The Wings of Icarus Part 8

LETTER XXIII.

GRAYSMILL, January 1st.

My pretty sweet, I have had much happiness to-day. First of all, a letter from you at breakfast, and one from Gabriel, then, suns.h.i.+ne all the morning, and all the morning a song in my heart; to-day I shall see him!

I set off immediately after early dinner, and walked across the Common to the Thatched Cottage. I cannot tell you what it was to me to catch sight of the chimney and the purling smoke again; I had to stand still and wait a while, my heart thumped so. (A fool, eh?) I crept noiselessly into the house, and through the hall, then stealthily opened the study door. There he sat on the ground by the fire, with his back to me, reading, of course.

"What a careless person!" said I, softly; "he'll blind himself one of these days."

Up he jumped.

"Emilia!" he cried, "dear Emilia!" and, catching me by both wrists, swung my arms up and down and to and fro.

"You faithless thing," said he, "you false friend, I hate you!"

Here Richard Norton ran in from the kitchen, with the teapot in his hand, followed by Jane; they both covered me with welcomes and reproaches. I was very happy, I a.s.sure you. We went into the kitchen and had early tea, talking all the while and all together. Gabriel was in one of his impish moods, and made me laugh till I cried. The first thing I thought, when I had time to think, was that I had been a fool to keep away so long and allow myself to grow sentimental; that it was altogether much more healthful for me to be in his dear company.

I came home in a much better frame of mind, although Gabriel insisted on walking nearly as far as Graysmill with me, and said as we parted:

"You must never again leave me for so long, Emilia; I am lost without you, I am, indeed."

I turned from him, half wis.h.i.+ng he had not said this, feeling a little giddy, a little less strong; but, as I ran along, something hit me on the shoulder. I looked behind me, and there he stood, like an imp of mischief, pelting me with pine-cones, which it seems he had collected in his pocket for that purpose. So I had to laugh, and was cured again.

The year has at least begun well.

Adieu, my sweetest. Things are often not so bad as we imagine. With this truism I take my leave of you.

Your EMILIA.

I think I forgot to send a New Year's wish to Mrs. Rayner. For you, my love, again all the good that this world holds. May it rain upon you in ceaseless showers!

LETTER XXIV.

GRAYSMILL, January 15th.

I have grown unutterably selfish. I only remembered this morning that you had asked me to send you those books. To think that a day should have come when I could forget to do something you had asked me! I have seen to it, with much penitence. Forgive me!

Your Emilia is a miserable specimen; she despises herself very much.

I go up and down all day like something that has lost its balance, neither have I any. One hour I am absolutely happy; the next I am biting the dust. One day I say to myself, I will never walk or talk or read or sit alone with him again,--and perhaps for that one day I keep my word. But then, the next, I do all I meant not to do, I pine for it till I bring it about. And when I have sat beside him a little while, doing my lessons, the Greek loses its hold of my poor brain, my head swims, I make a blunder; then he laughs and says he cannot understand how such an apparently clever woman can have such a sieve for a brain. I laugh, and tell him he's unmannerly. Then we both laugh, and I am well until I am ill again.

It is only since I knew Gabriel that I know how to laugh. I don't mean to say that I never laughed before. Do you remember how we sometimes screamed up in my room at Florence? I remember, too, as a child, going into wild fits of laughter, and mamma and I having to wipe each other's eyes. But these days were few and far between. I have learned to laugh with my years. Very fine wit is lost upon me, and I have certainly no native humour of my own; but I do know how to laugh about nothing at all, how to make merry over the thorns of life! Laughter was not meant for the joyful; it was made for us, the sombre of soul, to save our heart-strings here and there; like the song of a lark in the sky, to bid us lift our eyes from the dust of the road.

Sometimes, when I have been laughing very much, and then remember my pain, I see the vision of a child that dances on a grave-mound in the sun.

Sweet, I'll go on to-morrow.

January 20th.

I distinguished myself to-day! It came on to pour while I was at the Cottage, and, in spite of a certain caution that has crept into my actions of late, I stayed there the whole afternoon.

