It represented the head and shoulders of a winged female; the countenance was inflexible, grim, and cadaverous. The large, lurid eyes had an owlish stare; and the outspread pinions, black as night, made the wan face yet more livid by contrast. The extended hands were like those of a skeleton.
"What strange fancies you have! It makes the blood curdle in my veins to look at that awful countenance," said Clara shudderingly.
"I cannot draw it as I saw it in my dream! Cannot do justice to my ideal Mors!" answered Beulah, in a discontented tone, as she took up the crayon and retouched the poppies which cl.u.s.tered in the sable locks.
"For Heaven"s sake, do not attempt to render it any more horrible!
Put it away, and finish this lovely Greek face. Oh, how I envy you your talent for music and drawing! Nature gifted you rarely!"
"No! she merely gave me an intense love of beauty, which constantly impels me to embody, in melody or coloring, the glorious images which the contemplation of beauty creates in my soul. Alas! I am not a genius. If I were I might hope to achieve an immortal renown.
Gladly would I pay its painful and dangerous price!" She placed the drawing of Mors in her portfolio and began to touch lightly an unfinished head of Sappho.
"Ah, Clara, how connoisseurs would carp at this portrait of the "Lesbian Muse"! My guardian, for one, would sneer, superbly."
"Why, pray? It is perfectly beautiful!"
"Because, forsooth, it is no low-browed, swarthy Greek. I have a penchant for high, broad, expansive foreheads, which are antagonistic to all the ancient models of beauty. Low foreheads characterize the antique; but who can fancy "violet-crowned, immortal Sappho,"
""With that gloriole Of ebon hair, on calmed brows,"
other than I have drawn her!" She held up the paper, and smiled triumphantly.
In truth, it was a face of rare loveliness; of oval outline, with delicate yet n.o.ble features, whose expression seemed the reflex of the divine afflatus. The uplifted eyes beamed with the radiance of inspiration; the full, ripe lips were just parted; the curling hair cl.u.s.tered with child-like simplicity round the cla.s.sic head; and the exquisitely formed hands clasped a lyre.
"Beulah, don"t you think the eyes are most too wild?" suggested Clara timidly.
"What? for a poetess! Remember poesy hath madness in it," answered Beulah, still looking earnestly at her drawing.
"Madness? What do you mean?"
"Just what I say. I believe poetry to be the highest and purest phase of insanity. Those finely strung, curiously nervous natures that you always find coupled with poetic endowments, are characterized by a remarkable activity of the mental organs; and this continued excitement and premature development of the brain results in a disease which, under this aspect, the world offers premiums for. Though I enjoy a fine poem as much as anybody, I believe, in nine cases out of ten, it is the spasmodic vent of a highly nervous system, overstrained, diseased. Yes, diseased! If it does not result in the frantic madness of Lamb, or the final imbecility of Southey, it is manifested in various other forms, such as the morbid melancholy of Cowper, the bitter misanthropy of Pope, the abnormal moodiness and misery of Byron, the unsound and dangerous theories of Sh.e.l.ley, and the strange, fragmentary nature of Coleridge."
"Oh, Beulah! what a humiliating theory! The poet placed on an ignominious level with the nervous hypochondriac! You are the very last person I should suppose guilty of entertaining such a degraded estimate of human powers," interposed Clara energetically.
"I know it is customary to rave about Muses, and Parna.s.sus, and Helicon, and to throw the charitable mantle of "poetic idiosyncrasies" over all those dark spots on poetic disks. All conceivable and inconceivable eccentricities are pardoned, as the usual concomitants of genius; but, looking into the home lives of many of the most distinguished poets, I have been painfully impressed with the truth of my very unpoetic theory. Common sense has arraigned before her august tribunal some of the socalled "geniuses" of past ages, and the critical verdict is that much of the famous "fine frenzy" was bona-fide frenzy of a sadder nature."
"Do you think that Sappho"s frenzy was established by the Leucadian leap?"
"You confound the poetess with a Sappho who lived later, and threw herself into the sea from the promontory of Leucate. Doubtless she too had "poetic idiosyncrasies"; but her spotless life and, I believe, natural death, afford no indication of an unsound intellect. It is rather immaterial, however, to--" Beulah paused abruptly as a servant entered and approached the table, saying:
"Miss Clara, Dr. Hartwell is in the parlor and wishes to see you."
"To see me!" repeated Clara in surprise, while a rosy tinge stole into her wan face; "to see me! No! It must be you, Beulah."
"He said Miss Sanders," persisted the servant, and Clara left the room.
Beulah looked after her with an expression of some surprise; then continued penciling the chords of Sappho"s lyre. A few minutes elapsed, and Clara returned with flushed cheeks and a smile of trembling joyousness.
"Beulah, do pin my mantle on straight. I am in such a hurry. Only think how kind Dr. Hartwell is; he has come to take me out to ride; says I look too pale, and he thinks a ride will benefit me. That will do, thank you."
She turned away, but Beulah rose and called out:
"Come back here and get my velvet mantle. It is quite cool, and it will be a marvelous piece of management to ride out for your health and come home with a cold. What! no gloves either! Upon my word, your thoughts must be traveling over the bridge Shinevad."
"Sure enough; I had forgotten my gloves; I will get them as I go down. Good-by." With the mantle on her arm she hurried away.
