The Argonauts Part 39

These two brief words kept returning to his mind during every moment of rest, so that hours of noise and movement seemed to him a dream, and only those two words--unceasingly recurrent--the one true reality over which there was reason to be anxious.

Why had he taken on his head and hands this new burden of toil, which was greater than all the others? Why, in general, this climbing a sky-touching ladder with exertion of all his strength of nerve and brain? To what kind of heaven could he climb upon that ladder? New profits, ever-increasing wealth? But he had ceased to desire these! Although that seemed marvellous to the man himself, he had ceased really. Why? Did he own little? He was the possessor of enormously much. He had never been of those who make a golden chariot so as to sit in it with Bacchantes and with Bacchus. But pride? He laughed. Yes, pride, but that was before he had known, intimately, those giants who sit in various corners of the earth. He knows them now; he knows what they can do; and he knows his own power. Why toil? What for? But his worth; that worth which people esteem so immensely that they almost cast themselves at his feet, or do they cast themselves before his golden chariot? For, if that chariot were to shoot away from under him, would he retain the t.i.tle of modern Cid, t.i.tan, superhuman? It was wonderful with what clearness he saw then Maryan, sitting in that chair, and how distinctly he heard his voice inquiring: "What is the object of your toil, father? The object; the object? That decides everything. What was the object?

Of course, not this world's salvation!" He laughed again. What cause was there for long thought here! His object had been to win new profits continually; to gain ever-increasing wealth; and now, since he had ceased to desire these, the question was--what for?

But the genius of that Maryan with his questions! He had gone down so deeply into his father's being that those questions remained there and continued their inquisitorial labor. A beautiful and genial fellow! A young prince; almost a sage. But what does that signify if--he lacks something? What is it that he lacks, and so lacks that he is as if he had nothing? What is it that he lacks?

With a slow movement, in which weariness was evident, Darvid turned his head toward the desk, which was lighted abundantly with tapers burning on lofty candlesticks. What did those candlesticks bring to his mind? Ah, yes, he remembers! On a time he gave one of them, in the inner drawing-room, to Cara, so that the candle burning in it might light the way to her. He remembers how her slender arm bent beneath its weight when her small hand took it, and how beautifully the flame of the candle was reflected in the dark pupils gazing at him with such--with such what? With such exaltation! But how wonderful, how intense was his happiness when that child lived and loved him as she did!

That was his only happiness! Then, holding the light in the heavy candlestick straight on before her rosy face, she went on into the darkness.

Again he looked around, not with a wearied movement as before, but abruptly. He looked around at the door beyond which thick darkness was hiding, impenetrably, a series of drawing-rooms.

This darkness was like a black wall outside the door. Along Darvid's shoulders ran a movement of the skin, the same as a man feels when something heavy from behind is placed upon his shoulders, or rides onto him. That black wall, in which an enchanted row of empty drawing-rooms stood silent, seemed to put itself down on him. But again he looked toward the desk; there, among a mult.i.tude of papers, lay a letter from Maryan, received many days before. Darvid had not destroyed or put away this letter, and not knowing himself the reason why, had left it on the desk there. The letter, in that great study, appeared definitely with its white color on the green of the malachite writing utensils. Moreover, it was not a letter. A number of lines merely. He had written that, wis.h.i.+ng to spare his father and himself a new personal interview; he gives notice, in writing, of his trip to America. But as he is slow to write letters he confines himself to a few words. Since an incomprehensible lack of logic in directing his life had forced him to become a laborer, he desired to choose the field and the manner according to his own individuality. He had turned his personal property into money; this had brought him a considerable sum; he had borrowed another sum; he did not ask pardon for acting thus, since this borrowing was the natural outcome of a position of which he was not the cause, but on the contrary the victim. He makes no reproaches, since he is ever of opinion that all such things as offences and services, crimes and virtues, are soup prepared from the bones of great-grandfathers, and served in painted pots to Arcadians. All this was concluded with a compliment which was smooth, rounded, exquisite as to style, plan, and execution.

