He was to go off the next day; that night he had his last talk to his
aunt. She said that she would say good-bye to him then, and that she
hoped he would be back in June. She did not seem quite as serene as
usual, but she spoke very affectionately and gently of the delight his
visit had been. Then she said, "But I somehow feel--I can't give my
reasons--as if we had got into a mess here. You are rather a disturbing
clement, dear Howard! I may speak plainly to you now, mayn't I? I think
you have more effect on people than you know. You have upset us! I am
not criticising you, because you have exceeded all my hopes. But you
are too diffident, and you don't realise your power of sympathy. You
are very observant, very quick to catch the drift of people's moods,
and you are not at all formidable. You are so much interested in people
that you lead them to reveal themselves and to betray themselves; and
they don't find quite what they expect. You are afraid, I think, of
caring for people; you want to be in close relation with everyone, and
yet to preserve your own tranquillity. You are afraid of emotion; but
one can't care for people like that! It doesn't cost you enough! You
are like a rich man who can afford to pay for things, and I think you
rather pauperise people. Here you have been for three weeks; and nobody
here will be able to forget you; and yet I think you may forget us. One
can't care without suffering, and I think that you don't suffer. It is
all a pleasure and delight to you. You win hearts, and don't give your
own. Don't think I am ungrateful. You have made a great difference
already to my life; but you have made me suffer too. I know that like
Telemachus in Tennyson's poem you will be 'decent not to fail in
offices of tenderness'--I know I can depend on you to do everything
that is kind and considerate and just. You won't disappoint me. You
will do out of a natural kindliness and courtesy what many people can
only do by loving. You don't claim things, you don't lay hands on
things; and it looks so like unselfishness that it seems detestable of
me to say anything. But you will have to give yourself away, and I
don't think you have ever done that. I can say all this, my dear,
because I love you, as a mother might; you are my son indeed; but there
is something in you that will have to be broken; we have all of us to
be broken. It isn't that you have anything to repent of. You would take
endless trouble to help anyone who wanted help, you would be endlessly
patient and tender and strong; but you do not really know what love
means, because it does not hurt or wound you. You are like Achilles,
was it not, who had been dipped in the river of death, and you are
invulnerable. You won't, I know, resent my saying this? I know you
won't--and the fact that you will not makes it harder for me to say
it--but I almost wish it WOULD wound you, instead of making you think
how you can amend it. You can't amend it, but God and love can; only
you must dare to let yourself go. You must not be wise and forbearing.
There, dear, I won't say more!"
Howard took her hand and kissed it. "Thank you," he said, "thank you a
hundred times for speaking so. It is perfectly true, every word of it.
It is curious that to-day I have seen myself three times mirrored in
other minds. I don't like what I see--I am not complacent--I am not
flattered. But I don't know what to do! I feel like a patient with a
hopeless disease, who has been listening to a perfectly kind and wise
physician. But what can I do? It is just the vital impulse which is
lacking. I will be frank too; it is quite true that I live in the
surface of things. I am so much interested in books, ideas, thoughts, I
am fascinated by the study of human temperament; people delight me,
excite me, amuse me; but nothing ever comes inside. I don't excuse
myself, but I say: 'It is He that hath made us and not we ourselves.' I
am just so, as you have described, and I feel what a hollow-hearted
sort of person I am. Yet I go on amusing myself with friendships and
interests. I have never suffered, and I have never loved. Well, I would
like to change all that, but can I?"
"Ah, dear Howard," said his aunt, "that is the everlasting question. It
is like you to take this all so sweetly and to speak so openly. But
further than this no one can help you. You are like the young man whom
Jesus loved who had great possessions. You do not know how much! I will
not tell you to follow Him; and your possessions are not those which
can be given away. But you must follow love. I had a hope, I have a
hope--oh, it is more than that, because we all find our way sooner or
later--and now that you know the truth, as I see you know it, the light
will not be long in coming. God bless you, dearest child; there is pain
ahead of you; but I don't fear that--pain is not the worst thing or the
last thing!"