Read Peter Ibbetson Page 6

  Part Five

  "_Grouille, greve, greve, grouille, File, file, ma quenouille! File sa corde au bourreau Qui siffle dans le preau..._"

  So sang the old hag in _Notre Dame de Paris!_

  So sang to me night and day, for many nights and days, the thin smallvoice that always went piping inside me, now to one tune, now toanother, but always the same words--that terrible refrain that used tohaunt me so when I was a school-boy at Bluefriars!

  Oh, to be a school-boy again in a long gray coat and ridiculous pinkstockings--innocent and free--with Esmeralda for my only love, and Athosand Porthos and D'Artagnan for my bosom friends, and no worsetribulation than to be told on a Saturday afternoon that the thirdvolume was in hand--_volume trois en lecture_'.

  * * * * *

  Sometimes, I remember, I could hardly sleep on a Sunday night, for pityof the poor wretch who was to be hanged close by on Monday morning, andit has come to that with _me_!

  * * * * *

  Oh, Mary, Mary, Duchess of Towers, sweet friend of my childhood, andlove of my life, what must you think of me now?

  * * * * *

  How blessed are the faithful! How good it must be to trust in God andheaven, and the forgiveness of sin, and be as a little child in all butinnocence! A whole career of crime wiped out in a moment by just onecheap little mental act of faith at the eleventh hour, in the extremeterror of well-merited dissolution; and all the evil one has workedthrough life (that goes on breeding evil for ages to come) taken offone's shoulders like a filthy garment, and just cast aside, anywhere,anyhow, for the infecting of others--who do not count.

  What matter if it be a fool's paradise? Paradise is paradise, forwhoever owns it!

  * * * * *

  They say a Sicilian drum-major, during the French occupation of Palermo,was sentenced to be shot. He was a well-known coward, and it was fearedhe would disgrace his country at the last moment in the presence of theFrench soldiers, who had a way of being shot with a good grace and alight heart: they had grown accustomed to it.

  For the honor of Sicily his confessor told him, in the strictestconfidence, that his sentence was a mock one, and that he would be firedat with blank cartridges.

  It was a pious fraud. All but two of the twelve cartridges had bullets,and he fell, riddled through and through. No Frenchman ever died with alighter heart, a better grace. He was superb, and the national honorwas saved.

  Thrice happy Sicilian drum-major, if the story be true! That trust inblank cartridges was his paradise.

  * * * * *

  Oh, it is uphill work to be a stoic when the moment comes and the tug!But when the tug lasts for more than a moment--days and nights, days andnights! Oh, happy Sicilian drum-major!

  * * * * *

  Pray? Yes, I will pray night and morning, and all day long, to whateverthere is left of inherited strength and courage in that luckless,misbegotten waif, Peter Ibbetson; that it may bear him up a little whileyet; that he may not disgrace himself in the dock or on the gallows.

  * * * * *

  Repent? Yes, of many things. But of the thing for which I am here?Never!

  * * * * *

  It is a ghastly thing to be judge and jury and executioner all in one,and for a private and personal wrong--to condemn and strike and kill.

  Pity comes after--when it is too late, fortunately--the wretchedweakness of pity! Pooh! no Calcraft will ever pity _me_, and I do notwant him to.

  * * * * *

  He had his long, snaky knife against my stick; he, too, was a big strongman, well skilled in self-defence! Down he went, and I struck him againand again. "O my God! O Christ!" he shrieked....

  "It will ring in my heart and my ears till I die--till I die!"

  * * * * *

  There was no time to lose--no time to think for the best. It is all forthe best as it is. What might he not have said if he had lived!

  * * * * *

  Thank Heaven, pity is not remorse or shame; and what crime could wellbe worse than his? To rob one's dearly beloved dead of their fair shame!

  * * * * *

  He might have been mad, perhaps, and have grown in time to believe thelies he told himself. Such things have been. But such a madman should nomore be suffered to live than a mad dog. The only way to kill the liewas to kill the liar--that is, if one _can_ ever kill a lie!

  * * * * *

  Poor worm! after all, he could not help it, I suppose! he was _built_like that! and _I_ was built to kill him for it, and be hanged.'[Greek: Anagkae]!

  What an exit for "Gogo--gentil petit Gogo!"

  * * * * *

  Just opposite that wall, on the other side, was once a small tripe andtrotter shop, kept by a most lovely daughter of the people, so fair andgood in my eyes that I would have asked her to be my wife. What wouldshe think of me now? That I should have dared to aspire! What aKing Cophetua!

  * * * * *

  What does everybody think? I can never breathe the real cause to a soul.Only two women know the truth, and they will take good care not to tell.Thank Heaven for that!

  What matters what anybody thinks? "It will be all the same as a hundredyears hence." That is the most sensible proverb ever invented.

  * * * * *

  But meanwhile!

  * * * * *

  The judge puts on the black cap, and it is all for you! Every eye isfixed on you, so big and young and strong and full of life! Ugh!

  * * * * *

  They pinion you, and you have to walk and be a man, and the chaplainexhorts and prays and tries to comfort. Then a sea of faces; peopleopposite, who have been eating and drinking and making merry, waiting for_you!_ A cap is pulled over your eyes--oh, horror! horror! horror!

  * * * * *

  "Heureux tambour-major de Sicile!"

  * * * * *

  "Il faut laver son ligne sale en famille, et c'est ce que j'ai fait.Mais ca va ma couter cher!"

  * * * * *

  Would I do it all over again? Oh, let me hope, yes!

  * * * * *

  Ah, he died too quick; I dealt him those four blows in less than asmany seconds. It was five minutes, perhaps--or, at the most, ten--fromthe moment he came into the room to that when I finished him and wascaught red-handed. And I--what a long agony!

  Oh, that I might once more dream a "true dream," and see my dear peopleonce more! But it seems that I have lost the power of dreaming truesince that fatal night. I try and try, but it will not come. My dreamsare dreadful; and, oh, the _waking_!

  * * * * *

  After all, my life hitherto, but for a few happy years of childhood, hasnot been worth living; it is most unlikely that it ever would have been,had I lived to a hundred! Oh, Mary! Mary!

  * * * * *

  And penal servitude! Better any death than that. It is good that mysecret must die with me--that there will be no extenuatingcircumstances, no recommendation to mercy, no commutation of the swiftpenalty of death.

  "File, file... File sa corde au bourreau!"

  By such monotonous thoughts, and others as dreary and hopeless,recurring again and again in the same dull round, I beguiled theterrible time that intervened between Ibbetson's death and my trial atthe Old Bailey.

  It all seems very trivial and unimportant now--not worthrecording--even hard to remember.

  But at the time my misery w
as so great, my terror of the gallows sopoignant, that each day I thought I must die of sheer grief beforeanother twenty-four hours could possibly pass over me.

  The intolerable strain would grow more and more severe till a climax oftension was reached, and a hysterical burst of tears would relieve mefor a while, and I would feel reconciled to my fate, and able to facedeath like a man.... Then the anguish would gradually steal over meagain, and the uncontrollable weakness of the flesh....

  And each of these two opposite moods, while it lasted, made the otherseem impossible, and as if it never could come back again; yet back itcame with the regularity of a tide--the most harrowing seesaw thatever was.

  I had always been unstable like that; but whereas I had hithertooscillated between high elation and despondency, it was now from a dumb,resigned despair to the wildest agony and terror.

  I sought in vain for the only comfort it was in me to seek; but when,overdone with suffering, I fell asleep at last, I could no longer dreamtrue; I could dream only as other wretches dream.

