Collected Works of Algernon Blackwood

by Algernon Blackwood

  Another time they sat by night in ruined Karnak, watching the silver moonlight bring out another world among the mighty pylons. It painted the empty and enormous aisles with crowding processions of lost ages. Speaking in whispers, they saw the stars peep down between the soaring forest of old stone; the cold desert wind brought with it a sadness, a mournful retrospect too vast to realise, the tragedy that such splendour left but a lifeless skeleton behind, a gigantic, soulless ruin. That such great prophecies remained unfulfilled was somewhere both terrible and melancholy. The immortal strength of these Egyptian stones conveyed a grandeur almost sinister. The huge dumb beauty seemed menacing, even ominous; they sat closer; they felt dwarfed uncomfortably, their selves reduced to insignificance, almost threatened. Even Tony sobered as they talked in lowered voices, seated in the shadow of the towering columns, their feet resting on the sand.

  ‘I’m sure we’ve sat here before just like this, the three of us,’ he said in a lowered voice; ‘it all seems like a dream to me.’

  Madame Jaretzka, who was between them, made no answer, and Tom, leaning forward, caught his cousin’s eye beyond her.… The scene in the London theatre flashed across his mind. He felt very happy, very close to them both, extraordinarily at one with them, the woman he loved best in all the world, the man who was his greatest friend. He felt truth, not foolishness, in Tony’s otherwise commonplace remarks that followed: ‘I could swear I’d known you both before — here in Egypt.’

  Madame Jaretzka moved a little, shuffling farther back so that she could lean against the great curved pillar. It brought them closer together still. She said no word, however.

  ‘There’s certainly a curious sympathy between the three of us,’ murmured Tom, who usually felt out of his depth in similar talks, leaving his companions to carry it further while he listened merely. ‘It’s hard to believe that we meet for the first time now.’

  He sat close to her, fingering her gauzy veil that brushed his face. There was a pause, and then Madame Jaretzka said, turning to Tony: ‘We met here first anyhow, didn’t we? Two winters ago, before I met Tom — —’

  But Tony said he meant something far older than that, much longer ago. ‘You and Tom knew each other as children, you told me once. Tom and I were boys together too… but…’

  His voice died away in Tom’s ears; her answers also were inaudible as she kept her head turned towards Tony: his thoughts, besides, were caught away a moment to the days in Montreux and in London.… He fell into a reverie that lasted possibly a minute, possibly several minutes. The conversation between them left him somehow out of it; he had little to contribute; they had an understanding, as it were, on certain subjects that neglected him. His mind accordingly left them. He followed his own thoughts dreamily… far away … past the deep black shadows and out into the soft blaze of moonlight that showered upon the distant Theban hills.… He remembered the curious emotions that had marked his entry into Egypt. He thought of a change in Lettice, at present still undefined. He wondered what it was about her now that lent to her gentle spirit a touch of authority, of worldly authority almost, that he dared not fail to recognise — as though she had the right to it. The flavour of uneasiness stole back. It occurred to him suddenly that he felt no longer quite at home with her alone as of old. Some one watched him: some one watched them both.…

  It was as though for the first time he realised distance — a new distance creeping in upon their relationship somewhere.…

  A slight shiver brought him back. The wind came moaning down the monstrous, yawning aisles against them. The overpowering effect of so much grandeur had become intolerable. ‘Ugh! I’m cold,’ he exclaimed abruptly. ‘I vote we move a bit. I think — I’ll move anyhow.’

  Madame Jaretzka turned to him with a definite start; she straightened herself against the huge sandstone column. The moonlight touched her; it clothed her in gold and silver, the gold of the sand, the silver of the moon. She looked ethereal, ghostly, a figure of air and distance. She seemed to belong to her surroundings — another person somehow — faintly Egyptian almost.

  ‘I thought you were asleep, Tom,’ she said softly. She had been in the middle of an animated, though whispered, talk with Tony. She peered at him with a little smile that lifted her lip oddly.

  ‘I was far away somewhere,’ he returned, peering at her closely. ‘I forgot all about you both. I thought, for a moment, I was quite — alone.’

  He saw her start again. A significance he hardly intended had crept into his tone. Her face moved back into the shadow quickly beside Tony.

