He smiled as Féraz impulsively caught his hand and kissed it, and after the young man had left the room he still stood, lost in a reverie, murmuring under his breath: “And be happy ourselves! Is that possible — could that be possible — in this world?”
CHAPTER IX.
NEXT day towards noon, while Féraz, tired with his brief “worldly” experiences, was still sleeping, El-Râmi sought out Zaroba. She received him in the ante-room of the chamber of Lilith with more than her customary humility; her face was dark and weary, and her whole aspect one of resigned and settled melancholy. El-Râmi looked at her kindly, and with compassion.
“The sustaining of wrath is an injury to the spirit,” he wrote on the slate which served for that purpose in his usual way of communication with her; “I no longer mistrust you. Once more I say, be faithful and obedient. I ask no more. The spell of silence shall be lifted from your lips to-day.”
She read swiftly, and with apparent incre — dulity, and a tremor passed over her tall, gaunt frame. She looked at him wonderingly and wistfully, while he, standing before her, returned the look steadfastly, and seemed to be concentrating all his thoughts upon her with some fixed intention. After a minute or two he turned aside, and again wrote on the slate; this time the words ran thus:
“Speak; you are at liberty.”
With a deep shuddering sigh, she extended her hands appealingly.
“Master!” she exclaimed; and before he could prevent her, she had dropped on her knees. “Forgive — forgive!” she muttered. “Terrible is thy power, O El-Râmi, ruler of spirits! terrible, mystic and wonderful! God must have given thee thy force, and I am but the meanest of slaves to rebel against thy command. Yet out of wisdom comes not happiness, but great grief and pain; and as I live, El-Râmi, in my rebellion I but dreamed of a love that should bring thee joy! Pardon the excess of my zeal, for lo, again and yet again I swear fidelity! and may all the curses of heaven fall on me if this time I break my vow!”
She bent her head — she would have kissed the floor at his feet, but that he quickly raised her up and prevented her.
“There is nothing more to pardon,” he wrote. “Your wisdom is possibly greater than mine. I know there is nothing stronger than Love, nothing better perhaps; but Love is my foe whom I must vanquish, — lest he should vanquish me!”
And while Zaroba yet pored over these words, her black eyes dilating with amazement at the half confession of weakness implied in them he turned away and left the room.
That afternoon a pleasant sense of peace and restfulness seemed to settle upon the little household; delicious strains of melody filled the air; Féraz, refreshed in mind and body by a sound sleep, was seated at the piano, improvising strange melodies in his own exquisitely wild and tender fashion; while El-Râmi, seated at his writing-table, indited a long letter to Dr. Kremlin at Ilfracombe, giving in full the message left for him by the mysterious monk from Cyprus respecting the “Third Ray” or signal from Mars.
“Do not weary yourself too much with watching this phenomenon,” he wrote to his friend. “From all accounts, it will be a difficult matter to track so rapid a flash on the Disc as the one indicated, and I have fears for your safety. I cannot give any satisfactory cause for my premonition of danger to you in the attempt, because if we do not admit an end to anything, then there can be no danger even in death itself, which we are accustomed to look upon as an ‘end,’ when it may be proved to be only a beginning. But, putting aside the idea of ‘danger’ or ‘death,’ the premonition remains in my mind as one of ‘change’ for you; and perhaps you are not ready or willing even to accept a different sphere of action to your present one, therefore I would say, take heed to yourself when you follow the track of the ‘Third Ray.’”
Here his pen stopped abruptly; Féraz was singing in a soft mezza-voce, and he listened:
O Sweet, if love obtained must slay desire.
And quench the light and heat of passion’s fire;
If you are weary of the ways of love.
And fain would end the many cares thereof.
I prithee tell me so that I may seek
Some place to die in ere I grow too weak
To look my last on your belovèd face.
Yea, tell me all! The gods may yet have grace
And pity enough to let me quickly die
Some brief while after we have said ‘Good-bye!’
Nay, I have known it well for many days
You have grown tired of all tender ways;
Love’s kisses weary you, love’s eager words.
Old as the hills and sweet as singing-birds.
Are fetters hard to bear! O love, be free!
