“Beware the end! With Lilith’s love comes Lilith’s freedom.”
But Lilith smiled with placid sweetness, and still left her hand confidingly in his; he held that hand, so warm and soft and white, and was loth to let it go, — he studied the rapt expression of the beautiful face, the lovely curve of the sweet shut lips, the delicately veined lids of the closed eyes, — and was dimly conscious of a sense of vague happiness curiously intermingled with terror. By-and-by he began to collect his ideas which had been so suddenly scattered by that one word “Belovëd,” — and he resolved to break the mystic silence that oppressed and daunted him.
“Dreaming or waking, is she?” he queried aloud, a little tremulously, and as though he were talking to himself. “She must be dreaming!”
“Dreaming of joy!” said Lilith softly, and with quick responsiveness— “only that Joy is no dream! I hear your voice, — I am conscious of your touch, — almost I see you! The cloud hangs there between us still — but God is good, — He will remove that cloud.”
El-Râmi listened, perplexed and wondering.
“Lilith,” he said in a voice that strove in vain to assume its wonted firmness and authority— “What say you of clouds, — you who are in the full radiance of a light that is quenchless? Have you not told me of a glory that out-dazzles the sun, in which you move and have your being, — then what do you know of Shadow?”
“Yours is the Shadow,” replied Lilith— “not mine! I would that I could lift it from your eyes, that you might see the Wonder and the Beauty. Oh, cruel Shadow, that lies between my love and me!”
“Lilith! Lilith!” exclaimed El-Râmi in strange agitation— “Why will you talk of love?”
“Do you not think of love?” said Lilith— “and must I not respond to your innermost thought?”
“Not always do you so respond, Lilith!” said El-Râmi quickly, recovering himself a little, and glad of an opportunity to bring back his mind to a more scientific level. “Often you speak of things I know not, — things that perhaps I shall never know—”
“Nay, you must know,” said Lilith, with soft persistence. “Every unit of life in every planet is bound to know its Cause and Final Intention. All is clear to me, and will be so to you, hereafter. You ask me of these things — I tell you, — but you do not believe me; — you will never believe me till — the end.”
“Beware the end!” The words echoed themselves so distinctly in El-Râmi’s mind that he could almost have fancied they were spoken aloud in the room. “What end?” he asked eagerly.
But to this Lilith answered nothing.
He looked at the small sensitive hand he held, and stroking it gently, was about to lay it back on her bosom, when all at once she pressed her fingers closely over his palm, and sat upright, her delicate face expressive of the most intense emotion, notwithstanding her closed eyes.
“Write!” she said in a clear penetrating voice that sent silvery echoes through the room— “write these truths to the world you live in. Tell the people they all work for Evil, and therefore Evil shall be upon them. What they sow, even that shall they reap, with the measure they have used, it shall be measured to them again. O wild world! — sad world! — world wherein the pride of wealth, the joy of sin, the cruelty of avarice, the curse of selfishness, outweigh all pity, all sympathy, all love! For this God’s law of Compensation makes but one return — Destruction. Wars shall prevail; plague and famine shall ravage the nations; — young children shall murder the parents who bore them; theft and rapine shall devastate the land. For your world is striving to live without God, — and a world without God is a disease that must die. Like a burnt-out star this Earth shall fall from its sphere and vanish utterly — and its sister-planets shall know it no more. For when it is born again, it will be new.”
The words came from her lips with a sort of fervid eloquence which seemed to exhaust her, for she grew paler and paler, and her head began to sink backward on the pillow. El-Râmi gently put his arm round her to support her, and as he did so, a kind of supernatural light irradiated her features.
“Believe me, O my Belovëd, believe the words of Lilith!” she murmured. “There is but one Law leading to all Wisdom. Evil generates Evil, and contains within itself its own retribution. Good generates good, and holds within itself the germ of eternal reproduction. Love begets Love, and from Love is born Immortality!”
