Three Weeks Read online

  CHAPTER XVI

  To some natures security hath no charm--the sword of Damocles suspendedover their heads adds to their enjoyment of anything. Of such seemed Pauland his lady. It was as if they were snatching astonishing pleasures fromthe 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 shebade him sleep--sleep on this other loggia where they sat, which gave uponthe side canal obliquely, while looking into a small garden of roses andoleanders below. Here were shade and a cool small breeze.

  "We are so weary, my beloved one," the lady said. "Let us sleep on thesecouches of smooth silk, sleep the heavy hours of the afternoon away, andgo 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 restthere in the perfumed shade, near enough to his loved one to be able tostretch out his arm and touch her hair. And soon a sweet sleep claimedhim, and all was oblivion and peace.

  The lady lay still on her couch for a while, her eyes gleaming betweentheir half-closed lids. But at last, when she saw that Paul indeed sleptdeeply, she rose stealthily and crept from the place back to the room, thegloomy vast room within, where she summoned Dmitry, and ordered the manshe had called Vasili the night before into her presence. He came withcringing diffidence, prostrating himself to the ground before her, andkissing the hem of her dress, mute adoration in his dark eyes, like thoseof a faithful dog--a great scar showing blue on his bronzed cheek andforehead.

  She questioned him imperiously, while he answered humbly in fear. Dmitrystood by, an anxious, strained look on his face, and now and then he putin a word.

  Of what danger did they warn her, these two faithful servants? One camefrom afar for no other purpose, it seemed. Whatever it was she receivedthe news in haughty defiance. She spoke fiercely at first, and theyhumbled themselves the more. Then Anna appeared, and joined hersupplications to theirs, till at last the lady, like a pettish childchasing a brood of tiresome chickens, shooed them all from the room,'twixt laughter and tears. Then she threw up her arms in rage for amoment, and ran back to the loggia where Paul still slept. Here she satand looked at him with burning eyes of love.

  He was certainly changed in the eighteen days since she had first seenhim. His face was thinner, the beautiful lines of youth were drawn with afiner 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 sealupon 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 herown couch, and soon she also slept.

  It was six o'clock before they awoke, Paul first--and what was his joy tobe able to kneel beside her and watch her for a few seconds before herwhite lids lifted themselves! An attitude of utter weariness and _abandon_was hers. She was as a child tired out with passionate weeping, who hadfallen to sleep as she had flung herself down. There was something evenpathetic about that proud head laid low upon her clasped arms.

  Paul gazed and gazed. How he worshipped her! Wayward, tigerish, beautifulQueen. But never selfish or small. And what great thing had she not donefor him--she who must have been able to choose from all the world alover--and she had chosen him. How poor and narrow were all the thoughtsof his former life, everywhere hedged in with foolish prejudice andignorant certainty. Now all the world should be his lesson-book, and someday he would show her he was worthy of her splendid teaching and belief inhim, 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 sovery pale--fear came to him for an instant--and then he kissed her mouth.

  Her wonderful eyes unclosed themselves with none of the bewildered starepeople often wake with when aroused suddenly. It seemed that even in hersleep she had been conscious of her loved one's presence. Her lips partedin a smile, while her heavy lashes again swept her cheeks.

  "Sweetheart," she said, "you could awake me from the dead, I think. But weare 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 beautyaround, "I am so glad you only see Venice now, when your eyes can take itin, sweetheart. At first it would have said almost nothing to you," andshe smiled playfully. "In fact, my Paul would have spent most of his timein wondering how he could get exercise enough, there being so few placesto 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. Hewould have walked through St. Mark's, and thought it was a tumble-downplace, with uneven pavements, and he would have noticed there were a'jolly lot of pigeons' in the square! Then he would have been captiouswith the food at his hotel, grumbled at the waiters, scolded poorTompson--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 stoppedand bought corn for them, and fed the greedy creatures, ever ready for theunending largess of strangers. One or two, bolder than the rest, alightedon 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 theCampanile, still standing then. They looked at it all, they looked at thelion, and finally they entered St. Mark's.

  And here Paul held her arm, and gazed with bated breath. It was all sobeautiful and wonderful, and new to his eyes. He had scarcely ever been ina Roman Catholic church before, and had not guessed at the gorgeous beautyof this half-Byzantine shrine. They hardly spoke. She did not weary himwith details like a guide-book--that would be for his after-lifevisits--but now he must see it just as a glorious whole.

  "They worshipped here, and endowed their temple with gold and jewels," shewhispered, "and then they went into the Doge's Palace, and placed a wordin the lion's mouth which meant death or destruction to their bestfriends! A wonderful people, those old Venetians! Sly and fierce--crueland passionate--but with ever a shrewd smile in their eye, even in theirlove-affairs. I often ask myself, Paul, if we are not too civilised, we ofour time. We think too much of human suffering, and so we cultivate thenerves to suffer more, instead of hardening them. Picture to yourself, inmy grandfather's boyhood we had still the serfs! I am of his day, thoughit is over--I have beaten Dmitry--"

  Then she stopped speaking abruptly, as though aware she had localised hernation too much. A strange imperious expression came into her eyes as theymet Paul's--almost of defiance.

  Paul was moved. He began as if to speak, then he remembered his promisenever to question her, and remained silent.

  "Yes, my Paul--you have promised, you know," she said. "I am for you, yourlove--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 ordead.' My God! that means us both--we stand or fall together."

  "Dear one"--her voice fell softly into a note of intenseearnestness--"while fate lets us be together--yes--living or dead--butif we must part, then either would be the cause of the death of the otherby further seeking--never forget that, my beloved one. Listen"--her eyestook a sudden fierceness--"once I read your English book, 'The Lady andthe Tiger.' You remember it, Paul? She must choose which she would giveher 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 causedquestion at the moment; some were for one choice, some for the other--butfor me there was never any hesitation. I would give you to a thousandtigers sooner than to another woman--just as I would give my life athousand
times for your life, my lover."

  "Darling," said Paul, "and I for yours, my fierce, adorable Queen. But whyshould we speak of terrible things? Are we not happy today, and now, andhave you not told me to live while we may?"

  "Come!" she said, and they walked on down to the gondola again, andfloated away out to the lagoon. But when they were there, far away fromthe world, she talked in a new strain of earnestness to Paul. He mustpromise to do something with his life--something useful and great infuture years.

  "You must not just drift, my Paul, like so many of your countrymen do. Youmust help to stem the tide of your nation's decadence, and be a strongman. For me, when I read now of England, it seems as if all the hereditarylegislators--it is what you call your nobles, eh?--these men have fortheir motto, like Louis XV., _Apres moi le deluge_--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 andawakened to the highest point gradually slipping back to a browsing sheep,to live for _la chasse_ alone, and horses, and dogs, with each day nohigher aim than its own mean pleasure. Ah, Paul!" she continued withsudden passion, "I would rather you were dead--dead and cold with me, thanI should have to feel you were growing a _rien du tout_--a thing who willgo down into nothingness, and be forgotten by men!"

  Her face was aflame with the _feu sacre_. The noble brow and line of herthroat 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 splendidlady?

  And his worship grew and grew.