A thousand times in the night I reach out (it seems to me), and
touch her hair as it lies spread and dark. A thousand times in
the night I gaze upon her face, her eyes shielded, her lips
gently closed and curved. A thousand times in the night (it
seems to me), I bend above her and whisper, "I love you!" And
she, though asleep and myriads of miles away among the stars,
hears me always and stirs just faintly, and still sleeping
whispers through lips that barely part, "I know!" It is perhaps
that thing called Love which causes me to do this, because I
always whisper, "I love you;" though no word quite is wide and
deep and soft and kind enough to say what is in the soul at
certain times.
Now in lives there are ways. Some have few sorrows and many
things of fortune taken lightly, the things wished coming
easily. Again, others gain only by pain and suffering and long
effort and hard denyings. As it is decreed by chance, the way
with most is to gain all things hardly, and to know always
denial, and always to have longing. That is the way with most.
Of these things I spoke with the Singing Mouse, and told of many
things that came as sorrows and griefs and denials, saying that,
since this was decreed by chance, there was naught that a man
ought not to receive without murmur; and the Singing Mouse said
that this was true, that many things were denied, and that many
knew great sorrows. This was the reason we came to speak of
sorrows. I named very many sorrows that I had known, and many
that friends of mine had known, some of these far greater than
my own; as is most often the case when one comes to see deeply
into these things.
"All sorrows," said the Singing Mouse, "come to us, and we must
bear them, though some are very hard to bear; as when friends do
not know we love them, and think us ill-formed and crooked,
small and mean, when in truth in soul we are tall and comely,
large and strong. Or when we are thought to have done a bad
action when in truth we have done a good one; or when hunger and
thirst come and we have little comforts; or when sickness and
weakness come to us when we wish our strength; or when those die
whom we have loved. All, all these sorrows, and very many
others, come to us; and each sorrow must be borne, for that is
the way of life."
"What," I asked of the Singing Mouse, "is the greatest sorrow?"
"That," said the Singing Mouse, "is a thing hard to tell; for
each man thinks that the sorrow that he has is the greatest
sorrow for him or for the world; though perhaps in truth it is
not large. What to you," asked the Singing Mouse, "is the
greatest sorrow of those which have not yet come to you?"
... "A thousand times in the night, Singing Mouse," said I,
"I reach out and touch her hair, as it lies spread and dark.
I whisper to her, though she be myriads of miles away among the
stars; and she hears; and she answers! This is because of that
thing called Love. Now, this sorrow has not yet come to me; that
when I reach out my hand in the night I shall not touch her
hair; that when I bend to kiss her sleeping she shall not be
there any more; that when I whisper to her she may no longer
answer to me, seeing that this thing called Love can be no more
between us. That," said I to the Singing Mouse, "I could not
endure."
Indeed, at the thought of this, so sharp an agony came to me
that I arose and cried out loud. "I can not endure it, I can not
endure it!" I cried (although this sorrow had not yet come to
me).
"Ah!" said the Singing Mouse, "how idle and weak is the human
mind in the country where you live. Have you not said but now
that, though she be myriads of miles away among the stars, she
answers you when you whisper? Does she not hear? Do not her lips
move in speech as you whisper?"
"That is true," said I. "And will she always hear?"
"She will always hear," said the Singing Mouse. "So this sorrow
will not come as you fear."
"And shall I reach out and touch her hair as it lies spread and
dark?" This I asked of the Singing Mouse.
"You shall touch it, spread and dark, and fragrant as when you
were young," said the Singing Mouse, "if so you wish."
So then it seemed that perhaps all sorrows, even very great
ones, are a part of life. Although I know that, if I could no
longer know the fragrance of her hair, or hear the whisper of
her answer, then that sorrow would be more than I could bear.
[Illustration]
[Illustration: The Shoes of the Princess]
[Illustration]