Her voice grew fainter, — she sank entirely back on her pillow; yet once again her lips moved and the word “Immortality!” floated whisperingly forth like a sigh. El-Râmi drew his arm away from her, and at the same instant disengaged his hand from her clasp. She seemed bewildered at this, and for a minute or two, felt in the air as though searching for some missing treasure, — then her arms fell passively on each side of her, seemingly inert and lifeless. El-Râmi bent over her half curiously, half anxiously, — his eyes dwelt on the ruby-like jewel that heaved gently up and down on her softly rounded bosom, — he watched the red play of light around it, and on the white satiny skin beneath, — and then, — all at once his sight grew dazzled and his brain began to swim. How lovely she was! — how much more than lovely! And how utterly she was his! — his, body and soul, and in his power! He was startled at the tenour of his own unbidden thoughts, — whence, in God’s name, came these new impulses, these wild desires that fired his blood?...Furious with himself for what he deemed the weakness of his own emotions, he strove to regain the mastery over his nerves, — to settle his mind once more in its usual attitude of cold inflexibility and indifferent composure, — but all in vain. Some subtle chord in his mental composition had been touched mysteriously, he knew not how, and had set all the other chords a-quivering, — and he felt himself all suddenly to be as subdued and powerless as when his mysterious visitor, the monk from Cyprus, had summoned up (to daunt him, as he thought) the strange vision of an Angel in his room.
Again he looked at Lilith; — again he resisted the temptation that assailed him to clasp her in his arms, to shower a lover’s kisses on her lips, and thus waken her to the full bitter-sweet consciousness of earthly life, — till in the sharp extremity of his struggle, and loathing himself for his own folly, he suddenly dropped on his knees by the side of the couch and gazed with a vague wild entreaty at the tranquil loveliness that lay there so royally enshrined.
“Have mercy, Lilith!” he prayed half aloud, and scarcely conscious of his words. “If you are stronger in your weakness than I in my strength, have mercy! Repel me, — distrust me, disobey me — but do not love me! Make me not as one of the foolish for whom a woman’s smile, a woman’s touch, are more than life, and more than wisdom. O let me not waste the labour of my days on a freak of passion! — let me not lose everything I have gained by long study and research, for the mere wild joy of an hour! Lilith, Lilith! Child, woman, angel! — whatever you are, have pity upon me! I dare not love you!...I dare not!”
So murmuring incoherently, he rose, and walking dizzily like a man abruptly startled from deep sleep, he went straight out of the room, never looking back once, else he might have seen how divinely, how victoriously Lilith smiled!
CHAPTER VIII.
REACHING his study, he shut himself in and locked the door, — and then sitting down, buried his head in his hands and fell to thinking. Such odd thoughts too! — they came unbidden, and chased one another in and out of his brain like will-o’-the-wisps in a wilderness. It was growing late, and Féraz had not yet returned, — but he heeded not the hour, or his brother’s continued absence, — he was occupied in such a mental battle with his own inward forces as made him utterly indifferent to external things. The question he chiefly asked himself was this: — Of what use was all the science he had discovered and mastered, if he was not exempt, — utterly exempt from the emotions common to the most ignorant of men? His pride had been that he was “above” human nature, — that he was able to look down upon its trivial joys and sorrows with a supreme and satiric scorn, — that he knew its ways so well as to
be able to calculate its various hesitating moves in all directions, social and political, with very nearly exact accuracy. Why then was he shaken to the very centre of his being to-night, by the haunting vision of an angelic face and the echo of a sweet faint voice softly breathing the words— “My belovëd!” He could dominate others; why could he not dominate himself?
“This will never do!” he said aloud at last, starting up from his brooding attitude— “I must read — I must work, — I must, at all costs, get out of this absurd frame of mind into which I have unwittingly fallen. Besides, how often have I not assured myself that for all practical earthly considerations Lilith is dead — positively dead!”