  I always dreamed those two little dancing, deformed jailers, man andwife, had got me at last; and that I shrieked aloud for my belovedduchess to succor me, as they ran me in, each butting at me sideways,and showing their toothless gums in a black smile, and poisoning mewith their hot sour breath! The gate was there, and the avenue, alldistorted and quite unlike; and, opposite, a jail; but no powerfulDuchess of Towers to wave the horror away.

  * * * * *

  It will be remembered by some, perhaps, how short was my trial.

  The plea of "not guilty" was entered for me. The defence set up wasinsanity, based on the absence of any adequate motive. This defence wassoon disposed of by the prosecution; witnesses to my sanity were notwanting, and motives enough were found in my past relations with ColonelIbbetson to "make me--a violent, morose, and vindictive-naturedman--imbrue my hands in the gore of my relative and benefactor--a manold enough to be my father--who, indeed, might have been my father, forthe love he had bestowed upon me, with his honored name, when I was lefta penniless, foreign orphan on his hands."

  Here I laughed loud and long, and made a most painful impression, as isduly recorded in the reports of the trial.

  The jury found me guilty quite early in the afternoon of the second day,without leaving the box; and I, "preserving to the last the callous andunmoved demeanor I had borne all through the trial," was duly sentencedto death without any hope of mercy, but with an expression of regret onthe part of the judge--a famous hanging judge--that a man of myeducation and promise should be brought by his own evil nature anduncontrollable passions to so deplorable an end.

  Now whether the worst of certainties is better than suspense--whether mynerves of pain had been so exercised during the period preceding mytrial that I had really become callous, as they say a man's back doesafter a certain number of strokes from the "cat"--certain it was that Iknew the worst, and acquiesced in it with a surprised sense of actualrelief, and found it in me to feel it not unbearable.

  Such, at least, was my mood that night. I made the most of it. It wasalmost happiness by comparison with what I had gone through. I remembereating with a heartiness that surprised me. I could have gone straightfrom my dinner to the gallows, and died with a light heart and a goodgrace--like a Sicilian drum-major.

  I resolved to write the whole true story to the Duchess of Towers, withan avowal of my long and hopeless adoration for her, and the expressionof a hope that she would try to think of me only as her old playfellow,and as she had known me before this terrible disaster. And thinking ofthe letter I would write till very late, I fell asleep in my cell, withtwo warders to watch over me; and then--Another phase of my innerlife began.

  * * * * *

  Without effort, without let or hindrance of any kind, I was at theavenue gate.

  The pink and white may, the lilacs and laburnums were in full bloom, thesun made golden paths everywhere. The warm air was full of fragrance,and alive with all the buzz and chirp of early summer.

  I was half crying with joy to reach the land of my true dreams again, tofeel at home once more--_chez moi! chez moi!_

  La Mere Francois sat peeling potatoes at the door of her _loge_; she wassinging a little song about _cinq sous, sinq sous, pour monter notremenage._ I had forgotten it, but it all came back now.

  "CINQ SOUS, CINQ SOUS, POUR MONTER NOTRE MENAGE."]

  The facetious postman, Yverdon, went in at the gate of my old garden;the bell rang as he pushed it, and I followed him.

  Under the apple-tree, which was putting forth shoots of blossom inprofusion, sat my mother and Monsieur le Major. My mother took theletter from the postman's hand as he said, "Pour Vous? Oh yes, MadamePasquier, God sev ze Kveen!" and paid the postage. It was from ColonelIbbetson, then in Ireland, and not yet a colonel.

  Medor lay snoring on the grass, and Gogo and Mimsey were looking at thepictures in the _musee des familles._

  In a garden chair lolled Dr. Seraskier, apparently asleep, with his longporcelain pipe across his knees.

  Madame Seraskier, in a yellow nankeen gown with gigot sleeves, wascutting curl-papers out of the _Constitutionnel_.

  I gazed on them all with unutterable tenderness. I was gazing on themperhaps for the last time.

  I called out to them by name.

  "Oh, speak to me, beloved shades! Oh, my father! oh, mother, I want youso desperately! Come out of the past for a few seconds, and give me somewords of comfort! I'm in such woful plight! If you could only_know_ ..."

  But they could neither hear nor see me.

  Then suddenly another figure stepped forth from behind theapple-tree--no old-fashioned, unsubstantial shadow of by-gone days thatone can only see and hear, and that cannot hear and see one back again;but one in all the splendid fulness of life, a pillar of help andstrength--Mary, Duchess of Towers!

  I fell on my knees as she came to me with both hands extended.

  "Oh, Mr. Ibbetson, I have been seeking and waiting for you here nightafter night! I have been frantic! If you hadn't come at last, I musthave thrown everything to the winds, and gone to see you in Newgate,waking and before the world, to have a talk with you--an _abboccamento_.I suppose you couldn't sleep, or were unable to dream."

  I could not answer at first. I could only cover her hands with kisses,as I felt her warm life-current mixing with mine--a rapture!

  And then I said--

  "I swear to you by all I hold most sacred--by _my_ mother's memory and_yours_--by yourself--that I never meant to take Ibbetson's life, oreven strike him; the miserable blow was dealt...."

  "As if you need tell me that! As if I didn't know you of old, my poorfriend, kindest and gentlest of men! Why, I am holding your hands, andsee into the very depths of your heart!"

  (I put down all she said as she said it. Of course I am not, and neverhave been, what her old affectionate regard made me seem in her eyes,any more than I am the bloodthirsty monster I passed for. Woman-like,she was the slave of her predilections.)

  "And now, Mr. Ibbetson," she went on, "let me first of all tell you, fora certainty, that the sentence will be commuted. I saw the HomeSecretary three or four hours ago. The real cause of your deplorablequarrel with your uncle is an open secret. His character is well known.A Mrs. Gregory (whom you knew in Hopshire as Mrs. Deane) has been withthe Home Secretary this afternoon. Your chivalrous reticence at thetrial...."

  "Oh," I interrupted, "I don't care to live any longer! Now that I havemet you once more, and that you have forgiven me and think well of me inspite of everything, I am ready to die. There has never been anybody butyou in the world for _me_--never a ghost of a woman, never even a friendsince my mother died and yours. Between that time and the night I firstsaw you at Lady Cray's concert, I can scarcely be said to have lived atall. I fed on scraps of remembrance. You see I have no talent for makingnew friends, but oh, such a genius for fidelity to old ones! I waswaiting for Mimsey to come back again,
I suppose, the one survivor to meof that sweet time, and when she came at last I was too stupid torecognize her. She suddenly blazed and dazzled into my poor life like ameteor, and filled it with a maddening love and pain. I don't know whichof the two has been the sweetest; both have been my life. You cannotrealize what it has been. Trust me, I have lived my fill. I am ready andwilling to die. It is the only perfect consummation I can think of.Nothing can ever equal this moment--nothing on earth or in heaven. Andif I were free to-morrow, life would not be worth having without _you_.I would not take it as a gift."

  She sat down by me on the grass with her hands clasped across her knees,close to the unconscious shadows of our kith and kin, within hearing oftheir happy talk and laughter.

  Suddenly we both heard Mimsey say to Gogo--

  "O, ils sont joliment bien ensemble, le Prince Charmant et la feeTarapatapoum!"

  We looked at each other and actually laughed aloud. The duchess said--

  "Was there ever, since the world began, such a _muse en scene_, and forsuch a meeting, Mr. Ibbetson? Think of it! Conceive it! _I_ arranged itall. I chose a day when they were all together. As they would say inAmerica, _I_ am the boss of this particular dream."

  And she laughed again, through her tears, that enchanting ripple of alaugh that closed her eyes and made her so irresistible.

  "Was there ever," said I--"ever since the world began, such ecstasy as Ifeel now? After this what can there be for me but death--well earned andwell paid for? Welcome and lovely death!"