Jane was actually making herself a new dress, so I offered to help her, and we sewed by lamplight at the kitchen table, it being a very dark afternoon. Gabriel joined us after a while; he thought we looked so cosy that he brought his books and sat at the table too, just opposite me.

You have never really loved any man, you, so perhaps you don't know what it is to be afraid of your own eyes, because you feel that every time they rest on that thing you love, your poor heart runs and looks out of window.

I seldom look at Gabriel now,--I dare not. But there he sat opposite me, poring over his book. Jane was bent over her sewing. I forgot her, and I forgot my work too; it slipped from my fingers and fell into my lap. Suddenly he raised his head,--it seemed as if all the blood in my body rushed to my face; he had caught me all unguarded; what he might not know was laid bare before him. With a dull, wide gaze he stared at me, then bent over his book again; he had not seen me; he had merely looked up to get a better view, as it were, of something he had in mind.

Then I, too, bent my head low, for hot tears stood in my silly eyes, and, to my surprise, I felt a soft hand tuck my hair behind my ears, caressingly. I looked up and saw a world of pity in Jane Norton's face. When presently Gabriel left the room to fetch another volume, I said:

"Jane, he must never know it."

"My child," she answered, speaking as softly as I had done, "there is no fear that he should learn it from _me_."

"From me, then?" asked I; "is it so plain?"

"You are as pale as the table," she said. "Take care of yourself, Em,--don't be unhappy, all's well."

Just then Gabriel came in, and I left soon after. You see what an enemy I am to myself.

Good night, dearest; I am your EMILIA.

LETTER XXV.

GRAYSMILL, January 29th.

It is so easy to imagine the bright side of things when one is too far away to see the truth. Silly Constance, cruel Constance, what is the use of sending me such words of false hope? It does not follow, because you love me best of all the world, that another should do likewise. No, no; you know nothing at all about it, and yet in spite of all reason, I catch at every straw you send drifting towards me.

Once and for all, of course he loves me, but it stands just so. He loves me too well in one way to love me in another. If he loved me less, he might love me more. I have said all this to Jane. She declares that the only reason why he is not in love with me is that an obstacle stands in the way which has stood in the way all along, and which he has never dreamed of surmounting. She means my accursed money. I told her she was completely mistaken; that love, inevitable love, knows nothing of obstacles; besides, this could not be an obstacle between him and me,--he is too unworldly to be the slave of such prejudice. If I thought she was right, who knows but what I should send my money spinning into the lap of Charity, and let that lady dispense it as indiscriminately and wastefully as she pleases.

No, no; the fault lies in another direction. There has been a little mistake somewhere; I am not the lost half of his soul, for all that he is mine.

Little Constance, I think now that perhaps you were right when you said that I was not altogether a woman. I am certainly not made as a woman should be. A woman may return love, but she must never dare to give it. I have been guilty of this folly, and now, what is to become of me?

We are such fools, we women. When a man loves, he is all that he was, plus love; when we love, we throw ourselves headlong into the flood, and are nothing that we were.

So now you know all about it, and can prepare yourself for a gay companion. I have made up my mind to leave England, and join you in Vienna. No, it must be Italy; you must leave Vienna and come towards me.

You cannot see that between the last sentence and this there is a pause of ten minutes. It is all very well for me to talk of leaving Graysmill; I do talk of it, the words are words, but I don't understand them. I cannot leave; I ought to,--yet, Constance, I cannot leave him!

Write, you, and tell me where we shall meet; not in Florence, I could not bear that. And yet, perhaps, yes, in Florence. It will have to be, and I shall not realise that I have left him until I am with you again. There is comfort in that thought. One can do anything, after all, with a little determination, can't one, Constantia? Not that you can judge, you who never had any. Perhaps I have none myself, who knows? I have so deceived myself in loving Gabriel, and laid bare such great and unknown weakness in my own bosom, that all the world is upside down for me, and I can find my way no longer.

Write and tell me soon where we shall meet.