To some natures security hath no charm--the sword of Damocles suspended
over their heads adds to their enjoyment of anything. Of such seemed Paul
and his lady. It was as if they were snatching astonishing pleasures from
the very brink of some danger, none the less in magnitude because unknown.
They did not breakfast until after one o'clock the next day, and then she
bade him sleep--sleep on this other loggia where they sat, which gave upon
the side canal obliquely, while looking into a small garden of roses and
oleanders below. Here were shade and a cool small breeze.
"We are so weary, my beloved one," the lady said. "Let us sleep on these
couches of smooth silk, sleep the heavy hours of the afternoon away, and
go to the Piazza when the heat of the sun has lessened in measure."
An immense languor was over Paul--he asked nothing better than to rest
there in the perfumed shade, near enough to his loved one to be able to
stretch out his arm and touch her hair. And soon a sweet sleep claimed
him, and all was oblivion and peace.
The lady lay still on her couch for a while, her eyes gleaming between
their half-closed lids. But at last, when she saw that Paul indeed slept
deeply, she rose stealthily and crept from the place back to the room, the
gloomy vast room within, where she summoned Dmitry, and ordered the man
she had called Vasili the night before into her presence. He came with
cringing diffidence, prostrating himself to the ground before her, and
kissing the hem of her dress, mute adoration in his dark eyes, like those
of a faithful dog--a great scar showing blue on his bronzed cheek and
forehead.
She questioned him imperiously, while he answered humbly in fear. Dmitry
stood by, an anxious, strained look on his face, and now and then he put
in a word.
Of what danger did they warn her, these two faithful servants? One came
from afar for no other purpose, it seemed. Whatever it was she received
the news in haughty defiance. She spoke fiercely at first, and they
humbled themselves the more. Then Anna appeared, and joined her
supplications to theirs, till at last the lady, like a pettish child
chasing a brood of tiresome chickens, shooed them all from the room,
'twixt laughter and tears. Then she threw up her arms in rage for a
moment, and ran back to the loggia where Paul still slept. Here she sat
and looked at him with burning eyes of love.
He was certainly changed in the eighteen days since she had first seen
him. His face was thinner, the beautiful lines of youth were drawn with a
finer hand. He was paler, too, and a shadow lay under his curly lashes.
But even in his sleep it seemed as if his awakened soul had set its seal
upon his expression--he had tasted of the knowledge of good and evil now.
The lady crept near him and kissed his hair. Then she flung herself on her
own couch, and soon she also slept.
It was six o'clock before they awoke, Paul first--and what was his joy to
be able to kneel beside her and watch her for a few seconds before her
white lids lifted themselves! An attitude of utter weariness and _abandon_
was hers. She was as a child tired out with passionate weeping, who had
fallen to sleep as she had flung herself down. There was something even
pathetic about that proud head laid low upon her clasped arms.
Paul gazed and gazed. How he worshipped her! Wayward, tigerish, beautiful
Queen. But never selfish or small. And what great thing had she not done
for him--she who must have been able to choose from all the world a
lover--and she had chosen him. How poor and narrow were all the thoughts
of his former life, everywhere hedged in with foolish prejudice and
ignorant certainty. Now all the world should be his lesson-book, and some
day he would show her he was worthy of her splendid teaching and belief in
him, and her gift of an awakened soul. He bent still lower on his knees,
and kissed her feet with deepest reverence. She stirred not. She was so
very pale--fear came to him for an instant--and then he kissed her mouth.
Her wonderful eyes unclosed themselves with none of the bewildered stare
people often wake with when aroused suddenly. It seemed that even in her
sleep she had been conscious of her loved one's presence. Her lips parted
in a smile, while her heavy lashes again swept her cheeks.
"Sweetheart," she said, "you could awake me from the dead, I think. But we
are living still, my Paul--waste we no more time, in dreams."
They made haste, and were soon in the gondola on their way to the Piazza.
"Paul," she said, with a wave of her hand which included all the beauty
around, "I am so glad you only see Venice now, when your eyes can take it
in, sweetheart. At first it would have said almost nothing to you," and
she smiled playfully. "In fact, my Paul would have spent most of his time
in wondering how he could get exercise enough, there being so few places
to walk in! He would have bought a nigger boy with a dish for his father,
and some Venetian mirrors for his aunts, and perhaps--yes--a piece of Mr.
Jesurum's lace for his mother, and some blown glass for his friends. He
would have walked through St. Mark's, and thought it was a tumble-down
place, with uneven pavements, and he would have noticed there were a
'jolly lot of pigeons' in the square! Then he would have been captious
with the food at his hotel, grumbled at the waiters, scolded poor
Tompson--and left for Rome!"