And to reinstate himself in this idea, he unlocked his desk and took from it a small parchment volume in which he had carefully chronicled the whole account of his experiment on Lilith from the beginning. One page was written in the form of a journal-the opposite leaf being reserved for “queries,” and the book bore the curious superscription “In Search of the Soul of Lilith” on its cover. The statement began at once without preamble, thus: —
“August 8, 18 — . 9 p.m. — Lilith, an Arab girl, aged twelve, dies in my arms. Cause of death, fever and inanition. Heart ceased to beat at ten minutes past eight this evening. While the blood is still warm in the corpse, I inject the ‘Electro-flamma’ under the veins, close beneath the heart. No immediate effect visible.
“11 p.m. — Arab women lay out Lilith’s corpse for burial. Questioned the people as to her origin. An orphan child, of poor parentage, no education, and unquiet disposition. Not instructed in religious matters, but following the religious customs of others by instinct and imitation. Distinctive features of the girl when in health — restlessness, temper, animalism, and dislike of restraint. Troublesome to manage, and not a thinking child by any means.
“August 9. 5 a.m. — The caravan has just started on its way, leaving the corpse of Lilith with me. The woman Zaroba remains behind. Féraz I sent away last night in haste. I tell Zaroba part of my intention; she is superstitious and afraid of me, but willing to serve me. Lilith remains inanimate. I again use the ‘Electro-flamma,’ this time close to all the chief arteries. No sign of life.
“August 10. Noon. — I begin rather to despair. As a last resource I have injected carefully a few drops of the ‘Flamma’ close to the brain; it is the mainspring of the whole machine, and if it can be set in motion —
“Midnight. Victory! The brain has commenced to pulsate feebly, and the heart with it. Breathing has begun, but slowly and with difficulty. A faint colour has come into the hitherto waxen face. Success is possible now.
“August 15. — During these last five days Lilith has breathed, and, to a certain extent, lived. She does not open her eyes, nor move a muscle of her body, and at times still appears dead. She is kept alive (if it is life) by the vital fluid, and by that only. I must give her more time.
“August 20. — I have called her by name, and she has answered — but how strangely! Where does she learn the things she speaks of? She sees the Earth, she tells me, like a round ball circling redly in a cloud of vapours, and she hears music everywhere, and perceives a ‘light beyond.’ Where and how does she perceive anything?”
Here on the opposite side of the page was written the following “query,” which in this case was headed
“PROBLEM.”
“Given, a child’s brain, not wholly developed in its intellectual capacity, with no impressions save those which are purely material, and place that brain in a state of perpetual trance, how does it come to imagine or comprehend things which science cannot prove? Is it the Soul which conveys these impressions, and if so, what is the Soul, and where is it?”
El-Râmi read the passage over and over again, then, sighing impatiently, closed the book and put it by.
“Since I wrote that, what has she not said — what has she not told me!” he muttered; “and the ‘child’s brain’ is a child’s brain no longer, but a woman’s, while she has obtained absolutely no knowledge of any sort by external means. Yet she — she who was described by those who knew her in her former life as ‘not a thinking child, troublesome and difficult to manage,’ she it is who describes to me the scenery and civilization of Mars, the inhabitants of Sirius, the wonders of a myriad of worlds; she it is who talks of the ravishing beauty of things Divine and immortal, of the glory of the heavens, of the destined fate of the world. God knows it is very strange! — and the problem I wrote out six years ago is hardly nearer solving than it was then. If I could believe — but then I cannot — I must always doubt, and shall not doubt lead to discovery?”
Thus arguing with himself, and scoffing interiorly at the suggestion which just then came unbidden to his mind— “Blessed are they which have not seen and yet believed” — he turned over some more papers and sorted them, with the intention and hope of detaching his thoughts entirely from what had suddenly become the too-enthralling subject of Lilith’s beauteous personality. Presently he came upon a memorandum, over which he nodded and smiled with a sort of grim satirical content, entitled, “The Passions of the Human Animal as Nature made Him;” it was only a scrap — a hint of some idea which he had intended to make use of in literary work, but he read it over now with a good deal of curious satisfaction. It ran thus:
“Man, as a purely natural creature, fairly educated, but wholly unspiritualized, is a mental composition of: Hunger, Curiosity, Self-Esteem, Avarice, Cowardice, Lust, Cruelty, Personal Ambition; and on these vile qualities alone our ‘society’ hangs together; the virtues have no place anywhere, and do not count at all, save as conveniently pious metaphors.”