  "You have not yet thought, Mr. Ibbetson--you have not realized what lifemay have in store for you if--if all you have said about your affectionfor me is true. Oh, it is too terrible for me to think of, I know, thatyou, scarcely more than a boy, should have to spend the rest of yourlife in miserable confinement and unprofitable monotonous toil. Butthere is _another_ side to that picture.

  "Now listen to your old friend's story--poor little Mimsey's confession.I will make it as short as I can.

  "Do you remember when you first saw me, a sickly, plain, sad littlegirl, at the avenue gate, twenty years ago?

  "Le Pere Francois was killing a fowl--cutting its throat with aclasp-knife--and the poor thing struggled frantically in his grasp asits blood flowed into the gutter. A group of boys were looking on ingreat glee, and all the while Pere Francois was gossiping with M. leCure, who didn't seem to mind in the least. I was fainting with pity andhorror. Suddenly you came out of the school opposite with Alfred andCharlie Plunket, and saw it all, and in a fit of noble rage you calledPere Francois a 'sacred pig of assassin'--which, as you know, is veryrude in French--and struck him as near his face as you could reach.

  "Have you forgotten that? Ah, _I_ haven't! It was not an effectual deed,perhaps, and certainly came too late to save the fowl. Besides, PereFrancois struck you back again, and left some of the fowl's blood onyour cheek. It was a baptism! You became on the spot my hero--my angelof light. Look at Gogo over there. Is he beautiful enough? That was_you_, Mr. Ibbetson.

  "M. le Cure said something about 'ces _Anglais_' who go mad if a manwhips his horse, and yet pay people to box each other to death. Don'tyou really remember? Oh, the recollection to _me!_

  "And that little language we invented and used to talk so fluently!Don't you _rappel_ it to yourself? 'Ne le _recollectes_ tu pas?' as wewould have said in those days, for it used to be _thee_ and _thou_with us then.

  "Well, at all events, you must remember how for five happy years we wereso often together; how you drew for me, read to me, played with me; tookmy part in everything, right or wrong; carried me pickaback when I wastired. Your drawings--I have them all. And oh! you were so funnysometimes! How you used to make mamma laugh, and M. le Major! Just lookat Gogo again. Have you forgotten what he is doing now? I haven't.... Hehas just changed the _musee des familles_ for the _Penny Magazine_, andis explaining Hogarth's pictures of the 'Idle and IndustriousApprentices' to Mimsey, and they are both agreed that the idle one ismuch the less objectionable of the two!

  "Mimsey looks passive enough, with her thumb in her mouth, doesn't she?Her little heart is so full of gratitude and love for Gogo that shecan't speak. She can only suck her thumb. Poor, sick, ungainly child!She would like to be Gogo's slave--she would die for Gogo. And hermother adores Gogo too; she is almost jealous of dear Madame Pasquierfor having so sweet a son. In just one minute from now, when she hascut that last curl-paper, poor long-dead mamma will call Gogo to her andgive him a good 'Irish hug,' and make him happy for a week. Wait aminute and see. _There!_ What did I tell you?

  "Well, all that came to an end. Madame Pasquier went away and never cameback, and so did Gogo. Monsieur and Madame Pasquier were dead, and dearmamma died in a week from the cholera. Poor heartbroken Mimsey was takenaway to St. Petersburg, Warsaw, Leipsic, Venice, all over Europe, by herfather, as heart-broken as herself.

  "It was her wish and her father's that she should become a pianist byprofession, and she studied hard for many years in almost every capital,and under almost every master in Europe, and she gave promiseof success.

  "And so, wandering from one place to another, she became a youngwoman--a greatly petted and spoiled and made-much-of young woman, Mr.Ibbetson, although she says it who shouldn't; and had many suitors ofall kinds and countries.

  "But the heroic and angelic Gogo, with his lovely straight nose, and hishair _aux enfants d'Edouard_, and his dear little white silk chimney-pothat and Eton jacket, was always enshrined in her memory, in her inmostheart, as the incarnation of all that was beautiful and brave and good.But alas! what had become of this Gogo in the mean time? Ah, he wasnever even heard of--he was dead!

  "Well, this long-legged, tender-hearted, grown-up young Mimsey ofnineteen was attracted by a very witty and accomplished English attacheat Vienna--a Mr. Harcourt, who seemed deeply in love with her, andwished her to be his wife.

  "He was not rich, but Dr. Seraskier liked and trusted him so much thathe dispossessed himself of almost everything he had to enable this youngcouple to marry--and they did. And truth compels me to admit that for ayear they were very happy and contented with fate and each other.

  "Then a great misfortune befell them both. In a most unexpected manner,through four or five consecutive deaths in Mr. Harcourt's family, hebecame, first, Lord Harcourt, and then the Duke of Towers. And sincethen, Mr. Ibbetson, I have not had an hour's peace or happiness.

  "In the first place a son was born to me--a cripple, poor dear! anddeformed from his birth; and as he grew older it soon became evidentthat he was also born without a mind.

  "Then my unfortunate husband changed completely; he drank and gambledand worse, till we came to live together as strangers, and only spoke toeach other in public and before the world...."

  "Ah," I said, "you were still a great lady--an English duchess!"

  I could not endure the thought of that happy twelvemonth with thatbestial duke! I, sober, chaste, and clean--of all but blood, alas!--anda condemned convict!

  Oh, Mr. Ibbetson, you must make no mistake about _me_! I was neverintended by nature for a duchess--especially an English one. Not butwhat, if dukes and duchesses are necessary, the English are thebest--and, of course, by dukes and duchesses I mean all thatupper-ten-thousand in England which calls itself 'society'--as if therewere no other worth speaking of. Some of them are almost angelic, butthey are not for outsiders like me. Perpetual hunting and shooting andfishing and horseracing--eating, drinking, and killing, and makinglove--eternal court gossip and tittle-tattle--the Prince--theQueen--whom and what the Queen likes, whom and what she doesn't!--tameEnglish party politics--the Church--a Church that doesn't know its ownmind, in spite of its deans, bishops, archbishops, and their wives anddaughters--and all their silly, solemn sense of social rank and dignity!Endless small-talk, dinners, and drums, and no society from year's endto year's end but each other! Ah, one must be caught young, and put inharness early, to lead such an existence as that and be content! And Ihad met and known _such_ men and women with my father!
They _were_something to know!

  There is another society in London and elsewhere--a freemasonry ofintellect and culture and hard work--_la haute boheme du talent_--menand women whose names are or ought to be household words all over theworld; many of them are good friends of mine, both here and abroad; andthat society, which was good enough for my father and mother, is quitegood enough for me.

  I am a republican, Mr. Ibbetson--a cosmopolite--a born Bohemian!

  _"'Mon grand pere etait rossignol; Ma grand mere etait hirondelle!"_

  Look at my dear people there--look at your dear people! What waifs andstrays, until their ship comes home, which we know it never will! Ourfathers forever racking their five wits in the pursuit of an idea! Ourmothers forever racking theirs to save money and make both endsmeet!... Why, Mr. Ibbetson, you are nearer to the _rossignol_ than I am.Do you remember your father's voice? Shall I ever forget it! He sang tome only last night, and in the midst of my harrowing anxiety about you Iwas beguiled into listening outside the window. He sang Rossini's_'Cujus Animam.'_ He _was_ the nightingale; that was his vocation, if hecould but have known it. And you are my brother Bohemian; that is_yours!_ ... Ah, _my_ vocation! It was to be the wife of some busybrain-worker--man of science--conspirator--writer--artist--architect,if you like; to fence him round and shield him from all the littleworries and troubles and petty vexations of life. I am a woman ofbusiness _par excellence_--a manager, and all that. He would have had awarm, well-ordered little nest to come home to after hunting his idea!

