A year from the following June, and two days after her arrival in Menlo,
Magdaléna went into the middle woods. The great oaks were dusty already,
their brilliant greens were dimming: but the depths of the woods were
full of the warm shimmer of summer, of the mysterious noises produced by
creatures never seen, by the very heat itself, perchance by the riotous
sap in the young trees which had sprung to life from the roots of their
mighty parents.
Magdaléna left the driveway and pushed in among the brush. Poison oak
did not affect her; and she separated the beautiful creeper fearlessly
until she reached a spot where she was as sure of being alone and unseen
as if she had entered the bowels of the earth. She sat down on the warm
dry ground and looked about her for a moment, glad in the sense of
absolute freedom. Above the fragrant brush of many greens rose the old
twisted oaks, a light breeze rustling their brittle leaves, their arms
lifted eagerly to the warm yellow bath from above. Near her was a high
pile of branches and leaves, the home of a wood-rat. No sound came from
it, and mortal had nothing to fear from him. A few birds moved among the
leaves, but the heat made them lazy, and they did not sing.
After a few moments, Magdaléna's glance swept the wall of leaves that
surrounded her; then she took a pencil and a roll of foolscap from her
pocket. She had made up her mind that the time had come for her first
essay in fiction. For two years and a half she had studied and thought
to this end; too reverent to criticise, but taking the creators'
structures to pieces as best she could and giving all attention to parts
and details.
She had had a nebulous idea in her mind for some time. It had troubled
her that it did not assume definite form, but she trusted to that
inspiration of the pen of which she had read much.
Her hand trembled so that she could not write for a few moments. She put
the pencil down, not covering her face with her hands as a more
demonstrative girl would have done, but biting her lips. Her heart beat
suffocatingly. For the first time she fully realised what the power to
write would mean to her. Her religion had gone, that dear companion of
many years; she had practised faithfully until six months ago, when she
had asked her teacher to tell her father that she could never become
even a third-rate musician; and Don Roberto had, after a caustic hour,
concluded that he would "throw no more good money after bad;" she had
had long and meaning conferences with her mirror, conjuring up phantasms
of the beautiful dead women of her race, and decided sadly that the
worship of man was not for her. She had never talked for ten consecutive
minutes with a young man; but she had a woman's instincts, she had read,
she had listened to the tales of her aunt, and she knew that what man
most valued in woman she did not possess. Her great position and the
graces she hoped to cultivate might gratify her ambitions in a measure,
but they would not companion her soul. Books were left; but books are
too heterogeneous an interest to furnish a vital one in life, a reason
for being alive. She had read of the jealous absorption of art, of the
intense exclusive love with which it inspired its votaries. She had read
of the joys of creation, and her whole being had responded; she felt
that did her brain obey her will and shape itself to achievement, she
too would know ecstasy and ask nothing more of life.
Her nerves settled, and she began to write. Her reading had been
confined to the classics of the old world: not only had she not read a
modern novel, but of the regnant lights of her own country, Mr. Howells
and Mr. James, she had never heard. She may have seen their names in the
"Literary Bulletin" her bookseller sent her, but had probably gathered
that they were biologists. There was no one to tell her that the actors
and happenings within her horizon were the proper substance for her
creative faculty. California had whispered to her, but she had not
understood. Her intention was to write a story of England in the reigns
of Oliver Cromwell and Charles the Second. The romance of England
appealed to her irresistibly. The mass of virgin ore which lay at her
hand did not provoke a flash of magnetism from her brain.
She wrote very slowly. An hour passed, and she had only covered a page.
Her head ached a little from the intense concentration of mind. Her
fingers were stiff. Finally, she laid her pencil aside and read what she
had written. It was a laboured introduction to the story, an attempt to
give a picture of the times. She was only nineteen and a novice, but she
knew that what she had written was rubbish. It was a trite synopsis of
what she had read, of what everybody knew; and the English, although
correct, was commonplace, the vocabulary cheap. She set her lips, tore
it up, and began again. At the end of another hour she destroyed the
second result.
Then she determined to skip the prologue for the present and begin the
story. For many long moments she sat staring into the brush, her brain
plodding toward an opening scene, an opening sentence. At last she began
to write. She described the hero. He was walking down the great
staircase of a baronial hall,--in which he had lain concealed,--and the
company below were struck dumb with terror and amazement at the
apparition. She got him to the middle of the stair; she described his
costume with fidelity; she wrote of the temper of the people in the
great hall. Then she dropped the pencil. What was to happen thereafter
was a blank.
She read what she had written. It was lifeless. It was not fiction. The
least of Helena's letters was more virile and objective than this.
Again that mysterious indefinable presentiment assailed her. It was the
first time that it had come since that night she had stood on the
balcony and opened her brain to literary desire. Had that presentiment
meant anything since compassed? Her father's cruel treatment? Her
terrible experience in the street of painted women? Her illness? The
loss of her religion? It was none of these things. So far, it had not
been fulfilled; and it had struck its warning note again. She shivered,
then discovered that the yellow light was no longer about her, and that
her head ached. She rose stiffly and put the torn scraps of paper in her
pocket. As she left, she cast a curious glance about her retreat, not
knowing what prompted it. The scent of newly upturned earth came to her
nostrils; a bird flew down on the rat's nest, starting along the sides a
shower of loose earth; the frogs were chanting hoarsely.