Beulah laid aside her drawing materials and prepared for her customary evening walk. Her countenance was clouded, her lip unsteady. Her guardian"s studied coldness and avoidance pained her, but it was not this which saddened her now. She felt that Clara was staking the happiness of her life on the dim hope that her attachment would be returned. She pitied the delusion and dreaded the awakening to a true insight into his nature; to a consciousness of the utter uncongeniality which, she fancied, barred all thought of such a union. As she walked on these reflections gave place to others entirely removed from Clara and her guardian; and, on reaching the grove of pines opposite the asylum, where she had so often wandered in days gone by, she paced slowly up and down the "arched aisles," as she was wont to term them. It was a genuine October afternoon, cool and sunny. The delicious haze of Indian summer wrapped every distant object in its soft, purple veil; the dim vistas of the forest ended in misty depths; the very air, in its dreamy languor, resembled the atmosphere which surrounded
"The mild-eyed, melancholy lotus-eaters"
of the far East. Through the openings, pale, golden poplars shook down their dying leaves, and here and there along the ravine crimson maples gleamed against the background of dark green pines. In every direction bright-colored leaves, painted with "autumnal hectic,"
strewed the bier of the declining year. Beulah sat down on a tuft of moss, and gathered cl.u.s.ters of golden-rod and purple and white asters. She loved these wild wood-flowers much more than gaudy exotics or rare hothouse plants. They linked her with the days of her childhood, and now each graceful spray of golden-rod seemed a wand of memory calling up bygone joys, griefs, and fancies. Ah, what a hallowing glory invests our past, beckoning us back to the haunts of the olden time! The paths our childish feet trod seem all angel- guarded and thornless; the songs we sang then sweep the harp of memory, making magical melody; the words carelessly spoken now breathe a solemn, mysterious import; and faces that early went down to the tomb smile on us still with unchanged tenderness. Aye, the past, the long past, is all fairyland. Where our little feet were bruised we now see only springing flowers; where childish lips drank from some Marab verdure and garlands woo us back. Over the rustling leaves a tiny form glided to Beulah"s side; a pure infantine face with golden curls looked up at her, and a lisping voice of unearthly sweetness whispered in the autumn air. Here she had often brought Lilly and filled her baby fingers with asters and goldenrod; and gathered bright scarlet leaves to please her childish fancy. Bitter waves had broken over her head since then; shadows had gathered about her heart. Oh, how far off were the early years! How changed she was; how different life and the world seemed to her now! The flowery meadows were behind her, with the vestibule of girlhood, and now she was a woman, with no ties to link her with any human being; alone, and dependent only on herself. Verily she might have exclaimed in the mournful words of Lamb:
"All, all are gone, the old familiar faces."
She sat looking at the wild flowers in her hand; a sad, dreamy light filled the clear gray eyes, and now and then her brow was plowed by some troubled thought. The countenance told of a mind perplexed and questioning. The "cloud no bigger than a man"s hand" had crept up from the horizon of faith, and now darkened her sky; but she would not see the gathering gloom; shut her eyes resolutely to the coming storm. As the cool October wind stirred the leaves at her feet, and the scarlet and gold cloud-flakes faded in the west, she rose and walked slowly homeward. She was too deeply pondering her speculative doubts to notice Dr. Hartwell"s buggy whirling along the street; did not see his head extended, and his cold, searching glance; and of course he believed the blindness intentional and credited it to pique or anger. On reaching home she endeavored by singing a favorite hymn to divert the current of her thoughts, but the shadows were growing tenacious and would not be banished so easily. "If a man die shall he live again?" seemed echoing on the autumn wind. She took up her Bible and read several chapters, which she fancied would uncloud her mind; but in vain. Restlessly she began to pace the floor; the lamplight gleamed on a pale, troubled face. After a time the door opened and Clara came in. She took a seat without speaking, for she had learned to read Beulah"s countenance, and saw at a glance that she was abstracted and in no mood for conversation. When the tea bell rang Beulah stopped suddenly in the middle of the room.
"What is the matter?" asked Clara.
"I feel as if I needed a cup of coffee, that is all. Will you join me?"
"No; and if you take it you will not be able to close your eyes."
"Did you have a pleasant ride?" said Beulah, laying her hand on her companion"s shoulder and looking gravely down into the sweet face, which wore an expression she had never seen there before.
"Oh, I shall never forget it! never!" murmured Clara.
"I am glad you enjoyed it; very glad. I wish the color would come back to your cheeks. Riding is better for you now than walking." She stooped down and pressed her lips to the wan cheek as she spoke.
"Did you walk this evening, after I left you?"
"Yes."
"What makes you look so grave?"
"A great many causes--you among the number."
"What have I done?"
"You are not so strong as I should like to see you. You have a sort of spiritual look that I don"t at all fancy."
"I dare say I shall soon be well again." This was said with an effort, and a sigh quickly followed.
Beulah rang the bell for a cup of coffee, and, taking down a book, drew her chair near the lamp.
"What! studying already?" cried Clara impatiently.
"And why not? Life is short at best, and rarely allows time to master all departments of knowledge. Why should I not seize every spare moment?"
"Oh, Beulah! though you are so much younger, you awe me. I told your guardian to-day that you were studying yourself into a mere shadow.