  "Well, I thought myself the most unhappy woman alive, and wrapped myselfup in my affection for my much-afflicted little son; and as I held himto my breast, and vainly tried to warm and mesmerize him into feelingand intelligence, Gogo came back into my heart, and I was foreverthinking, 'Oh, if I had a son like Gogo what a happy woman I should be!'and pitied Madame Pasquier for dying and leaving him so soon, for I hadjust begun to dream true, and had seen Gogo and his sweet motheronce again.

  "And then one night--one never-to-be-forgotten night--I went to LadyGray's concert, and saw you standing in a corner by yourself; and Ithought, with a leap of my heart, 'Why, that must be Gogo, grown dark,and with a beard and mustache like a Frenchman!' But alas, I found thatyou were only a Mr. Ibbetson, Lady Cray's architect, whom she had askedto her house because he was 'quite the handsomest young man she hadever seen!'

  "You needn't laugh. You looked very nice, I assure you!

  "Well, Mr. Ibbetson, although you were not Gogo, you became suddenly sointeresting to me that I never forgot you--you were never quite out ofmy mind. I wanted to counsel and advise you, and take you by the hand,and be an elder sister to you, for I felt myself already older than youin the world and its ways. I wanted to be twenty years older still, andto have you for my son. I don't know _what_ I wanted! You seemed solonely, and fresh, and unspotted from the world, among all those smartworldlings, and yet so big and strong and square and invincible--oh, sostrong! And then you looked at me with such sincere and sweet andchivalrous admiration and sympathy--there, I cannot speak of it--andthen you were _so_ like what Gogo might have become! Oh, you made aswarm and devoted a friend of me at first sight as any one might desire!

  "And at the same time you made me feel so self-conscious and shy that Idared not ask to be introduced to you--I, who scarcely know whatshyness is.

  "Dear Giulia Grisi sang '_Sedut' al Pie d' un' Salice,' and that tunehas always been associated in my mind with your tongue ever since, andalways will be. Your dear mother used to play it on the harp. Doyou remember?

  "Then came that extraordinary dream, which you remember as well as I do:_wasn't_ it a wonder? You see, my dear father had learned a strangesecret of the brain--how in sleep to recall past things and people andplaces as they had once been seen or known by him--even unrememberedthings. He called it 'dreaming true,' and by long practice, he told me,he had brought the art of doing this to perfection. It was the oneconsolation of his troubled life to go over and over again in sleep allhis happy youth and childhood, and the few short years he had spent withhis beloved young wife. And before he died, when he saw I had become sounhappy that life seemed to have no longer any possible hope of pleasurefor me, he taught me his very simple secret.

  "Thus have I revisited in sleep every place I have ever lived in, andespecially this, the beloved spot where I first as a little girlknew _you_!"

  That night when we met again in our common dream I was looking at theboys from Saindou's school going to their _premiere communion_, andthinking very much of you, as I had seen you, when awake, a few hoursbefore, looking out of the window at the 'Tete Noire;' when you suddenlyappeared in great seeming trouble and walking like a tipsy man; and myvision was disturbed by the shadow of a prison--alas! alas!--and twolittle jailers jingling their keys and trying to hem you in.

  My emotion at seeing you again so soon was so great that I nearly woke.But I rescued you from your imaginary terrors and held you by the hand.You remember all the rest.

  I could not understand why you should be in my dream, as I had almostalways dreamed true--that is, about things that _had_ been in mylife--not about things that _might_ be; nor could I account for thesolidity of your hand, nor understand why you didn't fade away when Itook it, and blur the dream. It was a most perplexing mystery thattroubled many hours of both my waking and sleeping life. Then came thatmeeting with you at Cray, and part of the mystery was accounted for, foryou were my old friend Gogo, after all. But it is still a mystery, anawful mystery, that two people should meet as we are meeting now in oneand the same dream--should dovetail so accurately into each other'sbrains. What a link between us two, Mr. Ibbetson, already linked bysuch memories!

  After meeting you at Cray I felt that I must never meet you again,either waking or dreaming. The discovery that you were Gogo, after all,combined with the preoccupation which as a mere stranger you had alreadycaused me for so long, created such a disturbance in my spiritthat--that--there, you must try and imagine it for yourself.

  Even before that revelation at Cray I had often known you were here inmy dream, and I had carefully avoided you ... though little dreamingyou were here in your own dream too! Often from that littledormer-window up there I have seen you wandering about the park andavenue in seeming search of _me_, and wondered why and how you came. Youdrove me into attics and servants' bedrooms to conceal myself from you.It was quite a game of hide-and-seek--_cache-cache_, as we used tocall it.

  But after our meeting at Cray I felt there must be no more_cache-cache_; I avoided coming here at all; you drove me awayaltogether.

  Now try to imagine what I felt when the news of your terrible quarrelwith Mr. Ibbetson burst upon the world. I was beside myself! I came herenight after night; I looked for you everywhere--in the park, in the Boisde Boulogne, at the Mare d'Auteuil, at St. Cloud--in every place I couldthink of! And now here you are at last--at last!

  Hush! Don't speak yet! I have soon done!

  Six months ago I lost my poor little son, and, much as I loved him, Icannot wish him back again. In a fortnight I shall be legally separatedfrom my wretched husband--I shall be quite alone in the world! And then,Mr. Ibbetson--oh, _then_, dearest friend that child or woman everhad--every hour that I can steal from my waking existence shallhenceforward be devoted to you as long as both of us live, and sleep thesame hours out of the twenty-four. My one object and endeavor shall beto make up for the wreck of your sweet and valuable young life. 'Stonewalls shall not a prison make, nor iron bars a cage!' [And here shelaughed and cried together, so that her eyes, closing up, squeezed outher tears, and I thought, "Oh, that I might drink them!"]

  And now I will leave you. I am a weak and loving woman, and must notstay by your side till I can do so without too much self-reproach.

  And indeed I feel I shall soon fall awake from sheer exhaustion of joy.Oh, selfish and jealous wretch that I am, to talk of joy!

  "I cannot help rejoicing that no other woman can be to you what I hopeto be. No other woman can ever come _
near_ you! I am your tyrant andyour slave--your calamity has made you mine forever; but all mylife--all--all--shall be spent in trying to make you forget yours, and Ithink I shall succeed."

  "Oh, don't make such dreadful haste!" I exclaimed. "Am _I_ dreamingtrue? What is to prove all this to me when I wake? Either I am the mostabject and wretched of men, or life will never have another unhappymoment. How am I to _know_?'

  "Listen. Do you remember 'Parva sed Apta, le petit pavilion,' as youused to call it? That is still my home when I am here. It shall beyours, if you like, when the time comes. You will find much to interestyou there. Well, to-morrow early, in your cell, you will receive from mean envelope with a slip of paper in it, containing some violets, and thewords 'Parva sed Apta--a bientot' written in violet ink. Will thatconvince you?"

  "Oh yes, yes!"

  "Well, then, give me your hands, dearest and best--both hands! I shallsoon be here again, by this apple-tree; I shall count the hours.Good-bye!" and she was gone, and I woke.

  I woke to the gaslit darkness of my cell. It was just before dawn. Oneof the warders asked me civilly if I wanted anything, and gave me adrink of water.

  I thanked him quietly, and recalled what had just happened to me, with awonder, an ecstasy, for which I can find no words.

  No, it had _not_ been a _dream_--of that I felt quite sure--not in anyone single respect; there had been nothing of the dream about it exceptits transcendent, ineffable enchantment.

