one’s arms to the darkness, and whispers, “Come to me,” to ears that
cannot hear. What strange unnatural creatures we are, for we stifle the
voices of our souls, and seem to delight in torturing ourselves for the
sake of some idea born of a tradition, the value of which we dare not
even submit to the test of argument. If in response to your heart’s
cry there came the one whose presence you desire, you would instantly
torture yourself rather than confess your message. Whatever it cost
you, you would not only pretend that the sudden appearance of the
greatly beloved was the last thing you wished for, but you might even
send him away with the impression that he had deeply offended you. And
yet--Ah well! this artificial fortress we take such pains to build, and
to keep in repair, is not proof against every assault. There are crises
of life--an imminent danger, the presence or appearance of death, a
sudden and irresistible wave of passionate feeling, or a separation
that has no promise of reunion--before these the carefully constructed
rampart of convention and outward seeming goes down like a house of
cards.
“When a beloved hand is laid in ours,
When, jaded by the rush and glare
Of the interminable hours,
Our eyes within another’s eyes see clear;
When one world-deafened ear
Is by the tones of a loved voice caressed,
A bolt is shot back somewhere in the heart,
And a lost pulse of feeling stirs again;
The eye sinks inward and the heart lies plain,
And what we mean we say,
And what we would we know.”
There was a day which, to me, will ever be my day of days--halcyon
hours of joy and gladness, coloured by a setting of wondrous beauty,
and burdened by the fateful shadow of an inevitable parting that would,
in all human probability, be the point where two lives, which had
grown strangely and sweetly close, must divide, without any hope of
re-uniting. You remember how in that early dawn we drove through the
dewy grass, covered with the fairies’ dainty white gossamer kerchiefs,
lace cobwebs spread out to dry in the morning sun; and, as we left the
town and made for the distant mountains, the dark red road wound up and
down hills, through orchards and grass-land and forest, till we gained
a little village, where the road forked, and a clear, rain-swollen
stream slipped swiftly past the picturesque brown cottages. Whilst the
horses were being changed, we strolled a little way down the road, and
watched a group of laughing urchins, playing in that lilied stream
like water-babies. How they screamed with delight as their small
glistening bodies emerged from the shining water to struggle up a crazy
ladder that led from the back of a hut down into the winding stream;
and how the sun shone! lighting the snow-white plumage of a brood of
solemn-looking ducks, sailing majestically round the sedge-girt edges
of a tiny pool beneath the bridge. In that pool was mirrored a patch
of clear blue sky, and across it fell the shadows cast by a great
forest tree. That was “a day in spring, a day with thee and pleasure!”
Then, as we drove on, there were heavenly glimpses of sapphire hills,
seen down long vistas through the forest. For the last few miles, the
road followed the bank of a deep and rapid river, whose clear waters
reflected the graceful overhanging trees, while the banks were buried
in a thick maze of ferns and grasses, and great shining patches of
buttercups and marigolds.
Were you sorry when the drive was over, and our sweet converse perforce
ended? I wonder would you have enjoyed it better had that exquisite
spot, in the depths of the forest, been ours alone for that one day?
One day is so little in a lifetime, and yet what was ours was good! Do
you remember how, in that far-off place, we met on the road one whom
you recognised, but whose face and manner gave no clue to the romantic
story of his life, a story that would have brought him great renown
in the days when valour was accounted of the highest worth? You have
not forgotten that, nor yet the return drive, when, as we crested the
last hill, and began the steep and tortuous descent into the plain, the
lurid rays of the setting sun threw crimson stains across dark pools of
lotus-bearing water, half-hidden by overhanging grasses and the dank
leaves of white-blossomed lilies. Beneath us lay a wide stretch of
swamp-land, the very picture of abandonment, desolation, and solitude;
heaps of up-turned earth, green with rank vegetation, and pools of
dead water, whose dark shadows reflected the lambent fires of the
western horizon. A broken line of black trees stood clear against the
rapidly-darkening sky, but, as we reached the foot of the hill, heaven
and earth were wrapped in the shadows of night. And then my day was
done. Doubt was buried, and the “big word” bound our hearts in the joy
of that priceless sympathy which carries human aspirations beyond the
storm and stress of human life to a knowledge of the Divine. We said
little; when hearts are at one, few words are needed, for either knows
the other’s thoughts. But you were slow to unbend, making a brave
fight against fate, and keeping true to your creed, though seven days
would bring the end. To me, the light of that one brilliant day had
been intensified by the rapidly approaching shadow of the inevitable
parting. I wonder--now that the bitterness of separation has come,
now that I vaguely ask myself what has happened to Time since I lost
you--whether, if we could have that day again, you would again be so
merciless in your determination to hold love in leash, and give no sign
of either the passion or the pain that was tearing your heart. I think
it was a hard fight, for, though you concealed your thoughts, you could
not hide the physical effects of the struggle. Did you know how your
weariness distressed me, and what I would have given to have the right
to try to comfort you?
