I am in danger, I see, of being
included among the whimsical
fellows, which I so little desire
that I have got me into my writing-chair
to combat the charge, but, having
sat for an unconscionable time
with pen poised, I am come agitatedly
to the fear that there may be
something in it.
So long a time has elapsed,
you must know, since I abated
of the ardours of self-inquiry
that I revert in vain (through
many rusty doors) for the beginning
of this change in me, if changed
I am; I seem ever to see this
same man until I am back in those
wonderful months which were half
of my life, when, indeed, I know
that I was otherwise than I am
now; no whimsical fellow then,
for that was one of the possibilities
I put to myself while seeking
for the explanation of things,
and found to be inadmissible.
Having failed in those days to
discover why I was driven from
the garden, I suppose I ceased
to be enamoured of myself, as
of some dull puzzle, and then
perhaps the whimsicalities began
to collect unnoticed.
It is a painful
thought to me to-night, that
he could wake
up glorious once, this man in
the elbow-chair by the fire,
who is humorously known at the
club as a "confirmed spinster." I
remember him well when his years
told four and twenty; on my soul
the proudest subaltern of my
acquaintance, and with the most
reason to be proud. There was
nothing he might not do in the
future, having already done the
biggest thing, this toddler up
club-steps to-day.
Not, indeed, that I am a knave;
I am tolerably kind, I believe,
and most inoffensive, a gentleman,
I trust, even in the eyes of
the ladies who smile at me as
we converse; they are an ever-
increasing number, or so it seems
to me to-night. Ah, ladies, I
forget when I first began to
notice that smile and to be made
uneasy by it. I think I understand
it now, and in some vague way
it hurts me. I find that I watch
for it nowadays, but I hope I
am still your loyal, obedient
servant.
You will scarcely credit it,
but I have just remembered that
I once had a fascinating smile
of my own. What has become of
my smile? I swear I have not
noticed that it was gone till
now; I am like one who revisiting
his school feels suddenly for
his old knife. I first heard
of my smile from another boy,
whose sisters had considered
all the smiles they knew and
placed mine on top. My friend
was scornful, and I bribed him
to mention the plebiscite to
no one, but secretly I was elated
and amazed. I feel lost to- night
without my smiles. I rose a moment
ago to look for it in my mirror.
I like to believe
that she has it now. I think
she may have
some other forgotten trifles
of mine with it that make the
difference between that man and
this. I remember her speaking
of my smile, telling me it was
my one adornment, and taking
it from me, so to speak, for
a moment to let me see how she
looked in it; she delighted to
make sport of me when she was
in a wayward mood, and to show
me all my ungainly tricks of
voice and gesture, exaggerated
and glorified in her entrancing
self, like a star calling to
the earth: "See, I will show
you how you hobble round," and
always there was a challenge
to me in her eyes to stop her
if I dared, and upon them, when
she was most audacious, lay a
sweet mist.
They all came
to her court, as is the business
of young fellows,
to tell her what love is, and
she listened with a noble frankness,
having, indeed, the friendliest
face for all engaged in this
pursuit that can ever have sat
on woman. I have heard ladies
call her coquette, not understanding
that she shone softly upon all
who entered the lists because,
with the rarest intuition, she
foresaw that they must go away
broken men and already sympathised
with their dear wounds. All wounds
incurred for love were dear to
her; at every true utterance
about love she exulted with grave
approval, or it might be a with
a little "ah!" or "oh!" like
one drinking deliciously. Nothing
could have been more fair, for
she was for the first comer who
could hit the target, which was
her heart.
She adored all beautiful things
in their every curve and fragrance,
so that they became part of her.
Day by day, she gathered beauty;
had she had no heart (she who
was the bosom of womanhood) her
thoughts would still have been
as lilies, because the good is
the beautiful.
And they all forgave her; I
never knew of one who did not
forgive her; I think had there
been one it would have proved
that there was a flaw in her.
Perhaps, when good-bye came she
was weeping because all the pretty
things were said and done with,
or she was making doleful confessions
about herself, so impulsive and
generous and confidential, and
so devoid of humour, that they
compelled even a tragic swain
to laugh. She made a looking-glass
of his face to seek wofully in
it whether she was at all to
blame, and when his arms went
out for her, and she stepped
back so that they fell empty,
she mourned, with dear sympathy,
his lack of skill to seize her.
For what her soft eyes said was
that she was always waiting tremulously
to be won. They all forgave her,
because there was nothing to
forgive, or very little, just
the little that makes a dear
girl dearer, and often afterward,
I believe, they have laughed
fondly when thinking of her,
like boys brought back. You ladies
who are everything to your husbands
save a girl from the dream of
youth, have you never known that
double- chinned industrious man
laugh suddenly in a reverie and
start up, as if he fancied he
were being hailed from far-away?
I hear her hailing me now.
She was so light-hearted that
her laugh is what comes first
across the years; so high-spirited
that she would have wept like
Mary of Scots because she could
not lie on the bare plains like
the men. I hear her, but it is
only as an echo; I see her, but
it is as a light among distant
trees, and the middle-aged man
can draw no nearer; she was only
for the boys. There was a month
when I could have shown her to
you in all her bravery, but then
the veil fell, and from that
moment I understood her not.
For long I watched her, but she
was never clear to me again,
and for long she hovered round
me, like a dear heart willing
to give me a thousand chances
to regain her love. She was so
picturesque that she was the
last word of art, but she was
as young as if she were the first
woman. The world must have rung
with gallant deeds and grown
lovely thoughts for numberless
centuries before she could be;
she was the child of all the
brave and wistful imaginings
of men. She was as mysterious
as night when it fell for the
first time upon the earth. She
was the thing we call romance,
which lives in the little hut
beyond the blue haze of the pine-woods.
