the heart, as he stepped out into the street through the cafe’s swinging
door.... Very soon after that, the police. Clara and I were thrown into
the street. Clara died in the Hospital of pneumonia. That is all.”
_SEVEN_
EARTH
* * * * *
One of the candles between the woman and the boy had burned faster than
the other. It guttered, went out. She saw the death of Clara.... The
long gray room full of the streaking stains of the white sick. Clara’s
black hair and the wan sheet and the bars of the iron bed. Clara’s
clasping arms, moist, shutting out life.--Let me die with you!... The
fading eyes of Clara.
“You forgive me? forgive me? I should not have brought you in, O Fanny.
I am glad to pay for that, I was mad! But there were six years.... I
have loved you. Now, you, what are you going to do?”
“You forgive me, Clara? What becomes of any of us? I have loved you
also.”
... “I murdered her. For what?... White Clara for a dirty Jew! Mangel is
dead at any rate ... just dead in another place....”
“I was not sorry. Clara was dead. My friend! My world was gone. I did
not feel sorrow. Walking the streets, the innumerable streets my soul
was as upon a journey through numberless bodies and states of myself.
Numberless moments. And yet my soul was One. It was unchanged. It moved
through the broken sea of my Disaster, it knew it was One....
“It is One now. Here I am.... Four years I have been here. Susan and
Tessie I never saw again. Thelma came back. Dear Thelma. She has helped
me. You know how. She saved ... I can’t guess by what means ... part of
my furniture from the crash of the House. She is loyal like an animal.
You do well, Samson Brenner, caring even in the way you care, for
Thelma....
“Four years I have been here--“
Samson got up. Through the gloom of the heavy room he groped to the
sideboard. He found another candle. He brought it back to the table. He
lighted it with the other that was low, and set it alongside.
“I have a daughter,” she said, “nearly as big as you.”
--I want to speak! What can I say to this woman? It is hard, it will be
braver to keep silent: not to break this stillness in which her will so
strangely works--toward what? For her sake, I am still.
“I am a failure. Look at me, Boy. Look at me. Look at Fanny Dirk. There
is light enough to look.”
He looked at her. But he saw only her eyes that were very strong and
clear.
“You have talked with me long,” she said. “Be quiet with me now.”
They faced each other over the mellow table. It broadened, it narrowed:
they were far and close. There was a wave in the room, making the table
and the two flames and their own forms curve and refract, as if their
eyes caught this reality of them together through some substance quick
like flowing water.
“Be still,” she whispered.
The clock gave a stroke: “Half ... past ... eleven.”
--He stays!
--He has listened to my words. He has heard my will.
Carnally he came.
That is swept away.
My will has cleaned him unto me. He stays.
She watched him. Blond warm boy, with eyes tender and virgin: afraid of
the brusque world. Boy with heart beating a measure beyond the reach of
your eyes!
--Shall I learn now?
What Leon promised? what the dolorous years
Failed to fulfill?
Shall I learn now from you?...
He has stayed and been kind. Soon he will go away,
Forgetting Thelma. Will you leave me knowledge?
--O I do not understand ...
Why I have wanted, why I have wanted ...
Why I have fallen and fallen, looking for God!
You, Boy, won’t you go away
And leave me Knowledge?...
Her hands were upon the table. His hands were near her hands upon the
table. Their eyes joined. He rested upon the yearning of her eyes. His
mind was empty.
--Go away. Yes. Before I have lost!
Go, before your staying slays me, Boy.
Go--leave me Knowledge!
He did not stir. His eyes lay within her own as in a womb, resting
omnipotent, knowing no act. She held him.
--Go. Reveal to me!
The bell rang.
--Go!
The bell rang.
The bell drove an iron finger between his eyes and her own. His eyes
stirred. The bell rang.
--Go! By the will of God, go!
Leave me what my life has bled away
To find at the Bottom ...
The bell rang. His eyes were quickened, for his senses knew not her but
that the bell rang.
Fanny got up. He was fixed.... She felt a stirring under her heart.
“Hush, Edith my child,” she murmured, getting up.
Her body was stiff and leaden. But she felt with all her body how his
eyes were quickened. Her own eyes turned her about.
Fanny moved with her eyes. His eyes, stirring to life beyond her, were
within her womb like a child unborn.... “Hush Edith!”
She moved through the tunnelling hall, a shadow darker than it, about
eyes that were wells of fire. She had put back the chain upon the door.
Groping she loosed it. Thelma burst in....
Thelma Clark was there: exhilerant, laughing, savage.
“O you dear ... waiting all this time for _me_.” She swayed. “In the
dark! Waiting, you sillies, with a candle between you. What’s the
matter with the gas?”
The room flared bright.
--Give me your eyes. Not to her! Let me hold your eyes.
Thelma flung herself on Samson’s lap. She kissed him.
Fanny saw his eyes draw in, swerve to another orbit, flame away.... The
line of Thelma’s thigh lashed in blue silk, the crumple of her little
breasts bursting within the lowcut waist ... there, there.
The eyes of Samson died from the eyes of Fanny.
He stood. He touched Thelma’s lips with his hand.
“Come.”
They were gone....
* * * * *
Fanny heard the door shut. She was alone. She sat down where she had sat
before at the table. She arose. She shut out the gas. A peal of Thelma’s
laughter pierced the door. The room clapped close about the fainting
flame of the one candle.
Fanny sat down where she had sat before. Beyond her rigid gaze was an
empty place. Beyond the empty place was the Night. Within her gaze was
the Night. Her eyes held nothing.
“And a Jew,” she murmured “a Jew was to bring me Light.”
She faced the Emptiness about her. She met it. Emptiness? The little
candle stilly laid it whole, perfect, before her. Behind her a shut
door. About her Emptiness.
“--and God?”
Sudden her eyes were hard. “Think of him,” she spoke. Her mouth full of
tears made her voice liquid. “Think of him. Think of him, Fanny. No one
else!... Your Light-bearer, your Prophet, your Voice in the
Wilderness--there he is, out there, in the arms of Thelma.... Fanny,
dare to think.”
She was still. She was a little woman huddled in the Dark with hard
eyes, daring to think.
Daring to see!
Her mouth tremored. Her hands reached open before her. They clasped. She
drew her hands in upon her breasts: and as they pressed, her eyes blazed
with anguish as if she held flame to her flesh. She pressed ... she
pressed. Her face broke.... Then, from the wreckage of her features
there was born a smile making them clear and sharp, making them fair and
high. A Light shone in them.
_1916-1921_
Typographical errors corrected by the etext transcriber:
stook still=> stood still {pg 57}
football thrust her=> footfall thrust her {pg 86}
Take the chancet=> Take the chance {pg}106