I have a confused memory of those other days. Brief meetings and
partings; insane desires to make any excuse to write to you, or hear
from you, though I had but just left your presence; a hopeless and
helpless feeling that I had a thousand things to say to you, and yet
that I never could say one of them, because the time was so short
that every idea was swallowed up in the ever-present dread of your
departure, and the ceaseless repetition of your cry, “I cannot bear it,
I cannot bear it.” From out that vague background shine two stars, two
brilliant memories to light the darkness of the weary months until I
see your face again--a blissful memory and a sign. All the rest seems
swallowed up in the bitterness of that parting, which comes back like
some horrible nightmare.
Only black water under a heavy overcast sky; only the knowledge that
the end had come; that what should be said must be said then, with
the instant realisation that the pain of the moment, the feeling of
impotent rebellion against fate, destroyed all power of reflection, and
the impulse to recklessness was only choked back by the cold words of
a publicly spoken farewell. Then rapid motion, and in one minute the
envious darkness had taken everything but the horrible sense of loss
and inconsolable regret. Whatever my suffering, it was worse for you; I
at least was alone, alone with a voice which ever murmured in my ears
that despairing cry, “I cannot bear it, I cannot bear it.”
When two who have been brought together, so close together that they
have said the “big word” without faltering, are suddenly swept asunder
by the receding wave of adverse circumstances, there must ever arise
in their hearts that evil question, “How is it now? Is it the same?
Or have time, and distance, and a thousand other enemies, so filled
the space between us that the memory of either is growing dim, and
the influence of the other waning, waning till the absence of all
binding tie begins to feel like a very bond. Will the vision simply
fade gradually out of sight?” For us there is no promise, no tie,
no protestations of fealty; only knowledge, and that forced upon us
rather than sought. You give or you don’t give, that is all; if
you also take away, you are within your right. There may be reasons
and reasons, I understand them all; and I have only one desire, that
whatever prevails may secure you happiness. What you can give seems
to me so unlike what others ever have to give, so infinitely beyond
price, that, where I might gain, it is not right that I should speak.
Therefore I cannot urge, I dare not even plead, a cause that has less
to recommend it than the forlornest hope.
XXXV
OF OBSESSION
If that is irrevocable--why, then, no more. You can only decide, and
while I would not have you consider me, I do ask you to think of
yourself. I have no title to be considered, not the remotest; if I had,
it might be different. Possibly, even, I had better not write now, and
yet I must, though you say “Don’t.” It cannot matter for this once,
and after--well, there may be no after. We are curiously inconsistent
and very hard to understand; even when we think we know each other
well, we speak to conceal our thoughts; and, when we write (and it is
often easier to write what we mean than to say it) I wonder whether
it occurs to us how marvellously contradictory we can be, and what
difficult riddles we can frame, in two or three pages of a letter that
comes straight from the heart and cries to be understood. Verily we
are the slaves of circumstance; but whilst we accept that position,
whilst we make sacrifices that can be absolutely heroic, and dumbly
suffer the crucifixion of a lifetime, we want one other heart to know
and understand. There are few things harder to bear than to stifle
every strongest inclination, every dearest hope, to shut the gate
of life, to lock it and throw away the key, with a determination to
accept existence and make the best of it. God knows how bitter is that
renunciation, but, if it be for another, and that other misunderstands,
then the cruelty of it all seems almost beyond endurance.
If I may write no more to you, you may never understand. If I saw you,
later, under other circumstances, I could not speak; so there can be
no explanation for me. I do not plead, I may not. Not once, but often
you have heard my profession of faith--a gift is good, because it is
given freely. The greatest good, the most priceless gift, is love. It
is valuable because it is free. You cannot buy it or compel it; even
when given, you cannot lock it up, or chain it down, and say, “It is
mine for ever.” It comes, and it is the joy of life; it goes, and it
is pity, misery, despair. It is as useless to rave against the loss,
as to shake one’s fist at Zeus and his thunderbolts. If I ever had,
then I was thrice-blessed. If I have no longer, the fault is probably
mine, and I have still the knowledge of what was. Not God Himself can
deprive me of that. I would have liked that you should know all I yearn
to say, but because you are not here to tell me, “Say it, say it all,”
therefore I must keep silence. Perhaps I do not read aright all you
mean; but some at least I know, and that is what you would have me
understand without any shadow of doubt. That I realise, down to the
very lowest depths of the suffering which is dumb for sheer pain; and
I can say nothing, absolutely nothing, because I have no right; nay,
more, you tell me to be silent. Surely you know, you know, what I would
say? You remember how one evening we rode out by the rocks, and we
talked of a story of faith and high resolve, and you said you did not
think I was capable of a like devotion. That was a fairy tale; but what
I said then, I repeat, with greater confidence, now; with hope, yes, I
could stand and wait--with none, perhaps not.