  Every inflexion of that beloved voice, with its scarcely perceptibleforeign accent that I had never noticed before; every animated gesture,with its subtle reminiscence of both her father and her mother; herblack dress trimmed with gray; her black and gray hat; the scent ofsandal-wood about her--all were more distinctly and vividly impressedupon me than if she had just been actually, and in the flesh, at mybedside. Her tones still rang in my ears. My eyes were full of her: nowher profile, so pure and chiselled; now her full face, with her grayeyes (sometimes tender and grave and wet with tears, sometimes halfclosed in laughter) fixed on mine; her lithe sweet body curved forward,as she sat and clasped her knees; her arched and slender smooth straightfeet so delicately shod, that seemed now and then to beat time toher story....

  And then that strange sense of the transfusion of life at the touchingof the hands! Oh, it was _no dream_! Though what it was Icannot tell....

  I turned on my side, happy beyond expression, and fell asleep again--adreamless sleep that lasted till I was woke and told to dress.

  "MY EYES WERE FULL OF HER."]

  Some breakfast was brought to me, and _with it an envelope, open, whichcontained some violets, and a slip of paper, scented with sandal-wood,on which were written, in violet ink, the words--

  "Parva sed Apla--a bientot!Tarapatapoum."_

  I will pass over the time that elapsed between my sentence and itscommutation; the ministrations and exhortations of the good chaplain;the kind and touching farewells of Mr. and Mrs. Lintot, who had alsobelieved that I was Ibbetson's son (I undeceived them); the visit of myold friend Mrs. Deane ... and her strange passion of gratitude andadmiration.

  I have no doubt it would all be interesting enough, if properlyremembered and ably told. But it was all too much like adream--anybody's dream--not one of _mine_--all too slight and flimsy tohave left an abiding remembrance, or to matter much.

  In due time I was removed to the jail at----, and bade farewell to theworld, and adapted myself to the conditions of my new outer life with agood grace and with a very light heart.

  The prison routine, leaving the brain so free and unoccupied; thehealthy labor, the pure air, the plain, wholesome food were delightfulto me--a much-needed daily mental rest after the tumultuous emotions ofeach night.

  For I was soon back again in Passy, where I spent every hour of mysleep, you may be sure, never very far from the old apple-tree, whichwent through all its changes, from bare bough to tender shoots andblossoms, from blossom to ripe fruit, from fruit to yellow falling leaf,and then to bare boughs again, and all in a few peaceful nights, whichwere my days. I flatter myself by this time that I know the habits of aFrench apple-tree, and its caterpillars!

  And all the dear people I loved, and of whom I could never tire, wereabout--all but one. _The_ One!

  At last she arrived. The garden door was pushed, the bell rang, and shecame across the lawn, radiant and tall and swift, and opened wide herarms. And there, with our little world around us--all that we had everloved and cared for, but quite unseen and unheard by them--for the firsttime in my life since my mother and Madame Seraskier had died I held awoman in my arms, and she pressed her lips to mine.

  "AT LAST SHE ARRIVED."]

  Round and round the lawn we walked and talked, as we had often donefifteen, sixteen, twenty years ago. There were many things to say. "TheCharming Prince" and the "Fairy Tarapatapoum" were "prettily welltogether"--at last!

  The time sped quickly--far too quickly. I said--

  "You told me I should see your house--'Parva sed Apta'--that I shouldfind much to interest me there." ...

  She blushed a little and smiled, and said--

  "You mustn't expect _too_ much," and we soon found ourselves walkingthither up the avenue. Thus we had often walked as children, and once--amemorable once--besides.

  There stood the little white house with its golden legend, as I had seenit a thousand times when a boy--a hundred since.

  How sweet and small it looked in the mellow sunshine! We mounted thestone _perron_, and opened the door and entered. My heart beatviolently.

  Everything was as it had always been, as far as I could see. Dr.Seraskier sat in a chair by the window reading Schiller, and took nonotice of us. His hair moved in the gentle breeze. Overhead we heard therooms being swept and the beds made.

  I followed her into a little lumber-room, where I did not remember tohave been before; it was full of odds and ends.

  "Why have you brought me here?" I asked.

  She laughed and said--

  "Open the door in the wall opposite."

  There was no door, and I said so.

  Then she took my hand, and lo! there _was_ a door! And she pushed, andwe entered another suite of apartments that never could have been therebefore; there had never been room for them--nor ever could have been--inall Passy!

  "'AND NEUHA LED HER TORQUIL BY THE HAND.'"]

  "Come," she said, laughing and blushing at once; for she seemed nervousand excited and shy--do you remember--

  'And Neuha led her Torquil by the hand, And waved along the vault her flaming brand!'

  --do you remember your little drawing out of _The Island_, in the greenmorocco Byron? Here it is, in the top drawer of this beautiful cabinet.Here are all the drawings you ever did for me--plain and colored--withdates, explanations, etc., all written by myself--_l'album de la feeTarapatapoum_. They are only duplicates. I have the real ones at myhouse in Hampshire.

  The cabinet also is a duplicate;--isn't it a beauty?--it's from theCzar's Winter Palace. Everything here is a duplicate, more or less. See,this is a little dining-room;--did you ever see anything so perfect?--itis the famous _salle a manger_ of Princesse de Chevagne. I never use it,except now and then to eat a slice of English household bread withFrench butter and 'cassonade.' Little Mimsey, out there, does sosometimes, when Gogo brings her one, and it makes big Mimsey's mouthwater to see her, so she has to go and do likewise. Would you likea slice?

  You see the cloth is spread, _deux couverts_. There is a bottle offamous champagne from Mr. De Rothschild's; there's plenty more wherethat came from. The flowers are from Chatsworth, and this is a lobstersalad for _you_. Papa was great at lobster salads and taught me. I mixedit myself a fortnight ago, and, as you see, it is as fresh and sweet asif I had only just made it, and the flowers haven't faded a bit.

  Here are cigarettes and pipes and cigars. I hope they are good. I don'tsmoke myself.

  Isn't all the furniture rare and beautiful? I have robbed every palacein Europe of its
very best, and yet the owners are not a penny theworse. You should see up-stairs.

  Look at those pictures--the very pick of Raphael and Titian andVelasquez. Look at that piano--I have heard Liszt play upon it over andover again, in Leipsic!

  Here is my library. Every book I ever read is there, and every bindingI ever admired. I don't often read them, but I dust them carefully. I'vearranged that dust shall fall on them in the usual way to make it real,and remind one of the outer life one is so glad to leave. All has to betaken very seriously here, and one must put one's self to a littletrouble. See, here is my father's microscope, and under it a smallspider caught on the premises by myself. It is still alive. It seemscruel, doesn't it? but it only exists in our brains.

  Look at the dress I've got on--feel it; how every detail is worked out.And you have unconsciously done the same: that's the suit you wore thatmorning at Cray under the ash-tree--the nicest suit I ever saw. Here isa spot of ink on your sleeve as real as can be (bravo!). And this buttonis coming off--quite right; I will sew it on with a dream needle, anddream thread, and a dream thimble!

  This little door leads to every picture-gallery in Europe. It took me along time to build and arrange them all by myself--quite a week ofnights. It is very pleasant to walk there with a good catalogue, andmake it rain cats and dogs outside.

  Through this curtain is an opera box--the most comfortable one I'veever been in; it does for theatres as well, and oratorios and concertsand scientific lectures. You shall see from it every performance I'veever been at, in half a dozen languages; you shall hold my hand andunderstand them all. Every singer that I ever heard, you shall hear.Dear Giulia Grisi shall sing the 'Willow Song' again and again, and youshall hear the applause. Ah, what applause!

  Come into this little room--my favorite; out of _this_ window and downthese steps we can walk or drive to any place you or I have ever beento, and other places besides. Nothing is far, and we have only to gohand in hand. I don't know yet where my stables and coach-houses are;you must help me to find out. But so far I have never lacked a carriageat the bottom of those steps when I wanted to drive, nor a steam-launch,nor a gondola, nor a lovely place to go to.

