TŌKYŌ, January, 1900.
DEAR MRS. WETMORE,--Memories of handwriting must have become
strong with me; for I recognized the writing before I opened the letter.
And thereafter I did not do more than verify the signature--and put the
letter away, so that I might read it in the time of greatest silence and
serenity of mind. During the interval there rose up reproachfully before
me the ghost of letters written and rewritten and again rewritten to
you, but subsequently--I cannot exactly say why--posted in the fire!
(This letter goes to you in its first spontaneous form--so much the
worse for me!)
"Indifferent" you say. But you ought to see my study-room. It is not
very pretty--a little Japanese matted room, with glass sliding windows
(upstairs), and a table and chair. Above the table there is the portrait
of a young American naval officer in uniform--he is not so young
now;--that is a very dear picture. On the opposite wall is the shadow of
a beautiful and wonderful person, whom I knew long ago in the strange
city of New Orleans. (She was sixteen years old, or so, when I first met
her; and I remember that not long afterwards she was dangerously ill,
and that several people were afraid she would die in that quaint little
hotel where she was then stopping.) The two shadows watch me while the
light lasts; and I have the comfortable feeling of monopolizing their
sympathy--for they have nobody else to look at. The originals would not
be able to give me so much of their company.
The lady talks to me about a fire of wreckwood, that used to burn with
red and blue lights. I remember that I used to sit long ago by that
Rosicrucian glow, and talk to her; but I remember nothing else--only the
sound of her voice,--low and clear and at times like a flute. The gods
only know what _I_ said; for my thoughts in those times were seldom in
the room,--but in the future, which was black, without stars. But all
that was long ago. Since then I have become grey, and the father of
three boys.
The naval officer has been here again in the body, however. Indeed, I
expect him here, upstairs, in a day or two,--before he goes away to
Cavite,--after which I shall probably never see him again. We have sat
up till many a midnight,--talking about things.
Whether I shall ever see the original of the other shadow, I do not
know. I must leave the Far East for a couple of years, in order to
school a little son of mine, who must early begin to learn languages.
Whether I take him to England or America, I do not yet know; but America
is not very far from England. Whether the lady of the many-coloured
fires would care to let me hear her voice for another evening, sometime
in the future, is another question.
Two of the boys are all Japanese,--sturdy and not likely to cause
anxiety. But the eldest is almost altogether of another race,--with
brown hair and eyes of the fairy-colour,--and a tendency to pronounce
with a queer little Irish accent the words of old English poems which he
has to learn by heart. He is not very strong; and I must give the rest
of my life to looking after him.
I wish that I could make a book to please you more often than once
a year. (But I have so much work to do!) Curiously enough, some of
the thoughts spoken in your letter have been put into the printer's
hands--ghostly anticipation?--for a book which will probably appear
next fall. I cannot now judge whether it will please you--but there are
reveries in it, and sundry queer stories.
I think that you once asked me for a portrait of my boy. I send
one--but he is now older than his portrait by some two years. I shall
send a better one later on, if you wish. I should like to interest you
in him--to the simple extent of advising me about him at a later day;
for you represent for my imagination all the Sibyls, and your wisdom
would be for me as the worth of things precious from the uttermost
coasts.
Perhaps something of _me_ lives in that collie you describe: I think
that I can understand exactly what she feels when the Invisible gathers
about,--that is what she feels in regard to her mistress. A collie
_ought_ to recognize the ghostly, anyhow: her ancestors must have sat
at the feet of Thomas of Ercildoune. By the way, my poor dog _did_ get
murdered after all,--killed by men from a strange village. They were
chased by the police; but they "made good their escape." She left behind
her three weird little white puppies. We fed them and nursed them, and
saved two. It is painful being attached to birds and dogs and cats and
other lovable creatures: they die before us, and they have so many
sorrows which we cannot protect them from. The old gods, who loved human
beings, must have been very unhappy to see their pets wither and perish
in a little space.
Good-bye for the moment. It was so kind to write me.