Lack of logic. Those three words had fixed themselves in Darvid's memory, and after the words "what for?" appeared in it most frequently. Could they really relate to him? Had he in fact committed an error in logic? Yes, it seemed so. In that case his clear, sober, logical reason had deceived him. He rose, and with his profile toward the door, felt again, rather than saw, a black wall of darkness beyond. Again a s.h.i.+ver ran along the skin of his shoulders, which quivered and bent somewhat. He went to the desk, from which he took another letter, thrown down a moment before, and unread yet. Something in the room was moving; certain little steps ran along the carpet quietly. Puffie had woke; had run to the man, and begun to squirm at his feet.

"Puffie!" said Darvid, and he began to read the letter. It was an invitation from Prince Zeno to a grand farewell ball. The prince and his family were going abroad, and wished to take farewell of their acquaintances in the first rank of them with the "modern Cid." Prince Zeno had often given this t.i.tle to Darvid. But to-day the "modern Cid" read the letter of invitation while his mouth was awry from disgust. It had not the famous smile bristling with pin-points, but simply that disfigurement of the lips which accompanies the swallowing of something which is nauseating and repugnant. He placed before his mind the society in which some time before he had pa.s.sed a few days at the hunting trip. This society would fill the prince's drawing-rooms on that day, and not only did he note in himself an utter absence of desire to be in that society, but a repulsion for it. Not that he cherished hatred toward those people, but they were perfectly indifferent to him. He did not reproach that society; but when he thought of it he was conscious again of a boundless s.p.a.ce and a vacuum, which divided him from those who formed it. He imagined to himself Prince Zeno's drawing-rooms filled with faces, costumes, conversations, card-tables; and, it seemed to him, that it all existed at an immense distance--on the other side of a s.p.a.ce that was infinite and empty--on one edge of this s.p.a.ce was he; on the other were they; between him and them lay a vacuum; no bond between them; not even one as slender as a spider-web.

In the midst of the lofty chamber, above the round table, burned the lamp with a great and calm light; on the desk, in ma.s.sive candlesticks, burned candles. In that abundant light Darvid stood near the desk, with bent shoulders; a number of wrinkles between his brows; his face inclined low toward the paper which he held in his hand. At his feet, on the rug, like a tiny statue, sat the motionless Puffie; with upraised head, and through silken hair, the dog looked into the face of the man. But Darvid did not see the little animal, and did not read the flattering phrases on the paper; he only repeated the words which, on a time, he had heard from his daughter:

"What do you want of so many people, father? Do you love them? Do they love you? What comes of this? Pleasure or profit? What is it all for?"

"I do not love them, little one, and they do not love me. Profit comes to me from this--significance in society."

"But what is significance to you, father? What do you want of significance? Does it give you happiness?"

This time there appeared on his lips the smile full of pinpoints, which was famous in society.

"It has not given it, little one!"

His child had let down on her question his thought to the basis of life, as if on threads. Now he looked around, and his smile was bristling with pin-points of irony, increasing in sharpness.

He thought a long time before he said, aloud:

"What comes of this?"

And afterward, in an inquiring tone, he almost cried:

"An error?"

In the light of this thought that his life with its toils, its conflicts, and its triumphs could be an error, he saw, again, that Medusa-face, pale with terror.

Puffie, perhaps frightened by the cry which had been rent from his master, fell to barking. Darvid turned from the desk, and his glance met the black wall beyond the door.

"Was it an error?" he repeated.

The darkness was silent, and a face without eyes seemed to gaze at him persistently, with attention. He moved forward a few steps quickly, and pressed the bell-k.n.o.b. To the incoming servant he indicated the door, and said:

"Light up the drawing-rooms!"

After a few moments the series of drawing-rooms emerged from the darkness, and stood in the light of blazing lamps and candles.

Globe-lamps, burning at the walls, cast a hazy half-light, in which glittered, here and there, golden gleams, and appeared the features of painted faces and landscapes.

From shady corners emerged, partially, the forms of slender and swelling vases; portions of white garlands on the walls; the delicate mists of dim colors on Gobelin tapestry; the bright scarlet and blue of silk drapery. Farther on, in the small drawing-room, burned, in two chandeliers, a bundle of tapers, beneath which hung a crown of crystals, glittering like icicles, or immense congealed tears. Farther on still, in the dining-room, with its dark walls, gleamed a bright spot in the grand lamp of pendant bronze above the table. This point seemed very distant from Darvid's study; but on the whole expanse which divided him from it there was neither voice nor sound--there was nothing living. Notwithstanding the mult.i.tude of objects scattered, or collected, this was a desert on which silence had imposed itself.