  Out of _this_ window, from this divan, we can sit and gaze on whateverwe like. What shall it be? Just now, you perceive, there is a wild andturbulent sea, with not a ship in sight. Do you hear the waves tumblingand splashing, and see the albatross? I had been reading Keats's 'Ode tothe Nightingale,' and was so fascinated by the idea of a lattice openingon the foam

  '_Of perilous seas by faery lands forlorn_'

  that I thought it would be nice to have a lattice like that myself. Itried to evolve that sea from my inner consciousness, you know, orrather from seas that I have sailed over. Do you like it? It was done afortnight ago, and the waves have been tumbling about ever since. Howthey roar! and hark at the wind! I couldn't manage the 'faery lands.' Itwants one lattice for the sea, and one for the land, I'm afraid. Youmust help me. Mean while, what would you like there tonight--theYosemite Valley? the Nevski Prospect in the winter, with the sledges?the Rialto? the Bay of Naples after sunset, with Vesuvius in eruption?...

  --"Oh Mary--Mimsey--what do I care for Vesuvius, and sunsets, and theBay of Naples ... _just now_? ... Vesuvius is in my heart!"

  * * * * *

  Thus began for us both a period of twenty-five years, during which wepassed eight or nine hours out of the twenty-four in each other'scompany--except on a few rare occasions, when illness or some othercause prevented one of us from sleeping at the proper time.

  Mary! Mary!

  I idolized her while she lived; I idolize her memory.

  For her sake all women are sacred to me, even the lowest and mostdepraved and God-forsaken. They always found a helping friend in _her_.

  How can I pay a fitting tribute to one so near to me--nearer than anywoman can ever have been to any man?

  I know her mind as I know my own! No two human souls can ever haveinterpenetrated each other as ours have done, or we should have heard ofit. Every thought she ever had from her childhood to her death has beenrevealed--every thought of mine! Living as we did, it was inevitable.The touch of a finger was enough to establish the strange circuit, andwake a common consciousness of past and present, either hers or mine.

  And oh, how thankful am I that some lucky chance has preserved me,murderer and convict as I am, from anything she would have found itimpossible to condone!

  I try not to think that shyness and poverty, ungainliness and socialimbecility combined, have had as much to do as self-restraint andself-respect in keeping me out of so many pitfalls that have been fatalto so many men better and more gifted than myself.

  I try to think that her extraordinary affection, the chance result of apersistent impression received in childhood, has followed me throughlife without my knowing it, and in some occult, mysterious way has keptme from thoughts and deeds that would have rendered me unworthy, even inher too indulgent eyes.

  Who knows but that her sweet mother's farewell kiss and blessing, andthe tender tears she shed over me when I bade her good-bye at the avenuegate so many years ago, may have had an antiseptic charm? Mary! I havefollowed her from her sickly, suffering childhood to her girlhood--fromher half-ripe, gracefully lanky girlhood to the day of her retirementfrom the world of which she was so great an ornament. From girl to womanit seems like a triumphal procession through all the courts ofEurope--scenes the like of which I have never even dreamed--flattery andstrife to have turned the head of any princess! And she was the simpledaughter of a working scientist and physician--the granddaughter ofa fiddler.

  Yet even Austrian court etiquette was waived in favor of the child ofplain Dr. Seraskier.

  What men have I seen at her feet--how splendid, handsome, gallant,brilliant, chivalrous, lordly, and gay! And to all, from her, the samehappy geniality--the same kindly, laughing, frolicsome, innocent gayety,with never a thought of self.

  M. le Major was right--"elle avait toutes les intelligences de la teteet du coeur." And old and young, the best and the worst, seemed to loveand respect her alike--and women as well as men--for her perfectsincerity, her sweet reasonableness.

  And all this time I was plodding at my dull drawing-board inPentonville, carrying out another's designs for a stable or a pauper'scottage, and not even achieving that poor task particularly well!

  It would have driven me mad with humiliation and jealousy to see thispast life of hers, but we saw it all hand in hand together--the magicalcircuit was established! And I knew, as I saw, how it all affected her,and marvelled at her simplicity in thinking all this pomp and splendorof so little consequence.

  And I trembled to find that what space in her heart was not filled bythe remembrance of her ever-beloved mother and the image of her father(one of the noblest and best of men) enshrined the ridiculous figure ofa small boy in a white silk hat and an Eton jacket. And that smallboy was I!

  Then came a dreadful twelvemonth that I was fain to leave a blank--thetwelvemonth during which her girlish fancy for her husband lasted--andthen her life was mine again forever!

  And _my_ life!

  The life of a convict is not, as a rule, a happy one; his bed is notgenerally thought a bed of roses.

  Mine was!

  If I had been the most miserable leper that ever crawled to his wattledhut in Molokai, I should also have been the happiest of men, could sleepbut have found me there, and could I but sleeping have been the friendof sleeping Mary Seraskier. She would have loved me all the more!

  She has filled my long life of bondage with such felicity as no monarchhas ever dreamed, and has found her own felicity in doing so. That poor,plodding existence I led before my great misadventure, and have tried todescribe--she has witnessed almost every hour of it with passionateinterest and sympathy, as we went hand in hand together through eachother's past. She would at any time have been only too glad to share it,leaving her own.

  I dreaded the effect of su
ch a sordid revelation upon one who had livedso brilliantly and at such an altitude. I need have had no fear! Just asshe thought me an "angelic hero" at eight years old, she remainedpersuaded all through her life that I was an Apollo--a misunderstoodgenius--a martyr!

  I am sick with shame when I think of it. But I am not the first unworthymortal on whom blind, undiscriminating love has chosen to lavish itsmost priceless treasures. Tarapatapoum is not the only fairy who hasidealized a hulking clown with an ass's head into a Prince Charming;the spectacle, alas! is not infrequent. But at least I have been humblythankful for the undeserved blessing, and known its value. And,moreover, I think I may lay claim to one talent: that of also knowing byintuition when and where and how to love--in a moment--in aflash--and forever!

  Twenty-five years!

  It seems like a thousand, so much have we seen and felt and done in thatbusy enchanted quarter of a century. And yet how quickly the timehas sped!

  And now I must endeavor to give some account of our wonderful innerlife--_a deux_--a delicate and difficult task.

  There is both an impertinence and a lack of taste in any man's layingbare to the public eye--to any eye--the bliss that has come to himthrough the love of a devoted woman, with whose life his own hasbeen bound up.

  The most sympathetic reader is apt to be repelled by such arevelation--to be sceptical of the beauties and virtues and mental giftsof one he has never seen; at all events, to feel that they are noconcern of his, and ought to be the subject of a sacred reticence on thepart of her too fortunate lover or husband.

  The lack of such reticence has marred the interest of many anautobiography--of many a novel, even; and in private life, who does notknow by painful experience how embarrassing to the listener such tenderconfidences can sometimes be? I will try my best not to transgress inthis particular. If I fail (I may have failed already), I can only pleadthat the circumstances are quite exceptional and not to be matched; andthat allowances must be made for the deep gratitude I owe and feel overand above even my passionate admiration and love.

  For the next three years of my life has nothing to show but thealternation of such honeymooning as never was before with a dull butcontented prison life, not one hour of which is worth recording, or evenremembering, except as a foil to its alternative.

  It had but one hour for me, the bed hour, and fortunately that was anearly one.

  Healthily tired in body, blissfully expectant in mind, I would lie on myback, with my hands duly crossed under my head, and sleep would soonsteal over me like balm; and before I had forgotten who and what andwhere I really was, I would reach the goal on which my will was intent,and waking up, find my body in another place, in another garb, on acouch by an enchanted window, still with my arms crossed behind myhead--in the sacramental attitude.