  She teased Tom for his want of manners, then fell to caring for his comfort. ‘It’s icy,’ she said, ‘and you’re in flannels. The sudden chill of these Egyptian nights is really treacherous,’ and she took the rug from her lap and put it round his shoulders. As she did so, the strange appearance he had noted increased about her.

  And Tom got up abruptly. ‘No, Lettice dear, thank you; I think I’ll move a bit.’ He had said ‘Lettice dear’ without realising it, and before his cousin too. ‘I’ll take a turn and then come back for you. You stay here with Tony,’ and he moved off somewhat briskly.

  Then, instantly, the other two rose up like one person, following him to where the carriage waited.…

  ‘They’re frightening rather, don’t you think — these ancient places?’ she said presently, as they drove along past palms and the flat-topped houses of the felaheen. ‘There’s something watching and listening all the time.’

  Tom made no answer. He felt suddenly unsure of something — almost unsure of himself, it seemed.

  ‘One feels a bit lost,’ he said slowly after a bit, ‘and lonely. It’s the size, I think.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ she rejoined, peering at him with half-lowered eyelids, ‘and the silence.’ She broke off, then added, ‘You can hear your thoughts too clearly.’

  Tom was sitting back amid a bundle of rugs she had wrapped him in; Tony, beside her, on the front seat, seemed in a gentle doze. They drove the rest of the way in silence, dropping Tony first at the Savoy, then going on to Tom’s hotel. She insisted, although her own house was in the opposite direction. ‘And you’re to take a hot whisky when you get into bed, remember, and don’t get up to-morrow if you feel a chill.’ She gave him orders for his health and comfort as though he were her son. Tom noticed it, told her she was divinely precious to him, and promised faithfully to obey.

  ‘What do you think about Tony?’ he asked suddenly, when they had driven alone for several minutes. ‘I mean, what impression does he make on you? How do you feel him?’

  ‘He’s enjoying himself immensely with his numerous friends,’ she replied at once. ‘He grows on one rather. He’s a dear, I think.’ She looked at him, then turned away again. ‘Don’t you, Tom?’

  ‘Oh, rather. I’ve always thought so. I told you first long ago, didn’t I?’ He made no reference to the exaggeration about the friends. ‘And I think it’s wonderful how well we — what a perfect trio we are.’

  ‘Yes, isn’t it?’

  They both became thoughtful then. There fell a pause between them, when Tom broke in abruptly once again:

  ‘But — what do you feel? Because I think he’s half in love with you, if you want to know.’ He leaned over and whispered in her ear. The words tumbled out as though they were in a hurry. ‘It pleases me immensely, Lettice; it makes me feel so proud of you and happy. It’ll do him a world of good, too, if he loves a woman like you. You’ll teach him something.’ She smiled shyly and said, ‘I wonder, Tom. Do you really think so? He certainly seems fond of me, but I hadn’t thought quite that. You think everybody must fall in love with me.’ She pushed him away with a gentle yet impatient pressure of her arm, indicating the Arab coachman with a nod of her head. ‘Take care of him, Lettice: he’s a dear fellow; don’t let him break his heart.’

  Tom began to flirt outrageously; his arm crept round her, he leaned over and stole a kiss — and to his amazement she did not try to stop him. She
did not seem to notice it. She sat very still — a stone statue in the moonlight.

  Then, suddenly, he realised that she had not replied to his question. He promptly repeated it therefore. ‘You put me off with what he feels, but I want to know what you feel,’ he said with emphasis.

  ‘But, Tom, I’m not putting you off, as you call it — with anything,’ and there was a touch of annoyance in her tone and manner.

  ‘Tell me, Lettice; it interests me. You’re such a puzzle, d’you know, out here.’ His tone unconsciously grew more earnest as he spoke.

  Madame Jaretzka broke into a little laugh. ‘You boy!’ she exclaimed teasingly, ‘you’re trying to heighten his value so as to increase your own by contrast. The more people you can find in love with me, the more you’ll be able to flatter yourself.’

