Psyche Part 22

Then Psyche's voice sounded clearly, silver-clearly, from the consciousness of the wisdom and sacred knowledge which she possessed.

"Emeralda, for you I have gone through h.e.l.l along the black seas, oceans of pitch, along the horrible sloughs of flaming hurricanes, along the craters and caverns scarlet and yellow, along the azure fires and through the white and lilac glow. Give heed to what I say. h.e.l.l answered 'Vanity!' when I asked for the Jewel; the leviathans roared 'Vanity!'; the chimeras hissed 'Vanity!'; the spirits cried 'Vanity!'; and the whole plaintive viol trilled:

"'Vanity!'

"Do you understand me, Emeralda? Your wish was Vanity, for the mystic Jewel that bestows G.o.dlike power is Vanity, and.... Does not Exist."

Then it was terrible. The queen, a living idol, burned with rage, blazed with rage; her heart was inflamed with rage.

Around her, decked out for sacrifice, in festive garb, in the suns.h.i.+ne and her own dazzling splendour, her people trembled with fear. And cruelty gleamed in her fixed face; her emerald eyes started so revengefully from their sockets as though blinded by their own splendour, and she pulled at the numerous reins....

The horses reared, the white roses fell down, the people screamed with joy and the fear of death, and the triumphal chariot rattled on.

Swift as an arrow it thundered on over the people, who paved the way in ecstacy, and Psyche saw the maddened horses approaching, snorting, foaming, panting, trampling, pulling, their eyes round and mad....

For a moment she stood firm, proud, tall, pearl-white in the sacred knowledge she possessed; then the angry hoofs struck her down, and the horses trampled her as a flower. Emeralda's chariot rattled over her, with its many cutting wheels, and whilst she died like a crushed lily, trampled in her own lily-whiteness, she thought of her old father, and how she had crept to his breast and hidden her face in his beard, before she went to sleep at night....

She died.... But while she lay trampled to death in the mud of human flesh and blood, and the sacrificial roses kept falling down over her corpse unrecognisable----

She returned to life, hovering through the air, and felt so light and unenc.u.mbered, and was whiter than ever and naked.

And on her tender shoulders she felt two new wings quivering...!

She hovered over her own body into a drifting cloud, a mist of fragrance, which farther on she lost sight of; and light, white, and rarefied, she looked wonderingly at her trampled body and laughed. Strange, clear, and childlike sounded her laugh in the cloud and vapoury fragrance....

CHAPTER XXVI

The triumphal chariot rattled on madly. Emeralda stretched out her sceptre, on the top of which glowed a star of destroying rays. When she stretched out the sceptre and directed the rays, she scorched monuments, palaces, and parks to a white ash, and, for her cruel jubilant procession, she cut down everything that came in her way. The thick white ashes flew up like dust; the jubilant mult.i.tude were scorched; the palaces of jaspar and malachite shrivelled up like burnt paper; the breath of the horses blew away, like ash, the white burnt gardens. And right over everything went Emeralda, scorching as she went. Powerful, foolish, arrogant, and proud she was, and more unfeeling than ever, spiteful and cruel, hurt in her pride; and she scorched, and made the way smooth before her. Behind her lay all the town, and she drove through her kingdom, filling the air with her rays. She drove through valleys and burnt up the harvest; she reduced villages to dust; she dried up rivers; and before her, the mountains split asunder.

Her sceptre made a way for her, and no law of nature resisted her power. The air was grey with the clouds of ash, which rained down upon the earth.

She went along as swiftly as an arrow, swiftly as lightning, swiftly as light, swiftly as thought. She went so swiftly, that in a single hour she had gone all round her wide kingdom intoxicated with the pride of annihilation, and she drove her maddened horses through endless plains of sand.

Desert after desert she consumed; the lions fled before her; she overtook them in a moment; clouds of sand she sent up into the air....

But then she relaxed her speed. She stopped.

Before her, grey and high through the clouds of sand and falling ash, there loomed a most dreadful shadow.

The shadow was like a gigantic beast, squatting in the sand, with a woman's head in a stiff basalt veil. The woman's head had a woman's breast, two basalt b.r.e.a.s.t.s of a gigantic woman. But the body that squatted in the sand was a lion, and the paws stuck out like walls. And so great was the shadow, so monstrous the beast, that even the triumphal chariot of Emeralda appeared small.

"Sphinx!" said Emeralda, "I will know. I am powerful, but there is power above me. There are spheres above mine, and there are G.o.ds above my divinity. There are laws of nature which my sceptre cannot alter. Sphinx, tell me the riddle. Reveal to me the place where the Jewel lies hidden, which gives almighty power over the world and G.o.d, so that I may find it and become the mightiest of all G.o.ds. Sphinx, answer me, I say! Open your stony lips and let your voice once more be heard, that shall make the world tremble with wonder. For centuries you have not spoken. Sphinx, speak now! For if you do not speak, Sphinx, and reveal to me where the Jewel lies hidden, then, great and terrible as you are, I will scorch you to a white ash and go over you in triumph. Sphinx, speak!"

The Sphinx was silent. The Sphinx looked with stony eyes at the clouds of sand and raining ash. Her basalt lips remained shut.

"Sphinx, speak!!" said Emeralda, threateningly and red with rage.

The Sphinx spoke not and looked.

Emeralda stretched out her sceptre and directed the destroying rays.

The rays split on the basalt with crackling sparks like flashes of forked lightning. Emeralda uttered a cry, hoa.r.s.e and terrible. She threw away her broken sceptre. But of her greater power she did not doubt, and for the last time she threatened.

"Terrible Sphinx, tremble! I am more terrible than you!! Speak, Sphinx!!"

The Sphinx was silent.

Then Emeralda tugged at the reins.

The maddened horses reared, snorting, foaming, panting, trampling, pulling, and dashed against the Sphinx.

But the foremost horses were dashed to pieces against the G.o.d-like basalt.

Then Emeralda uttered cry after cry, one hoa.r.s.e cry after another, which resounded through the desert. She tugged at the reins; the horses, despairing of their attack against the immovable, drove at the Sphinx, and fell back crushed, falling over one another and trampling one another to death; the triumphal chariot split, and the splinters of sparkling jewels flew up like cracking fireworks, and Emeralda fell between the still revolving wheels. And her heart of ruby broke. All her dazzling splendour suddenly faded. The terrifying fan-like aureola suddenly grew dim, and the desert was grey and gloomy, with a gentle rain of thick white ash falling down.

The Sphinx was silent, and looked on....

CHAPTER XXVII

Psyche was alive again, soaring through the air, and felt so light and ethereal; pearl-whiter she was than ever, and naked.

And on her tender shoulders she felt two new wings fluttering...!

She hovered away over her own dead body into a drifting cloud, a fragrant mist, which farther on she lost sight of; and light, white, and ethereal, she looked with wonder at her trampled corpse and laughed....

Strange, clear, and childlike sounded her laugh in the cloud and vapoury fragrance....

"Psyche!"

She heard her name, but so dazzled and astonished was she, that she did not see. Then the wind blew about her; the cloud moved, the fragrance ascended like incense, and she saw many like herself, restored to life, hovering in the fragrant cloud, and round her she distinguished the outlines of well-known faces.

"Psyche!"

She recognised the voice, deep bronze, but yet strange. And the wind blew about her and she saw a bright light before her, and recognised the Chimera!