  Then would I stretch my limbs and slip myself free of my outer life, asa new-born butterfly from the durance of its self-spun cocoon, with anunutterable sense of youth and strength and freshness and felicity; andopening my eyes I would see on the adjacent couch the form of Mary, alsosupine, but motionless and inanimate as a statue. Nothing could wake herto life till the time came: her hours were somewhat later, and she wasstill in the toils of the outer life I had just left behind me.

  And these toils, in her case, were more complicated than in mine.Although she had given up the world, she had many friends and an immensecorrespondence. And then, being a woman endowed with boundless healthand energy, splendid buoyancy of animal spirits, and a great capacityfor business, she had made for herself many cares and occupations.

  She was the virtual mistress of a home for fallen women, a reformatoryfor juvenile thieves, and a children's convalescent hospital--to all ofwhich she gave her immediate personal superintendence, and almost everypenny she had. She had let her house in Hampshire, and lived with acouple of female servants in a small furnished house on Campden Hill.She did without a carriage, and went about in cabs and omnibuses,dressed like a daily governess, though nobody could appear more regallymagnificent than she did when we were together.

  She still kept her name and title, as a potent weapon of influence onbehalf of her charities, and wielded it mercilessly in her constant raidon the purse of the benevolent Philistine, who is fond of great people.

  All of which gave rise to much comment that did not affect herequanimity in the least.

  She also attended lectures, committees, boards, and councils; openedbazaars and soup kitchens and coffee taverns, etc. The list of herself-imposed tasks was endless. Thus her outer life was filled tooverflowing, and, unlike mine, every hour of it was worth record--as Iwell know, who have witnessed it all. But this is not the place in whichto write the outer life of the Duchess of Towers; another hand has donethat, as everybody knows.

  Every page henceforward must be sacred to Mary Seraskier, the "feeTarapatapoum" of "Magna sed Apta" (for so we had called the new homeand palace of art she had added on to "Parva sed Apta," the home of herchildhood).

  To return thither, where we left her lying unconscious. Soon the colorwould come back to her cheeks, the breath to her nostrils, the pulse toher heart, and she would wake to her Eden, as she called it--our commoninner life--that we might spend it in each other's company for the nexteight hours.

  Pending this happy moment, I would make coffee (such coffee!), and smokea cigarette or two; and to fully appreciate the bliss of _that_ one mustbe an habitual smoker who lives his real life in an English jail.

  When she awoke from her sixteen hours' busy trance in the outer world,such a choice of pleasures lay before us as no other mortal has everknown. She had been all her life a great traveller, and had dwelt inmany lands and cities, and seen more of life and the world and naturethan most people. I had but to take her hand, and one of us had but towish, and, lo! wherever either of us had been, whatever either of us hadseen or heard or felt, or even eaten or drunk, there it was all overagain to choose from, with the other to share in it--such a hypnotism ofourselves and each other as was never dreamed of before.

  Everything was as life-like, as real to us both, as it had been toeither at the actual time of its occurrence, with an added freshness andcharm that never belonged to mortal existence. It was no dream; it was asecond life, a better land.

  We had, however, to stay within certain bounds, and beware oftransgressing certain laws that we discovered for ourselves, but couldnot quite account for. For instance, it was fatal to attempt exploitsthat were outside of our real experience; to fly, or to jump from aheight, or do any of these non-natural things that make the charm andwonder of ordinary dreams. If we did so our true dream was blurred, andbecame as an ordinary dream--vague, futile, unreal, and untrue--thebaseless fabric of a vision. Nor must we alter ourselves in any way;even to the shape of a finger-nail, we must remain ourselves; althoughwe kept ourselves at our very best, and could choose what age we shouldbe. We chose from twenty-six to twenty-eight, and stuck to it.

  Yet there were many things, quite as impossible in real life, that wecould do with impunity--most delightful things!

  For instance, after the waking cup of coffee, it was certainlydelightful to spend a couple of hours in the Yosemite Valley, leisurelystrolling about and gazing at the giant pines--a never-palling source ofdelight to both of us--breathing the fragrant fresh air, looking at ourfellow-tourists and listening to their talk, with the agreeableconsciousness that, solid and substantial as we were to each other, wewere quite inaudible, invisible, and intangible to them. Often we woulddispense with the tourists, and have the Yosemite Valley all toourselves. (Always there, and in whatever place she had visited with herhusband, we would dispense with the figure of her former self and him, asight I could not have borne.)

  When we had strolled and gazed our fill, it was delightful again, justby a slight effort of her will and a few moments' closing of our eyes,to find ourselves driving along the Via Cornice to an exquisite gardenconcert in Dresden, or being rowed in a gondola to a Saturday Pop at St.James's Hall. And thence, jumping
into a hansom, we would be whiskedthrough Piccadilly and the park to the Arc de Triomphe home to "Magnased Apta," Rue de la Pompe, Passy (a charming drive, and not a bit toolong), just in time for dinner.

  A very delicious little dinner, judiciously ordered out of _her_remembrance, not _mine_ (and served in the most exquisite littledining-room in all Paris--the Princesse de Chevagne's): "huitresd'Ostende," let us say, and "soupe a la bonne femme," with a "perdrixaux choux" to follow, and pancakes, and "fromage de Brie;" and to drink,a bottle of "Romane Conti;" without even the bother of waiters to changethe dishes; a wish, a moment's shutting of the eyes--_augenblick_! andit was done--and then we could wait on each other.

  After my prison fare, and with nothing but tenpenny London dinners torecollect in the immediate past, I trust I shall not be thought a grossmaterialist for appreciating these small banquets, and in such company.(The only dinner I could recall which was not a tenpenny one, except theold dinners of my childhood, was that famous dinner at Cray, where I haddiscovered that the Duchess of Towers was Mimsey Seraskier, and I didnot eat much of _that_.)

  Then a cigarette and a cup of coffee, and a glass of curacoa; and after,to reach our private box we had but to cross the room and lifta curtain.

  And there before us was the theatre or opera-house brilliantly lighted,and the instruments tuning up, and the splendid company pouring in:crowned heads, famous beauties, world-renowned warriors and statesmen,Garibaldi, Gortschakoff, Cavour, Bismarck, and Moltke, now so famous,and who not? Mary would point them out to me. And in the next box Dr.Seraskier and his tall daughter, who seemed friends with all thatbrilliant crowd.

  Now it was St. Petersburg, now Berlin, now Vienna, Paris, Naples, Milan,London--every great city in turn. But our box was always the same, andalways the best in the house, and I the one person privileged to smokemy cigar in the face of all that royalty, fashion, and splendor.

  Then, after the overture, up went the curtain. If it was a play, and theplay was in German or Russian or Italian, I had but to touch Mary'slittle finger to understand it all--a true but incomprehensible thing.For well as I might understand, I could not have spoken a word ofeither, and the moment that slight contact was discontinued, they mightas well have been acting in Greek or Hebrew, for _me_.

  But it was for music we cared the most, and I think I may say that ofmusic during those three years (and ever after) we have had our glut.For all through her busy waking life Mary found time to hear whatevergood music was going on in London, that she might bring it back to me atnight; and we would rehear it together, again and again, and _da capo_.

  It is a rare privilege for two private individuals, and one of them aconvict, to assist at a performance honored by the patronage andpresence of crowned heads, and yet be able to encore any particularthing that pleases them. How often have we done that!

  Oh, Joachim! oh, Clara Schumann! oh, Piattil--all of whom I know sowell, but have never heard with the fleshly ear! Oh, others, whom itwould be invidious to mention without mentioning all--a glorious list!How we have made you, all unconscious, repeat the same movements overand over again, without ever from you a sign of impatience or fatigue!How often have we summoned Liszt to play to us on his own favoritepiano, which adorned our own favorite sitting-room! How little he knew(or will ever know now, alas!) what exquisite delight he gave us!

