Perfect self-deception can be a rare, almost a precious thing, ranking
with all absurd, delightful faiths from the child's sweet certainty of
fairydom to the enthusiast's belief in the potency of his own star.
Maxine, in her little white bedroom, arraying herself for Blake, was
wrapped in a cloud of illusion, translated to a sphere above the common
earth by this magic blindness. Never again while life lasted was she to
stand as she stood to-night, eyes searching her mirror with perfect
steadfast sincerity, lips parted in breathless joy of confidence. Never
again! But for the moment the illusion was complete. She saw the
triumphing soul of Max glimmer through her own fair body, saw the boy's
faith carried like a banner in her woman's hands.
Her dressing was a tremulous affair, tinged with a fine excitement.
Again she clothed herself in the soft white dress, the long gray cloak
of former meetings; but, banishing the willing Jacqueline, she coiled
her hair with her own hands and last, most significant touch, pinned a
white rose at her breast.
It was the night of nights! No need to assure herself of the fact; the
knowledge sang in her blood, burned in her cheeks. The night of nights!
When Maxine would receive the soul of Blake and place it, mystic and
sacramental, in the keeping of Max!
The folly of the affair, the naivety of it, made for tears as well as
smiles; and Maxine, glowing to the eternal, aspiring flame, looked her
last into the little mirror that had so carefully preserved its secrets,
and passed across the hall to the _salon_, where the night stretched
beckoning, velvet fingers through the open window.
Young, luxurious summer palpitated through the dusk, fanning the ardor
in her heart. She ran forward, drawn by its allurement; then, all at
once, she stopped, her hand flying to her heart, her breath suspended in
a little cry of surprise. Blake had slipped unheard into the
_appartement_, and was awaiting her on the balcony.
At her cry, he turned--wheeled round toward her--and his eyes scanned
her surprised, betraying face.
"You are glad!" he cried, in sudden self-expression. "You are glad to
see me!" The words were hot as they were abrupt, they seared her with
their swiftness and their conviction, they were as a raiding army before
which all ramparts fell. Mentally, morally, she felt herself sway until
preconceived ideas drifted to and fro, weeds upon a tide.
"Yes," she answered, scarcely aware of her own voice. "I am glad."
Where now were the subtle ways, the divers interlacing paths wherein
Maxine was to pursue her chase, delivering her quarry into the hands of
Max? Where were the barbed and potent shafts whereby that capture was to
be achieved? All had vanished into the night; she stood before her
intended victim unarmed, ungirt, and--miracle of miracles--undismayed!
She and Blake confronted each other. Their lips were dumb, but their
looks embraced. Fate--life--was in the air, in the myriad voices of the
night, the myriad pulses of their bodies, the myriad thoughts that
wheeled and flashed within their brains.
This knowledge rushed in upon her swimming senses, upon eyes suddenly
opened, ears suddenly made free of the music of the spheres; and her
hand--the hand that had first girded on her boy's attire--went out to
Blake like that of any girl.
It was nature's signal, stronger in its frailty than any attained art of
woman; and he answered to it as man has ever answered--ever will answer.
"Oh, my love!" he cried. "My love!" And his arms went round her.
It is sacrilege to attempt analysis of birth or love or death. Death and
birth, the mysteries! Love, the revelation! Man, as he has existed
through all time, had being in Blake's embrace; woman, as she has been
from the first, lived in Maxine's leap of the heart, her leap of the
spirit as the ecstasy of his touch thrilled her. Here was no coldness;
here was no sensuality. Divinity manifested itself, no longer above, but
within them. The lights in the sky were divine, but so were the lights
of the town. Divinity fired their souls, merging each in each; but as
truly it fired their clasping hands, their lips trembling to kiss.
Maxine--removed by fabulous distances from Max, from the studio, from
all accepted things--breathed her wonderment in an unconscious appeal.
"Speak to me!"
And Blake, awed and enraptured, whispered his answer.
"There is nothing to say that you do not know. I worship you. I bent my
knee and kissed the hem of your garment the first moment it brushed my
path. There is nothing to say that you do not know. I have waited all my
life for this."
"All your life?"
"All my life. But love is not reckoned by time. One dreams--and one
wakes."
"You dreamed--" She closed her eyes, her ears drank in the cadences of
his voice.
"Always! As a child, I dreamed over my play; as a boy, I dreamed over
my books--and as a man, over my loves. I was never in love with
woman--always in love with love."
"And now?"
"I am awake--I have come into my inheritance! My love! My love!" It was
an instant of intense sensation. She could feel the beating of his
heart; his fingers and hers were interlaced. "Maxine! Open your eyes!
Look at me!"
Obediently--any woman to any man--she opened them and met his gaze.
"You know? You understand?"
She stood rigid, her eyes wide, her nostrils dilated--a creature swaying
upon the verge of an abyss, contemplating a plunge into space.
"Maxine!" he said again. "Maxine!"
It was the primitive human cry. She heard and acknowledged it in every
fibre of her being; she drew a swift, sharp breath, then, with a free
gesture, cast her arms about his neck.
"Ned! Ned! Say again that you love me! Say it a thousand, say it a
million times and for every time you say it, I will tell you twice that
I love you."
Passion, intoxication sped the words, and Blake's mouth, closing upon
hers, broke the ecstasy of speech.
"I love you! I worship you! You are my life. You are myself."
Reality vibrated through his speech; and Maxine, hearing, lost herself.
With arms still clasped about him, she leaned her body backward, gazing
into his face.
"Again! Say it again!"
"You are my life! We are one! Maxine! Maxine!" His glance burned her,
his arms were close about her. With a sudden ardent movement, she
caught his face between her hands, drew it down, and kissed it full upon
the mouth, not once but many times, fiercely, closely; then, with a
little cry, inarticulate as the cry of an animal, she freed herself and
fled through the _salon_, through the hall and out upon the landing, the
door of the _appartement_ closing behind her.