No one could have looked less
elfish. She was all on a noble
scale, her attributes were so
generous, her manner unconquerably
gracious, her movements indolently
active, her face so candid that
you must swear her every thought
lived always in the open. Yet,
with it all, she was a wild thing,
alert, suspicious of the lasso,
nosing it in every man's hand,
more curious about it than about
aught else in the world; her
quivering delight was to see
it cast for her, her game to
elude it; so mettlesome was she
that she loved it to be cast
fair that she might escape as
it was closing round her; she
scorned, however her heart might
be beating, to run from her pursuers;
she took only the one step backward,
which still left her near them
but always out of reach; her
head on high now, but her face
as friendly, her manner as gracious
as before, she is yours for the
catching. That was ever the unspoken
compact between her and the huntsmen.
It may be but an old trick
come back to me with these memories,
but again I clasp my hands to
my brows in amaze at the thought
that all this was for me could
I retain her love. For I won
it, wonder of the gods, but I
won it. I found myself with one
foot across the magic circle
wherein she moved, and which
none but I had entered; and so,
I think, I saw her in revelation,
not as the wild thing they had
all conceived her, but as she
really was. I saw no tameless
creature, nothing wild or strange.
I saw my sweet love placid as
a young cow browsing. As I brushed
aside the haze and she was truly
seen for the first time, she
raised her head, like one caught,
and gazed at me with meek affrighted
eyes. I told her what had been
revealed to me as I looked upon
her, and she trembled, knowing
she was at last found, and fain
would she have fled away, but
that her fear was less than her
gladness. She came to me slowly;
no incomprehensible thing to
me now, but transparent as a
pool, and so restful to look
upon that she was a bath to the
eyes, like banks of moss.
Because I knew the maid, she
was mine. Every maid, I say,
is for him who can know her.
The others had but followed the
glamour in which she walked,
but I had pierced it and found
the woman. I could anticipate
her every thought and gesture,
I could have flashed and rippled
and mocked for her, and melted
for her and been dear disdain
for her. She would forget this
and be suddenly conscious of
it as she began to speak, when
she gave me a look with a shy
smile in it which meant that
she knew I was already waiting
at the end of what she had to
say. I call this the blush of
the eye. She had a look and a
voice that were for me alone;
her very finger-tips were charged
with caresses for me. And I loved
even her naughtinesses, as when
she stamped her foot at me, which
she could not do without also
gnashing her teeth, like a child
trying to look fearsome. How
pretty was that gnashing of her
teeth! All her tormentings of
me turned suddenly into sweetnesses,
and who could torment like this
exquisite fury, wondering in
sudden flame why she could give
herself to anyone, while I wondered
only why she could give herself
to me. It may be that I wondered
over-much. Perhaps that was why
I lost her.
It was in the full of the moon
that she was most restive, but
I brought her back, and at first
she could have bit my hand, but
then she came willingly. Never,
I thought, shall she be wholly
tamed, but he who knows her will
always be able to bring her back.
I am not that man, for mystery
of mysteries, I lost her. I know
not how it was, though in the
twilight of my life that then
began I groped for reasons until
I wearied of myself; all I know
is that she had ceased to love
me; I had won her love, but I
could not keep it. The discovery
came to me slowly, as if I were
a most dull-witted man; at first
I knew only that I no longer
understood her as of old. I found
myself wondering what she had
meant by this and that; I did
not see that when she began to
puzzle me she was already lost
to me. It was as if, unknowing,
I had strayed outside the magic
circle.
When I did understand I tried
to cheat myself into the belief
that there was no change, and
the dear heart bleeding for me
assisted in that poor pretence.
She sought to glide to me with
swimming eyes as before, but
it showed only that this caressing
movement was still within her
compass, but never again for
me. With the hands she had pressed
to her breast she touched mine,
but no longer could they convey
the message. The current was
broken, and soon we had to desist
miserably from our pretences.
She could tell no more than I
why she had ceased to love me;
she was scarcely less anxious
than I that I should make her
love me again, and, as I have
said, she waited with a wonderful
tolerance while I strove futilely
to discover in what I was lacking
and to remedy it. And when, at
last, she had to leave me, it
was with compassionate cries
and little backward flights.
The failure was mine alone,
but I think I should not have
been so altered by it had I known
what was the defect in me through
which I let her love escape.
This puzzle has done me more
harm than the loss of her. Nevertheless,
you must know (if I am to speak
honestly to you) that I do not
repent me those dallyings in
enchanted fields. It may not
have been so always, for I remember
a black night when a poor lieutenant
lay down in an oarless boat and
let it drift toward the weir.
But his distant moans do not
greatly pain me now; rather am
I elated to find (as the waters
bring him nearer) that this boy
is I, for it is something to
know that, once upon a time,
a woman could draw blood from
me as from another.
I saw her again, years afterward,
when she was a married woman
playing with her children. She
stamped her foot at a naughty
one, and I saw the gleam of her
teeth as she gnashed them in
the dear pretty way I can't forget;
and then a boy and girl, fighting
for her shoulders, brought the
whole group joyously to the ground.
She picked herself up in the
old leisurely manner, lazily
active, and looked around her
benignantly, like a cow: our
dear wild one safely tethered
at last with a rope of children.
I meant to make her my devoirs,
but, as I stepped forward, the
old wound broke out afresh, and
I had to turn away. They were
but a few poor drops, which fell
because I found that she was
even a little sweeter than I
had thought.
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