From the threshold of the study to that door, beyond which the largest of the lamps was suspended as a s.h.i.+ning object in its bronze above the table, Darvid moved, stepping with inclined face; at his lips the fire of a lighted cigarette; now, as it were, extinguished; and, now, s.h.i.+ning up again. Behind him, right there near his feet, with the end of its snout almost touching the floor, rolled along little Puffie, like a bundle of raw silk.

After a while, the step of the advancing man grew more hurried and uneven; increasing disquiet was expressed in him; now the light scattering along the unoccupied and silent s.p.a.ce the extent of that s.p.a.ce, and he himself wandering along through it. What did all this signify? Here and there, in the gildings and polished surfaces, quivered flashes like playful gnomes; at other points, on bluish backgrounds, pale faces looked from tapestry thrown over furniture; still, farther, a great mirror reflects two cl.u.s.ters of lights, beneath which hang crystal pendants, and, increasing the perspective, made the s.p.a.ce still greater, and the light more peculiar; in another place, from behind bluish folds depending from a door, appears a vase of Chinese porcelain; and, at that moment, it a.s.sumes, in Darvid's eyes, a strange appearance. Large, covered with blue decorations, it has a form which is swollen in the middle, but slender above, with a long neck, and not altogether visible; it seems to lean forward from behind the curtains, gaze at the pa.s.sing man, follow his steps, and laugh at him. Yes, the Chinese vase is laughing--its body seems to swell more and more from laughter, and in the blue painting the white background has, here and there, a deceptive similarity to grinning teeth. Darvid strives not to look at the vase, and hastens on; behind him Puffie's s.h.a.ggy feet tread the floor more hurriedly, but as he returns, the porcelain monster thrusts out its long neck again from behind the curtain, jeers, bares its teeth, and seems ready to burst from laughter. At the opposite side of that drawing-room, on a blue background, is the pale face of an old man, and from above a gray beard the sad and inquisitive eyes of the patriarch are settled on Darvid.

What does all this mean? Darvid halted in the centre of one of the drawing-rooms, right there behind him the bundle of raw silk halted also, and stood on its s.h.a.ggy paws. What was he doing in those empty drawing-rooms; why had he commanded to light them?

This act seems like madness. He called to mind recent acts of an insane king, who, in a brilliantly lighted edifice, listened alone to the rendering of an opera. Is he also becoming insane?

Why is he not at work? He has so much to do! Darvid advanced quickly, and halted again. The Chinese vase inclined half way from behind the curtain, it seemed bursting from laughter. Work?

What for? The object? The object? That decides everything! He turned his glance from the gnas.h.i.+ng teeth of the Chinese monster, and it met the pale face of the patriarch, whose eyes, looking out at him from the blue background, and from above a gray beard, said with sadness, and inquiringly: "The wrong road!"

He had lost the road! Only the habit of restraining internal impulses, and the expression of them, kept him from crying "Help!" But he had the cry within him, and with a quick and uneven tread he went toward the great lamp burning at the end of the perspective, in the centre of the open s.p.a.ce between the walls of the dining-room. Behind him ran along Puffie, with all the speed of his s.h.a.ggy feet.

Meanwhile, in one of the drawing-rooms, the clock began to strike eleven--one, two, three. Its deep sounds penetrated slowly the empty s.p.a.ce on which silence had imposed itself, until somewhere, at the other end of the perspective, a second clock began to strike, as if answering this one in a thinner voice and more hurriedly. This seemed a voice, an echo, a conversation carried on by things that were inanimate.

Darvid returned to his study, and pressing the k.n.o.b of the bell again, said to his servant:

"Put out the lights!"

He sat in one of the armchairs at the round table, and felt an unspeakable weariness from the crown of his head to his feet.

Some light body sprang to his knee. He placed his hand on the silky coat of the creature nestling up to him, and said:

"Puffie!"

He considered that he must renounce absolutely that colossal affair to obtain which he had struggled so long, because strength, and especially desire for such immense toil, seemed to fail him. He was so tired. But if he abandons toil what will he do; what is he to live for? What is the object of life? The darkness was silent, and as a face without eyes seemed to gaze on him with stubbornness and attention.

