Waves, slowly, softly breaking, not on the Basin shore: though ever, in
remotest lands, we dream of that.
We hold it mystic more and more, for love of it!--ay, we have it
mingled in our thoughts with that one safe and sweet possession, the
Land unspoken, the Basin whose colors dawn at eventide!
And we never count: "Such an one was lost," and, "Such an one was
living, when we knew." For there, there are none lost. They live
again!
I suggested once that we should build a house fitting those grand
sea-cliffs, sometimes to occupy it.
But Vesty, ever wise, was silent, troubled, and I read her thought.
No, we should introduce no discordant element there, of liveries and
servants, and riches and seclusive walls, of _mine_ and _thine_.
"Mine _is_ thine if thou needest it," was ever the Basin code: "even my
life!" Before such a spirit the admission of worldly wealth and rank
were tawdry.
But Vesty communicates with them (dear to me when they arrive are the
stamps unutterably erased by Lunette's faithful art): and we know that
they are happier for us, and by us comforted.
And do I never blush for Vesty in her new position? Ay, a thousand
times, for pride and joy! Her manners are from a high source indeed;
you will not find me any that are higher.
Full are her hands of charity and mercy, given, as the great Founder of
our nobilities gave, without stooping, of condescension. Saint Vesta!
who gives a glory to my name it never had before--the high and noble
lady of my house!
And love makes, as fully as may be in this world, security about her
steps, which yet it would not hamper.
Driven in her state carriage, robed in velvet and sable, she is royal;
yet not so queenly, not so matchless, as when walking, pitiful, lonely,
and strong against misfortune, by the Basin shores, with her child
upheld upon her arm, and the old shawl.
One evening I found her by the window, gazing out wistfully where the
wind was tossing the rain, which ceased now and then in strange
intermittent gusts, still wild of the tempest.
She looked up at me with a smile, trustful, but earnest and pathetic.
"I want to go out in the storm," she said.
"Then go, child," I answered her. "Your possessions are wide, and, as
we of the Basin say, you are not made of sugar, to melt; neither," I
added, "are you like Lot's wife."
She showed her fine teeth over that old tender and beloved
reminiscence, but the wistful look, and sad, was still in her eyes.
"And--I would like to put on the old shawl again, just this once," she
said.
"Oh," said I, "that is another thing. That is priceless, and I have
it, as you know, locked among my treasures. Still, this once, yes."
And I brought it to her.
Still smiling at me, as pleading for her fancy, she held it at her
throat as of old.
I made haste to resume my reading with seeming preoccupation apart, for
I thought she wished to go alone.
"Aren't you coming?" said she, wistfully again, and paled and turned to
me.
The look in her eyes--she wanted me! Oh, how my heart leaped--a trick
taught it at the Basin, which now it will never get over.
But, sly as Captain Leezur, I hid my delight in the folds of my great
overcoat.
Long we walked together. "What inspired you to this? This is best of
all," I said.
"Why?" said Vesty, glowing and beautiful.
"Because now I see again that you are 'Vesty.' And my Lady of M----
was a possible dream always. But Vesty seemed unattainable.
"That rose color," I added, looking at her cheeks, "I never saw
anywhere except at certain sunsets--you know where."
For we of the Basin--however wilfully inclined sometimes, as Captain
Pharo--at heart bow down to our wives, and make love to them, long,
long after we are married: quite, indeed, until death do us part, as
all true Basins should.
"Paul!" said Vesty. Now "Paul" was really my name, with considerable
before and after it, but never mind all that.
"Paul!"
"Well?" I said.
Confused with the rose-color blushes: "I forgot," she murmured, "what I
was going to say."
No, she had not forgotten it! Her face was eloquent; only she cannot
talk with that fluency with which she can look beautiful and sigh.
Especially when she would express anything of deep feeling, she has a
way of brushing a speck of dust from my right shoulder, and letting her
hand rest there a moment, that tells me worlds, but would not go for
much, I admit, on a smart female rostrum.
But "Paul!" that voice creeps to me at all times, for counsel, for
sympathy; comes impulsively, that is the best of it--comes ever
impulsively. I do not know why I am so blessed among my fellows! Just
as the lad comes to me--he, too, of the highest breeding. I never saw
a look of wonder or shrinking on his face; and once, in an illness that
he had he clung to me, cried for me, even above his mother.
I gave my heart to him then. When a sick child, with a mother like
Vesty, turns and clings to one--well, it is like to set one up.
He quotes me, refers to me, defends me, apes all my mannerisms, and
struts with them proudly as clear legal type and documentary evidence.
He has my name, Gurdon "Paul," with the rest: he is my heir. Handsome,
stalwart, as our race has notably been; loving, generous, fearless, all
that the world can give him will be his besides; tutors, splendors,
wide, luxurious travel, the entrance to glittering courts--only, God
grant that he may find just the Basin at last!--the true, the pitiful,
the pure of heart: that he may come up to the stature of his father,
who knew but one plain path, and that the royal one; who, in the battle
with fear and death, was greater than the storm.
So, often in rich and high cathedrals with Vesty by my side, the organ
has but to peal forth plaintively, and those stately, emblematic
windows fade away to others, broken, swaying in the wind, and the roar
of the tides comes in, and high above the great clouds pass wondrously.
And I think how the Christ, painted in purple and crimson glories in
these walls, and before whose image the hosts bow down, was a poor
Basin of the Basins, in His birth and in His death; who had never a
sure pillow, and who minded all woes save His own.
And above the written scroll of the preacher I hear the old prophetic
voice, how "not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not
many noble, are called." . . .
Vesty walks this new way with me, that was not of her knowledge or
choosing with a patience in any tedious form or imposed convention, far
surpassing mine.
Then I tell her that I am only an adopted Basin, and have missed so
many of the first important years of good breeding; when I was taught
to be only moody, if I would, and solitary and selfish.
Then she turns the rose-color, and her eyes shine on me; and if I have
been patient with some vapid visitor, uttering weary commonplaces
(longing, oh how infinitely, all the while in my heart, for Captain
Leezur and the log!) she comes to me afterward, and leans over me with
a caress and says, "That 's a dear Basin!"
Thus I observe always my lady's rank, and am happy when she exalts me
to it.
Sometimes in dark hours, when gigantic shadows, unexplained, oppress
heart and soul----lo! the "Boys" play softly to us once again upon
instruments above our art, with a touch that thrills above these
masters.
We recognize that life is not a draught, either of joy or misery, but a
sweet, stern task set us, in a failing tenement; and half between
smiles and tears we dream how, to that darkening school-house, when the
shadows grow heartbroken and weary, some loving Basin, only great
because of the faith that was in him, shall come to lead us home.