You will lose little joy in losing me;
Let me depart, remembering only this.
That once you loved me, and that once your kiss
Crown’d me with joy supreme enough to last
Through all my life till that brief life be past.
Forget me, Sweetest-heart, and nevermore
Turn to look back on what has gone before.
Or say, ‘Such love was brief, but wondrous fair;’
The past is past forever; have no care
Or thought for me at all, no tear or sigh.
Or faint regret; for, Dearest, I shall die
And dream of you i’ the dark, beneath the grass;
And o’er my head perchance your feet may pass.
Lulling me faster into sleep profound
Among the fairies of the fruitful ground.
Love wearied out by love, hath need of rest.
And when all love is ended, Death is best.
The song ceased; but though the singer’s voice no longer charmed the silence, his fingers still wandered over the keys of the piano, devising intricate passages of melody as delicate and devious as the warbling of nightingales. El-Râmi, unconsciously to himself, heaved a deep sigh, and Féraz, hearing it, looked round.
“Am I disturbing you?” he asked.
“No. I love to hear you; but, like many youthful poets, you sing of what you scarcely understand — love, for instance; you know nothing of love.”
“I imagine I do,” replied Féraz meditatively. “I can picture my ideal woman; she is—”
“Fair, of course!” said El-Râmi, with an indulgent smile.
“Yes, fair; her hair must be golden, but not uniformly so — full of lights and shadows, suggestive of some halo woven round her brows by the sunlight, or the caressing touch of an angel. She must have deep, sweet eyes in which no actual colour is predominant; for a pronounced blue or black does away with warmth of expression. She must not be tall, for one cannot caress tall women without a sense of the ludicrous spoiling sentiment—”
“Have you tried it?” asked El-Râmi, laughing.
Féraz laughed too.
“You know I have not; I only imagine the situation. To explain more fully what I mean, I would say one could more readily draw into one’s arms the Venus of Medicis than that of Milo — one could venture to caress a Psyche, but scarcely a Juno. I have never liked the idea of tall women, they are like big handsome birds — useful, no doubt, but not half so sweet as the little fluttering singing ones.”
“Well, and what other attributes must this imagined lady of yours possess?” asked El-Râmi, vaguely amused at his brother’s earnestness.
“Oh, many more charms than I could enumerate,” replied Féraz. “And of one thing I am certain, she is not to be found on this earth. But I am quite satisfied to wait; I shall find her, even as she will find me some day. Meanwhile I ‘imagine’ love, and in imagination I almost feel it.”
He went on playing, and El-Râmi resumed the writing of his letter to Kremlin, which he soon finished and addressed ready for post. A gentle knock at the street-door made itself heard just then through the ebb and flow of Féraz’s music, and Feraz left off his improvisation abruptly and went to answer the summons. He returned, and announced with some little excitement:
&nbs
p; “Madame Irene Vassilius.”
El-Râmi rose and advanced to meet his fair visitor, bowing courteously.
“This is an unexpected pleasure, Madame,” he said, the sincerity of his welcome showing itself in the expression of his face, “and an unmerited honour for which I am grateful.”
She smiled, allowing her hand to rest in his for a moment; then, accepting the low chair which Féraz placed for her near his brother’s writing-table, she seated herself, and lifted her eyes to El-Râmi’s countenance — eyes which, like those of Féraz’s ideal ladye-love, were “deep and sweet, and of no pronounced colour.”
“I felt you would not resent my coming here as an intrusion,” she began; “but my visit is not one of curiosity. I do not want to probe you as to your knowledge of my past, or to ask you anything as to my future. I am a lonely creature, disliked by many people, and in the literary career I have adopted I fight a desperately hard battle, and often crave for a little — just a little sympathetic comprehension. One or two questions puzzle me which you might answer if you would. They are on almost general subjects; but I should like to have your opinion.”
“Madame, if you, with your exceptional gifts of insight and instinct, are baffled in these ‘general’ questions,” said El-Râmi, “shall not I be baffled also?”