A few hours later, in a sleeping-room, furnished by the most skilled of decorators in the capital, a night-lamp, placed on the mantle, cast its light on a bed adorned with rich carving; a hand, white and thin, stretched forth on the silken coverlet, and a face, also thin, with ruddy side-whiskers, itself as if carved out of ivory, and gleaming with a pair of blue, sleepless eyes, which wandered through that s.p.a.cious, half-lighted, chamber with a tortured and heavy expression.

All at once Darvid raised himself in bed, and, with his elbow on the pillow, gazed upward. Higher on the wall was the face of a maiden, small, oval, rosy, with thick, bright hair scattered above her Grecian forehead, and by a movement of her eyes she seemed to summon the man gazing at her. She smiled, with rosy lips, at him, lovingly, and moved her eyelids, inviting him.

Darvid, with raised brows, and with his forehead gathered in a number of great wrinkles; with eyes turned to that picture above him bent forward still more, and, with trembling lips, whispered: "My little one." But immediately after he rubbed his eyes, and smiled. It was a picture by Greuze! There were two of them: one almost invisible in the shade; the other that one emerging from the shade into a half light in such fas.h.i.+on that the head of the maiden seemed to stand out from, the canvas as it were suspended.

"It is like Cara; very like her. The same type--the very same lips, hair, and forehead--"

He knew that that was a painted face; still, with his head on the pillow, he raised his eyes to it frequently, and as often as he raised them he saw a loving smile on the rosy lips and the distinct movement of the eyes which seemed to call and invite him.

He thought that he was ill, unnerved; that he must summon in physicians. Next morning Darvid heard, in the study of a famous doctor, that his nerves were unstrung remarkably; suffering from a blow which had struck him--over-work. He had toiled beyond measure. There was only one cure: complete and long rest. A journey abroad. A change of impressions, after hard and special toil; life in the midst of splendid scenery and works of art.

Meditating afterward on this advice of the doctor, he thought that he had not the slightest wish to follow it. Neither nature nor art attracted him in any way. During his whole life he had not had the time for them, and it was too late now for new studies. Why was he to undertake a journey if not for that purpose? He had travelled much in his lifetime, but always on business, and with a clearly defined object; without business and an object, travelling through the world seemed to him exactly like that walking in the night through his empty, lighted mansion; something akin to madness.

What then? Days pa.s.sed again in toil, amidst consultations and reckonings. The arranging of balances and reports--the round body rolled on by the power of impetus. At appointed hours he received visits. He received also Prince Zeno, who came to take farewell of him for many months, till the following winter.

"We are scattering, all of us," said the prince. "Like birds in autumn we are flying to places where the sun s.h.i.+nes most beautifully. You, too, will go, of course. Whither? To the South or the East? Perhaps to that estate where your wife and daughter are pa.s.sing the sad time of family mourning? But apropos of the country. You know that poor Kranitski; well, he came to take farewell of me. He has left the city; left it never to come back again. He has gone to the country. He is to remain on his estate--a small one, not over-pleasantly situated. I was there once on a visit to his mother, with whom I was connected by blood-bonds. A tiresome little hole, that place! But what is to be done? This handsome and once charming man has grown dreadfully old; the conditions of his life were difficult--so he has gone.

Your son is making a long journey. Is he in the United States already? Baron Blauendorf is going there also; only yesterday he bade good-by to us. We scatter through the world; but, till we meet again? For I should be in despair were I to lose an acquaintance so precious and dear to me as yours is."

Ah, how indifferent it was to Darvid whether he should keep or lose acquaintance with Prince Zeno. He saw and recognized in the man many fine and agreeable qualities, but he would rather not see him, just as he would rather not see others. All seemed strange to him and distant. Conversation, even with the most agreeable and worthy, both wearied and annoyed him. "What do you want of so many people, father? Do you love them? Do they love you?"

One thought now devoured him. That "poor Kranitski" had left the city to live on his estate permanently, or rather in his poor village, situated in that same district as Krynichna, not very near, but in the same region. Of course, he will be a frequent guest at Krynichna--but, maybe not; even, surely not. Indeed, she had broken with him, and, in truth, she felt immense shame and pain--he laughed. A penitent Magdalen! He finished with the thought: Unhappy woman!

But what more had he to do that day? Ah! he had an appointment to meet that young sculptor at the cemetery toward evening, and agree on a monument for Cara. That was to be a monument of great cost and beauty--a mountain of gold above the "little one."