"All?" I said.
She tossed lightly a little dust from her hand.
"Nay--all," she replied; "but what is that to me? Mine only to see Charon on the wave pa.s.s light over and return. Man of the green world, prithee die not yet awhile! "Tis dull being a shade. See these cold palms! Yet my heart beats on."
"For what?" I said.
Criseyde folded her hands and leaned her cheek sidelong upon the stone.
"For what?" I repeated.
"For what but idle questions?" she said; "for a traveller"s vanity that deems looking love-boys into a woman"s eyes her sweeter entertainment than all the heroes of Troy. Oh, for a house of nought to be at peace in! Oh, gooseish swan! Oh, brittle vows! Tell me, Voyager, is it not so?--that men are merely angry boys with beards; and women--repeat not, ye who know! Never yet set I these steadfast eyes on a man that would not steal the moon for taper--would she but come down." She turned an arch face to me: "And what is to be faithful?"
"I?" said I--""to be faithful?""
"It is," she said, "to rise and never set, O sun of utter weariness!
It is to kindle and never be quenched, O fretting fire of midsummer!
It is to be snared and always sing, O shrilling bird of dulness! It is to come, not go; smile, not sigh; wake, never sleep. Couldst _thou_ love so many nots to a silk string?"
"What, then, is to change,... to be fickle?" I said.
"Ah! to be fickle," she said, "is showers after drought, seas after sand; to cry, unechoed; to be thirsty, the pitcher broken. And--ask now this pitiless darkness of the eyes!--to be remembered though Lethe flows between. Nay, you shall watch even hope away ere another comes like me to mope and sigh, and play at swords with Memory."
She rose to her feet and drew her hands across her face, and smiling, sighed deeply. And I saw how inscrutable and lovely she must ever seem to eyes scornful of mean men"s idolatries.
"And you will embark again," she said softly; "and in how small a ship on seas so mighty! And whither next will fate entice you, to what new sorrows?"
"Who knows?" I said. "And to what further peace?"
She laughed lightly. "Speak not of mockeries," she said, and fell silent.
She seemed to be thinking quickly and deeply; for even though I did not turn to her, I could see in imagination the restless sparkling of her eyes, the stillness of her ringless hands. Then suddenly she turned.
"Stranger," she said, drawing her finger softly along the cold stone of the bench, "there yet remain a few bright hours to morning. Who knows, seeing that felicity is with the bold, did I cast off into the sea--who knows whereto I"d come! "Tis but a little way to being happy--a touch of the hand, a lifting of the brows, a shuddering silence. Had I but man"s courage! Yet this is a solitary place, and the G.o.ds are revengeful."
I cannot say how artlessly ran that voice in this still garden, by some strange power persuading me on, turning all doubt aside, calming all suspicion.
"There is honeycomb here, and the fruit is plenteous. Yes," she said, "and all travellers are violent men--catch and kill meat--that I know, however doleful. "Tis but a little sigh from day to day in these cool gardens; and rest is welcome when the heart pines not. Listen, now; I will go down and you shall show me--did one have the wit to learn, and courage to remember--show me how sails your wonderful little ship; tell me, too, where on the sea"s horizon to one in exile earth lies, with all its pleasant things--yet thinks so bitterly of a woman!"
"Tell me," I said; "tell me but one thing of a thousand. Whom would _you_ seek, did a traveller direct you, and a boat were at your need?"
She looked at me, pondering, weaving her webs about me, lulling doubt, and banishing fear.
"One could not miss--a hero!" she said, flaming.
"That, then, shall be our bargain," I replied with wrath at my own folly. "Tell me this precious hero"s name, and though all the dogs of the underworld come to course me, you shall take my boat, and leave me here--only this hero"s name, a pedlar"s bargain!"
She lowered her lids. "It must be Diomed," she said with the least sigh.
"It must be," I said.
"Nay, then, Antenor, or truly Thersites," she said happily, "the silver-tongued!"
"Good-bye, then," I said.
"Good-bye," she replied very gently. "Why, how could there be a vow between us? I go, and return. You await me--me, Criseyde, Traveller, the lonely-hearted. That is the little all, O much-surrendering Stranger! Would that long-ago were now--before all chaffering!"
Again a thousand questions rose to my tongue. She looked sidelong at the dry fountain, and one and all fell silent.
"It is harsh, endless labour beneath the burning sun; storms and whirlwinds go about the sea, and the deep heaves with monsters."
"Oh, sweet danger!" she said, mocking me.
I turned from her without a word, like an angry child, and made my way to the steps into the sea, pulled round my boat into a little haven beside them, and shewed her oars and tackle and tiller; all the toil, and peril, the wild chances."
"Why," she cried, while I was yet full of the theme, "I will go then at once, and to-morrow Troy will come."
I looked long at her in silence; her slim beauty, the answerless riddle of her eyes, the age-long subtilty of her mouth, and gave no more thought to all life else.
Day was already waning. I filled the water-keg with fresh water, put fruit and honeycomb and a pillow of leaves into the boat, proffered a trembling hand, and led her down.
The sun"s beams slanted on the foamless sea, glowed in a flame of crimson on marble and rock and cypress. The birds sang endlessly on of evening, endlessly, too, it seemed to me, of dangers my heart had no surmise of.
Criseyde turned from the dark green waves. "Truly, it is a solitary country; pathless," she said, "to one unpiloted;" and stood listening to the hollow voices of the water. And suddenly, as if at the consummation of her thoughts, she lifted her eyes on me, darkly, with unimaginable entreaty.
"What do you seek else?" I cried in a voice I scarcely recognised.
"Oh, you speak in riddles!"
I sprang into the boat and seized the heavy oars. Something like laughter, or, as it were, the clapper of a scarer of birds, echoed among the rocks at the rattling of the rowlocks. As if invisible hands withdrew it from me, the island floated back.
I turned my prow towards the last splendour of the sun. A chill breeze played over the sea: a shadow crossed my eyes.
Buoyant was my boat; how light her cargo!--an oozing honeycomb, ashy fruits, a few branches of drooping leaves, closing flowers; and solitary on the thwart the wraith of life"s unquiet dream.
So fell night once more, and made all dim. And only the cold light of the firmament lit thoughts in me restless as the sea on which I tossed, whose moon was dark, yet walked in heaven beneath the distant stars.