“That does not follow,” replied Irene, returning his glance steadily, “for you men always claim to be wiser than women. I do not agree with this fiat, so absolutely set forth by the lords of creation; yet I am not what is termed ‘strong-minded,’ I simply seek justice. Pray stay with us,” she added, turning to Féraz, who was about to retire, as he usually did whenever El-Râmi held an interview with any visitor; “there is no occasion for you to go away.”
Féraz hesitated, glancing at his brother.
“Yes, by all means remain here, Féraz,” said El-Râmi gently, “since Madame Vassilius desires it.”
Delighted with the permission, Féraz ensconced himself in a corner with a book, pretending to read, but in reality listening to every word of the conversation. He liked to hear Irene’s voice — it was singularly sweet and ringing, and at times had a peculiar thrill of pathos in it that went straight to the heart.
“You know,” she went on, “that I am, or am supposed to be, what the world calls ‘famous.’ That is, I write books which the public clamour for and read, and for which I receive large sums of money. I am able to live well, dress well, and look well, and I am known as one of society’s ‘celebrities.’ Well, now, can you tell me why, for such poor honours as these, men, supposed to be our wiser and stronger superiors, are so spitefully jealous of a woman’s fame?”
“Jealous?” echoed El-Râmi dubiously, and with something of hesitation. “You mean—”
“I mean what I say,” continued Madame Vassilius calmly; “neither more nor less. Spitefully jealous is the term I used. Explain to me this riddle: Why do men en — courage women to every sort of base folly and vanity that may lead them at length to become the slaves of man’s lust and cruelty, and yet take every possible means to oppose and hinder them in their attempts to escape from sensuality and animalism into intellectual progress and pre-eminence? In looking back on the history of all famous women, from Sappho downwards to the present time, it is amazing to consider what men have said of them. Always a sneer at ‘women’s work.’ And if praise is at any time given, how grudging and half-hearted it is! Men will enter no protest against women who uncover their bare limbs to the public gaze and dance lewdly in music-halls and theatres for the masculine delectation; they will defend the street-prostitute; they will pledge themselves and their family estates in order to provide jewels for the newest ‘ballerina’; but for the woman of intellect they have nothing but a shrug of contempt. If she produces a great work of art in literature, it is never thoroughly acknowledged; and the hard blows delivered on Charlotte Bronté, George Eliot, Georges Sand, and others of their calibre, far out — weighed their laurels. George Eliot and Georges Sand took men’s names in order to shelter themselves a little from the pitiless storm that assails literary work known to emanate from a woman’s brain; but let a man write the veriest trash that ever was printed, he will still be accredited by his own sex with something better than ever the cleverest woman could compass. How is it that the ‘superior’ sex are cowardly enough to throw stones at those among the ‘inferior,’ who surpass their so-called lords and masters both in chastity and intellect?”
She spoke earnestly, her eyes shining with emotion; she looked lovely, thus inspired by the strength of her inward feelings. El-Râmi was taken aback. Like most Orientals, he had to a certain extent despised women and their work. But, then, what of Lilith? Without her aid would his discoveries in spiritual science have progressed so far? Had he or any man a right to call woman the “inferior” sex?
“Madame,” he said slowly and with a vague embarrassment, “you bring an accusation against our sex which it is impossible to refute, because it is simply and undeniably true. Men do not love either chastity or intellect in women.”
He paused, looking at her, then went on:
“A chaste woman is an embodied defiance and reproach to man; an intellectual woman is always a source of irritation, because she is invariably his superior. By this I mean that when a woman is thoroughly gifted, she is gifted all round; an intellectual man is generally only gifted in one direction. For example, a great poet, painter, or musician, may be admirable in his own line, but he generally lacks in something; he is stupid, perhaps, in conversation, or he blunders in some way by want of tact; but a truly brilliant woman has all the charms of mental superiority, generally combined with delicate touches of satire, humour, and wit, — points which she uses to perfection against the lumbering animal Man, with the result that she succeeds in pricking him in all his most vulnerable parts. He detests her accordingly, and flies for consolation to the empty-headed dolls of the music-hall, who flatter him to the top of his bent, in order to get as much champagne and as many diamonds as they can out of him. Man must be adored; he insists upon it, even if he pays for it.”
“It is a pity he does not make himself a little more worthy of adoration,” said Irene, with a slight scornful smile.
