with you. At least, I think so. It is--what shall call it?--the
psychic trace of the woman in me. Yes, after all, the woman! The
counter-impulse, the struggle of the weakness that is womanishness
itself, when one has to face any sharp decision... to throw one's whole
being into the scale! Oh, I know it, I have found it in me before now!
I am not as you, the Uranian who is too much man! I am more feminine
in impulse--of weaker stuff... I feel it with shame. You know how the
woman says 'no' when she means 'yes' with all her soul! How she draws
back from the arms of the man that she loves when she dreams every
night of throwing herself into them? How she finds herself doing, over
and over, just that which is _against_ her thought, her will, her
duty! I tell you, there is something of _that_ in me, Oswald! I must
make it less... you must help me. It must be one of the good works of
your friendship, of your love, for me. Oh, Oswald, Oswald!... you are
not only to console me for all that I have suffered, for anything in
my past that has gone wrong. For, you are to help me to make myself
over, indeed, in all that _is_ possible, whatever cannot be so."
"We must help each other Imre. But do not speak so of woman, my
brother! Sexually, we may not value her. We may not need her, as do
those Others. But think of the joy that they find in her to which we
are cold; the ideals from which we are shut out! Think of your mother,
Imre; as I think of mine! Think of the queens and peasants who have
been the light and the glory of races and peoples. Think of the
gentle, noble sisters and wives, the serene, patient rulers of myriad
homes. Think of the watching nurses in the hospitals... of the spirits
of mercy who walk the streets of plague and foulness!... think of the
nun on her knees for the world...!"
The shadows in the room were almost at their deepest. We were
still sitting face to face, almost without having stirred since
that moment when I had quitted his side so suddenly--to divine how
much closer I was to be drawn to him henceforth. Life!--Life and
Death!--Life--Love--Death! The sense of eternal kinship in their
mystery.... somehow it haunted one then! as it is likely to do when not
our unhappiness but a kind of over-joy swiftly oppresses us; making us
to feel that in some other sphere, and if less grossly "set within
this muddy vesture of decay," we might understand all three... might
find all three to be one! Life--Love--Death!...
"Oswald, you will never go away from me!"
"Imre, I will never go away from thee. Thy people shall be mine. Thy
King shall be mine. Thy country shall be mine,--thy city mine! My feet
are fixed! We belong together. We have found what we had despaired
of finding... 'the friendship which is love, the love which is
friendship'. Those who cannot give it--accept it--let them live
without it. It can be 'well, and very well' with them. Go they their
ways without it! But for Us, who for our happiness or unhappiness
cannot think life worth living if lacking it... for Us, through the
world's ages born to seek it in pain or joy... it is the highest,
holiest Good in the world. And for one of us to turn his back upon it,
were to find he would better never have been born!"......
* * * * *
It was eleven o'clock. Imre and I had supped and taken a stroll in the
yellow moonlight, along the quais, overlooking the shimmering Duna;
and on through the little Erzsébet-tér where we had met, a few weeks
ago--it seemed so long ago! I had heard more of Imre's life and
individuality as a boy; full of the fine and unhappy emotions of the
uranistic youth. We had laughed over his stock of experiences in the
Camp. We had talked of things grave and gay.
Then we had sauntered back. It was chance; but lo! we were on the
Lánczhid, once more! The Duna rippled and swirled below. The black
barges slumbered against the stone _rakpartok._ The glittering belts
of the city-lights flashed in long perspectives along the wide river's
sweeping course and twinkled from square to square, from terrace to
terrace. Across from us, at a garden-café, a cigány orchestra was
pulsating; crying out, weeping, asking, refusing, wooing, mocking,
inebriating, despairing, triumphant! All the warm Magyar night about
us was dominated by those melting chromatics, poignant cadences--those
harmonies eternally oriental, minor-keyed, insidious, nerve-thrilling.
The arabesques of the violins, the vehement rhythms of the clangorous
czimbalom!.... Ah, this time on the Lánczhid, neither for Imre nor
me was it the sombre Bakony song, "O jaj! az álom nelkül"--but
instead the free, impassioned leap and acclaim,--"Huszár legény
vagyok!--Huszár legény vagyok!"
We were back in the quiet room, lighted now only by the moon. Far up,
on the distant Pálota heights, the clear bell of Szent-Mátyás struck
the three-quarters. The slow notes filled the still night like a
benediction, keyed to that haunting, divine, prophetic triad,
Life--Love--Death! Benediction threefold and supreme to the world!
"Oh, my brother! Oh, my friend!" exclaimed Imre softly, putting
his arm about me and holding me to his heart. "Listen to me.
Perhaps.. perhaps even yet, canst thou err in one, only one thought. I
would have thee sure that when I am with thee here, now, I _miss_
nothing and no one--I seek nothing and no one! My quest, like thine,
is over!... I wish no one save thee, dear Oswald, no one else, even as
I feel thou wishest none save me, henceforth. I would have thee
believe that I am glad _just_ as thou art glad. Alike have we two been
sad because of our lonely hearts, our long restlessness of soul and
body, our vain dreams, our worship of this or that hope--vision--which
has been kept far from us--it may be, overvalued by us! We have
suffered so much thou and I!... because of what never could be! We
shall be all the happier now for what is real for us... I love thee, as
thou lovest me. I have found, as thou hast found, 'the friendship
which is love, the love which is friendship.'... Come then, O friend! O
brother, to our rest! Thy heart on mine, thy soul with mine! For us
two it surely is... Rest!"
"Truth? What is truth? Two human hearts
Wounded by men, by fortune tried.
Outwearied with their lonely parts.
Vow to beat henceforth side by side."*
THE END.
*Matthew Arnold
TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE
Obvious printing errors have been silently corrected throughout.
Otherwise, inconsistencies and possible errors have been preserved,
and some irregular and non-standard formatting and punctuation has
likewise been retained.