  Tom laughed with her, though he did not quite understand. He had never heard her say such a thing before. He accepted the cleverness she gave him credit for, however. ‘Of course, and why shouldn’t I?’ And he was just going to put his original question in another form — had already begun it, in fact — when she interrupted him, putting her hand playfully over his mouth for a second: ‘I do think Tony’s a happy entertaining sort of man,’ she told him, ‘even fascinating in a certain kind of way. He’s very stimulating to me. And I feel — don’t you, Tom?’ — a slight change — was it softness? — crept into her tone— ‘a sort of beauty in him somewhere?’

  ‘Yes, p’raps I do,’ he assented briefly; ‘but, I say, Lettice darling, you mischievous Egyptian princess.’

  ‘Be quiet, Tom, and take your arm away. Here’s the hotel in sight.’ And yet, somehow, he fancied that she preferred his action to the talk.

  ‘Tell me this first,’ he went on, obeying her peremptory tone: ‘do you think it’s true that we three have been together before like that — as Tony said, I mean? It’s a funny thing, but I swear it sounded true when he said it.’ His tone was earnest again. ‘It gave me the creeps a bit, and, d’you know, you looked so queer, so wonderful in the moonlight — you looked un-English, foreign — like one of those Egyptian figures come to life. That’s what made me cold, I think.’ His laughter died away. He was grave suddenly. He sighed a little and moved closer to her. ‘That’s — what made me get up and leave you,’ he added abruptly.

  ‘Oh, he’s always saying that kind of thing,’ she answered quickly, moving the rugs for him to get out as the carriage slowed up before the brilliantly lit hotel. She made no reference to his other words. ‘There’s a lot of poetry in Tony too — out here.’

  ‘Said it before, has he?’ exclaimed Tom with genuine astonishment. ‘All three of us or — or just you and him? Am I in the business too?’ He was now bubbling over with laughter again for some reason; it all seemed comical, almost. Yet it was a sudden, an emotional laughter. His emotion — his excitement surprised him even at the time.

  ‘All three of us — I think,’ she said, as he held her hand a moment, saying good-bye. ‘Yes, all three of us, of course. Now good-night, you inquisitive and impertinent boy, and if you have to stay in bed to-morrow we’ll come over and nurse you all day long.’ He answered that he would certainly stay in bed in that case — and watched her waving her hand over the back of the carriage as she drove away into the moonlight like a fading dream of stars and mystery and beauty. Then he took his telegrams and letters from the Arab porter with the face of expressionless bronze, and went up to bed.

  ‘What a strange and wonderful woman!’ he thought as the lift rushed him up: ‘out here she seems another being, and a thousand times more fascinating.’ He felt almost that he would like to win her all over again from the beginning. ‘She’s different to what she was in England. Tony’s different too. And so am I, I do believe!’ he exclaimed in his bedroom, looking at his sunburned face in the glass a moment. ‘We’re all different!’ He felt singularly happy, hilarious, stimulated — a deep and curious excitement was in him. Above all there was high pride that she belonged to him so absolutely. But the analysis he had indulged in England vanished here. He forgot it all.… He was in Egypt with her… now.

  He read his letters and telegrams, only half realising at first that they called him back to Assouan. ‘What a bore,’ he thought; ‘I simply shan’t go. A week’s delay won’t matter. I can telephone.’

  He laid them down upon the table beside him and walked out on to his balcony. Responsibility seemed less in him. He felt a little reckless. His position was quite secure. He was his own master. He meant to enjoy himself.… But another, deeper voice was sounding in him too. He heard it, but at first refused to recognise it. It whispered. One word it whispered: ‘Stay…!’

  There was no sleep in him; with an overcoat thrown across his shoulders he watched the calm Egyptian night, the soft army of the stars, the river gleaming in a broad band of silver. Hitherto Lettice had monopolised his energies; he had neglected Egypt, whose indecipherable meaning now came floating in upon him with a strange insistence. Lettice came with it too. The two beauties were indistinguishable.…