“It is,” agreed El-Râmi; “but most men, even the ugliest and stupidest, consider themselves perfect.”
“Do you?” she asked suddenly.
“Do I consider myself perfect?” El-Râmi smiled, and reflected on this point. “Madame, if I am frank with you, and with myself, I must answer ‘Yes!’ I am made of the same clay as all my sex, and consider myself worthy to be the conqueror of any woman under the sun! Ask any loathsome, crook-backed dwarf that sweeps a crossing for his livelihood, and his idea of his own personal charm will be the same.”
Féraz laughed outright; Madame Vassilius looked amused and interested.
“You can never eradicate from the masculine nature,” proceeded El-Râmi, “the idea that our attentions, no matter how uncouth, are, and always must be, agreeable to the feminine temperament. Here you have the whole secret of the battle carried on by men, against women who have won the prize of a world-wide fame. An intellectual woman sets a barrier between herself and the beasts; the beasts howl, but cannot leap it; hence their rage. You, Madame, are not only intellectual, but lovely to look at; you stand apart, a crowned queen, seeking no assistance from men; by your very manner you imply your scorn of their low and base desires. They must detest you in self-defence; most of your adverse critics are the poorly paid hacks of the daily journals, who envy you your house, your horses, your good fortune, and your popularity with the public; if you want them to admire you, go in for a big scandal. Run away with some blackguard; have several husbands; do something to tarnish your woman’s reputation; be a vulture or a worm, not a star; men do not care for stars, they are too distant, too cold, too pure!”
“Are you speaking satirically,” asked Madame Vassilius, “or in grim earnest?”
“In grim earnest, fair lady,�
� and El-Râmi rose from his chair and confronted her with a half-smile. “In grim earnest, men are brutes! The statement is one which is frequently made by what is called the ‘Shrieking Sisterhood’; but I, a man, agree to it in cold blood, without conditions. We are stupid brutes; we work well in gangs, but not so well singly. As soldiers, sailors, builders, engineers, labourers, all on the gang method, we are admirable. The finest paintings of the world were produced by bodies of men working under one head, called ‘schools,’ but differing from our modern ‘schools’ in this grand exception, that whereas now each pupil tries his hand at something of his own, then all the pupils worked at the one design of the Master. Thus were painted the frescoes of Michael Angelo, and the chief works of Raphael. Now the rule is ‘every man for himself and the devil take the hindmost,’ And very poorly does ‘each man for himself’ succeed. Men must always be helped along, either by each other — or...by...a woman! Many of them owe all their success in life to the delicate management and patient tact of woman, and yet never have the grace to own it. Herein we are thankless brutes as well as stupid. But, as far as I personally am concerned, I am willing to admit that all my best discoveries, such as they are, are due to the far-reaching intelligence and pure insight of a woman.”
This remark utterly amazed Féraz; Madame Vassilius looked surprised and interested.
“Then,” she said, smiling slightly, “of course you love someone?”
A shadow swept over El-Râmi’s features.
“No, Madame; I am not capable of love, as this world understands loving. Love has existence no doubt, but surely not as Humanity accepts it. For example, a man loves a woman; she dies; he gradually forgets her, and loves another, and so on. That is not love, but it is what society is satisfied with, as such. You are quite right to despise such a fleeting emotion for yourself; it is not sufficient for the demands of your nature; you seek something more lasting.”
“Which I shall never find,” said Irene quietly.
“Which you will find, and which you must find,” declared El-Râmi. “All longings, however vague, whether evil or good, are bound to be fulfilled, there being no waste in the economy of the universe. This is why it is so necessary to weigh well the results of desire before encouraging it. I quite understand your present humour, Madame — it is one of restlessness and discontent. You find your crown of fame has thorns; never mind! wear it royally, though the blood flows from the torn brows. You are solitary at times, and find the solitude irksome; Art serves her children thus — she will accept no half-love, but takes all. Were I asked to name one of the most fortunate of women, I think I should name you, for notwithstanding the progress of your intellectual capacity, you have kept your faith.”
Delphi Collected Works of Marie Corelli (Illustrated) (Delphi Series Eight Book 22) Page 266