“It is true!” he said aloud— “as true as the very light of the skies! Now am I, or have I ever been, guilty of these common vices of ordinary nature? No, no; I have examined my own conscience too often and too carefully. I have been accused of personal ambition, but even that is a false accusation, for I do not seek vulgar rewards, or the noise of notoriety ringing about my name. All that I am seeking to discover is meant for the benefit of the world; that Humanity — poor, wretched, vicious Humanity — may know positively and finally that there is a Future. For till they do know it, beyond all manner of doubt, why should they strive to be better? Why should they seek to quell their animalism? Why should they need to be any better than they are? And why, above all things, should they be exhorted by their preachers and teachers to fasten their faith to a Myth, and anchor their hopes on a Dream?”
At that moment a loud and prolonged rat-tat-tatting at the street-door startled him, — he hastily thrust all his loose manuscripts into a drawer, and went to answer the summons, glancing at the clock as he passed it with an air of complete bewilderment, — for it was close upon two a.m., and he could not imagine how the time had flown. He had scarcely set foot across the hall before another furious knocking began, and he stopped abruptly to listen to the imperative clatter with a curious wondering expression on his dark handsome face. When the noise ceased again, he began slowly to undo the door.
“Patience, my dear boy,” he said, as he flung it open— “is a virtue, as you must have seen it set forth in copy-books. I provided you with a latch-key — where is it? — there could not be a more timely hour for its usage.”
But while he spoke, Féraz, for it was he, had sprung in swiftly like some wild animal pursued by hunters, and he now stood in the hall, nearly breathless, staring confusedly at his brother with big, feverishly-bright bewildered eyes.
“Then I have escaped!” he said in a half-whisper— “I am at home, — really at home again!”
El-Râmi looked at him steadily, — then, turning away quietly, carefully shut and bolted the door.
“Have you spent a happy day, Féraz?” he gently inquired.
“Happy!” echoed Féraz— “Happy? Yes. No! Good God! — what do you mean by happiness?”
El-Râmi looked at him again, and making no reply to this adjuration, simply turned about and went into his study. F�
�raz followed.
“I know what you think,” he said in pained accents— “You think I’ve been drinking — so I have. But I’m not drunk, for all that. They gave me wine — bad Burgundy — detestable champagne — the sun never shone on the grapes that made it, — and I took very little of it. It is not that which has filled me with a terror too real to deserve your scorn, — it is not that which has driven me home here to you for help and shelter—”
“It is somewhat late to be ‘driven’ home,” remarked El-Râmi with a slightly sarcastic smile— “Two in the morning, — and — bad champagne or good, — you are talking, my dear Féraz, to say the least of it, rather wildly.”
“For God’s sake do not sneer at me!” cried Féraz passionately— “I shall go mad if you do! Is it as late as you say? — I never knew it. I fled from them at midnight; — I have wandered about alone under the stars since then.”
At these words, El-Râmi’s expression changed from satire to compassion. His fine eyes softened, and their lustrous light grew deeper and more tender.
“Alone — and under the stars?” he repeated softly— “Are not the two things incompatible — to you? Have you not made the stars your companions — almost your friends?”
“No, no!” said Féraz, with a swift gesture of utter hopelessness. “Not now — not now! for all is changed. I see life as it is — hideous, foul, corruptible, cruel! and the once bright planets look pitiless; the heavens I thought so gloriously designed, are but an impenetrable vault arched over an ever-filling Grave. There is no light, no hope anywhere; how can there be in the face of so much sin? El-Râmi, why did you not tell me? why did you not warn me of the accursëd Evil of this pulsating movement men call Life? For it seems I have not lived, I have only dreamed!”
Delphi Collected Works of Marie Corelli Page 264