  A flock of boats lay motionless, their black masts hanging in mid-air; all was still and silent, no voices, no footsteps, no movements anywhere. In the distance the desolate rocky hills rolled like a solid wave along the horizon. Gaunt and mysterious, they loomed upon the night. They were pierced by myriad tombs, those solemn hills; the stately dead lay there in hundreds — he imagined them looking forth a moment like himself across the peace and silence of the moonlit desert. They focussed upon Thebes, upon the white hotel, upon a modern world they could not recognise — upon his very windows. It seemed to him for a moment that their ancient eyes met his own across the sand, across the silvery river, and, as they met, a shadowy gleam of recognition passed between them and himself. At the same time he also saw the eyes he loved. They gazed through half-closed eyelids… the Eastern eyes of his early boyhood’s dream. He remembered again the strange emotion of the day he first arrived in Egypt, weeks ago.…

  And then he suddenly thought of Tony, and of Tony’s careless remark as they sat in ruined Karnak together: ‘I feel as if we three had all been here before.’

  Why it returned to him just now he did not know: for some reason unexplained the phrase revived in him. Perhaps he felt an instinctive sympathy towards the poet’s idea that he and she were lovers of such long standing, of such ancient lineage. It flattered his pride, while at the same time it disturbed him. A sense of vague disquiet grew stronger in him. In any case, he did not dismiss it and forget — his natural way of treating fancies. ‘Perhaps,’ he murmured, ‘the bodies she and I once occupied lie there now — lie under the very stars their eyes — our own — once looked upon.’

  It was strange the fancy took such root in him.… He stood a long time gazing at the vast, lonely necropolis among the mountains. There was an extraordinary stillness over that western bank, where the dead lay in their ancient tombs. The silence was eloquent, but the whole sky whispered to his soul. And again he felt that Egypt welcomed him; he was curiously at home here. It moved the deeps in him, brought him out; it changed him; it brought out Lettice too — brought out a certain power in her. She was more of a woman here, a woman of the world. She was more wilful, and more human. Values had subtly altered. Tony himself was altered.… Egypt affected them all three.…

  The vague uneasiness persisted. His mood changed a little, the excitement gradually subsided; thought shifted to a minor key, subdued by the beauty of the southern night. The world lay in a mysterious glow, the hush was exquisite. Yet there was expectancy: that glow, that hush were ready to burst into flame and language. They covered secrets. Something was watching him. He was dimly aware of a thousand old forgotten things.…

  He no longer thought, but felt. The calm, the peace, the silence laid soothing fingers against the running of his blood; the turbulent condition settled down. Then, through the quieting surface of his reverie, stole up a yet deeper mood that seemed evoked partly by the mysterious glamour of the scene,
yet partly by his will to let it come. It had been a long time in him; he now let it up to breathe. It came, moreover, with ease, and quickly.

  For a gentle sadness rose upon him, a sadness deeply hidden that he suddenly laid bare as of set deliberation. The recent play and laughter, above all his own excitement, had purposely concealed it — from others possibly, but certainly from himself. The excitement had been a mask assumed by something deeper in him he had wished — and tried — to hide. Gently it came at first, this sadness, then with increasing authority and speed. It rose about him like a cloud that hid the stars and dimmed the sinking moon. It spread a veil between him and the rocky cemetery on those mournful hills beyond the Nile. In a sense it seemed, indeed, to issue thence. It emanated from their silence and their ancient tombs. It sank into him. It was penetrating — it was familiar — it was deathless.

  But it was no mood of common sadness; there lay no physical tinge in it, but rather a deep, unfathomable sadness of the spirit: an inner loneliness. From his inmost soul it issued outwards, meeting half-way some sense of similar loneliness that breathed towards him from these tragic Theban hills.…

  And Tom, not understanding it, tried to shake himself free again; he called up cheerful things to balance it; he thought of his firm position in the world, of his proud partnership, of his security with her he loved, of his zest in life, of the happy prospect immediately in front of him. But, in spite of all, the mood crept upwards like a rising wave, swamping his best resistance, drowning all appeal to joy and confidence. He recognised an unwelcome revival of that earlier nightmare dread connected with his boyhood, things he had decided to forget, and had forgotten as he thought. The mood took him gravely, with the deepest melancholy he had ever known. It had begun so delicately; it became in a little while so determined, it threatened to overmaster him. He turned then and faced it, so to speak. He looked hard at it and asked of himself its meaning. Thought and emotion in him shuffled with their shadowy feet.