"Oh! darling!" said Paul, laughing too, in spite of his protest. "Surely,
surely, I never was so bad as that--and yet I expect it is probably true.
How can I ever thank you enough for giving me eyes and an understanding?"
"There--there, beloved," she said.
They walked through the Piazza; the pigeons amused Paul, and they stopped
and bought corn for them, and fed the greedy creatures, ever ready for the
unending largess of strangers. One or two, bolder than the rest, alighted
on the lady's hat and shoulder, taking the corn from between her red lips,
and Paul felt jealous even of the birds, and drew her on to see the
Campanile, still standing then. They looked at it all, they looked at the
lion, and finally they entered St. Mark's.
And here Paul held her arm, and gazed with bated breath. It was all so
beautiful and wonderful, and new to his eyes. He had scarcely ever been in
a Roman Catholic church before, and had not guessed at the gorgeous beauty
of this half-Byzantine shrine. They hardly spoke. She did not weary him
with details like a guide-book--that would be for his after-life
visits--but now he must see it just as a glorious whole.
"They worshipped here, and endowed their temple with gold and jewels," she
whispered, "and then they went into the Doge's Palace, and placed a word
in the lion's mouth which meant death or destruction to their best
friends! A wonderful people, those old Venetians! Sly and fierce--cruel
and passionate--but with ever a shrewd smile in their eye, even in their
love-affairs. I often ask myself, Paul, if we are not too civilised, we of
our time. We think too much of human suffering, and so we cultivate the
nerves to suffer more, instead of hardening them. Picture to yourself, in
my grandfather's boyhood we had still the serfs! I am of his day, though
it is over--I have beaten Dmitry--"
Then she stopped speaking abruptly, as though aware she had localised her
nation too much. A strange imperious expression came into her eyes as they
met Paul's--almost of defiance.
Paul was moved. He began as if to speak, then he remembered his promise
never to question her, and remained silent.
"Yes, my Paul--you have promised, you know," she said. "I am for you, your
love--your love--but living or dead you must never seek to know more!"
"Ah!" he cried, "you torture me when you speak like that. 'Living or
dead.' My God! that means us both--we stand or fall together."
"Dear one"--her voice fell softly into a note of intense
earnestness--"while fate lets us be together--yes--living or dead--but
if we must part, then either would be the cause of the death of the other
by further seeking--never forget that, my beloved one. Listen"--her eyes
took a sudden fierceness--"once I read your English book, 'The Lady and
the Tiger.' You remember it, Paul? She must choose which she would give
her lover to--death and the tiger, or to another and more beautiful woman.
One was left, you understand, to decide the end one's self. It caused
question at the moment; some were for one choice, some for the other--but
for me there was never any hesitation. I would give you to a thousand
tigers sooner than to another woman--just as I would give my life a
thousand times for your life, my lover."
"Darling," said Paul, "and I for yours, my fierce, adorable Queen. But why
should we speak of terrible things? Are we not happy today, and now, and
have you not told me to live while we may?"
"Come!" she said, and they walked on down to the gondola again, and
floated away out to the lagoon. But when they were there, far away from
the world, she talked in a new strain of earnestness to Paul. He must
promise to do something with his life--something useful and great in
future years.
"You must not just drift, my Paul, like so many of your countrymen do. You
must help to stem the tide of your nation's decadence, and be a strong
man. For me, when I read now of England, it seems as if all the hereditary
legislators--it is what you call your nobles, eh?--these men have for
their motto, like Louis XV., _Après moi le déluge_--It will last my time.
Paul, wherever I am, it will give me joy for you to be strong and great,
sweetheart. I shall know then I have not loved just a beautiful shell,
whose mind I was able to light for a time. That is a sadness, Paul,
perhaps the greatest of all, to see a soul one has illuminated and
awakened to the highest point gradually slipping back to a browsing sheep,
to live for _la chasse_ alone, and horses, and dogs, with each day no
higher aim than its own mean pleasure. Ah, Paul!" she continued with
sudden passion, "I would rather you were dead--dead and cold with me, than
I should have to feel you were growing a _rien du tout_--a thing who will
go down into nothingness, and be forgotten by men!"
Her face was aflame with the _feu sacré_. The noble brow and line of her
throat will ever remain in Paul's memory as a thing apart in womankind.
Who could have small or unworthy thoughts who had known her--this splendid
lady?
And his worship grew and grew.