  Oh, Pattit, Angelina! Oh, Santley and Sims Reeves! Oh, De Soria,nightingale of the drawing-room, I wonder you have a note left!

  And you, Ristori, and you, Salvini, et vous, divine Sarah, qui debutiezalors! On me dit que votre adorable voix a perdu un peu de sa premierefraicheur. Cela ne m'etonne pas! Bien sur, nous y sommes pourquelque chose!

  * * * * *

  And then the picture-galleries, the museums, the botanical andzoological gardens of all countries--"Magna sed Apta" had space for themall, even to the Elgin Marbles room of the British Museum, which Iadded myself.

  What enchanted hours have we spent among the pictures and statues of theworld, weeding them here and there, perhaps, or hanging themdifferently, or placing them in what we thought a better light! The"Venus of Milo" showed to far greater advantage in "Magna sed Apta" thanat the Louvre.

  And when busied thus delightfully at home, and to enhance the delight,we made it shocking bad weather outside; it rained cats and dogs, orelse the north wind piped, and snow fell on the desolate gardens of"Magna sed Apta," and whitened the landscape as far as eye could see.

  Nearest to our hearts, however, were many pictures of our own time, forwe were moderns of the moderns, after all, in spite of our efforts ofself-culture.

  There was scarcely a living or recently living master in Europe whosebest works were not in our possession, so lighted and hung that even themasters themselves would have been content; for we had plenty of spaceat our command, and each picture had a wall to itself, so toned as to dofull justice to its beauty, and a comfortable sofa for twojust opposite.

  But in the little room we most lived in, the room with the magic window,we had crowded a few special favorites of the English school, for we hadso much foreign blood in us that we were more British than John Bullhimself--_plus royalistes que le Roi_.

  There was Millais's "Autumn Leaves," his "Youth of Sir Walter Raleigh,"his "Chill October"; Watts's "Endymion," and "Orpheus and Eurydice";Burne-Jones's "Chant d'Amour," and his "Laus Veneris"; Alma-Tadema's"Audience of Agrippa," and the "Women of Amphissa"; J. Whistler'sportrait of his mother; the "Venus and Aesculapius," by E. J. Poynter;F. Leighton's "Daphnephoria"; George Mason's "Harvest Moon"; andFrederic Walker's "Harbor of Refuge," and, of course, Merridew's"Sun-God."

  While on a screen, designed by H. S. Marks, and exquisitely decoratedround the margin with golden plovers and their eggs (which I adore),were smaller gems in oil and water-color that Mary had fallen in lovewith at one time or another. The immortal "Moonlight Sonata," byWhistler; E, J. Poynter's exquisite "Our Lady of the Fields" (datedParis, 1857); a pair of adorable "Bimbi" by V. Prinsep, who seems veryfond of children; T. R. Lamont's touching "L'Apres Diner de l'AbbeConstantin," with the sweet girl playing the old spinet; and thatadmirable work of T. Armstrong, in his earlier and more realisticmanner, "Le Zouave et la Nounou," not to mention splendid rough sketchesby John Leech, Charles Keene, Tenniel, Sambourne, Furniss, Caldecott,etc.; not to mention, also, endless little sketches in silver point of amost impossibly colossal, blackavised, shaggy-coated St. Bernard--signedwith the familiar French name of some gay troubadour of the pencil, somestray half-breed like myself, and who seems to have loved his dog asmuch as I loved mine.

  Then suddenly, in the midst of all this unparalleled artistic splendor,we felt that a something was wanting. There was a certain hollownessabout it; and we discovered that in our case the principal motives forcollecting all these beautiful things were absent.

  1. We were not the sole possessors. 2. We had nobody to show them to. 3. Therefore we could take no pride in them.

  THE NURSERY SCHOOL-ROOM.]

  And found that when we wanted bad weather for a change, and the joys ofhome, we could be quite as happy in my old school-room, where thesquirrels and the monkey and the hedgehog were, with each of us on acane-bottomed arm-chair by the wood-fire, each roasting chestnuts forthe other, and one book between us, for one of us to read out loud; or,better still, the morning and evening papers she had read a few hoursearlier; and marvellous to relate, she had not even _read_ them whenawake! she had merely glanced through them carefully, taking in theaspect of each column one after another, from top to bottom--and yet shewas able to read out every word from the dream-paper she held in herhands--thus truly chewing the very cud of journalism!

  This always seemed to us, in a small but practical way, the mostcomplete and signal triumph of mind over matter we had yet achieved.

  Not, indeed, that we could read much, we had so much to talk about.

  Unfortunately, the weak part of "Magna sed Apta" was its library.Naturally it could only consist of book
s that one or the other of us hadread when awake. She had led such an active life that but little leisurehad been left her for books, and I had read only as an every-day youngman reads who is fond of reading.

  However, such books as we _had_ read were made the most of, and somagnificently bound that even their authors would have blushed withpride and pleasure had they been there to see. And though we had littletime for reading them over again, we could enjoy the true bibliophilousdelight of gazing at their backs, and taking them down and fingeringthem and putting them carefully back again.

  In most of these treats, excursions, festivities, and pleasures of thefireside, Mary was naturally leader and hostess; it could scarcely havebeen otherwise.

  There was once a famous Mary, of whom it was said that to know her was aliberal education. I think I may say that to have known Mary Seraskierhas been all that to me!

  But now and then I would make some small attempt at returning herhospitality.

  We have slummed together in Clerkenwell, Smithfield, Cow Cross,Petticoat Lane, Ratcliffe Highway, and the East India and WestIndia docks.

  She has been with me to penny gaffs and music-halls; to Greenwich Fair,and Cremorne and Rosherville gardens--and liked them all. She knewPentonville as well as I do; and my old lodgings there, where we haveboth leaned over my former shoulder as I read or drew. It was she whorescued from oblivion my little prophetic song about "The Chime," whichI had quite forgotten. She has been to Mr. Lintot's parties, and foundthem most amusing--especially Mr. Lintot.

  And going further back into the past, she has roamed with me all overParis, and climbed with me the towers of Notre Dame, and looked in vainfor the mystic word [Greek: Anagkae]!

  But I had also better things to show, untravelled as I was.

  She had never seen Hampstead Heath, which I knew by heart; and HampsteadHeath at any time, but especially on a sunny morning in late October, isnot to be disdained by any one.

  Half the leaves have fallen, so that one can see the fading glory ofthose that remain; yellow and brown and pale and hectic red, shininglike golden guineas and bright copper coins against the rich, dark,business-like green of the trees that mean to flourish all the winterthrough, like the tall slanting pines near the Spaniards, and the oldcedar-trees, and hedges of yew and holly, for which the Hampsteadgardens are famous.

  Before us lies a sea of fern, gone a russet-brown from decay, in whichare isles of dark green gorse, and little trees with little scarlet andorange and lemon-colored leaflets fluttering down, and running aftereach other on the bright grass, under the brisk west wind which makesthe willows rustle, and turn up the whites of their leaves in piousresignation to the coming change.

  Harrow-on-the-Hill, with its pointed spire, rises blue in the distance;and distant ridges, like receding waves, rise into blueness, one afterthe other, out of the low-lying mist; the last ridge bluely melting intospace. In the midst of it all gleams the Welsh Harp Lake, like a pieceof sky that has become unstuck and tumbled into the landscape with itsshiny side up.

  On the other side, all London, with nothing but the gilded cross of St.Paul's on a level with the eye; it lies at our feet, as Paris used to dofrom the heights of Passy, a sight to make true dreamers gaze and thinkand dream the more; and there we sit thinking and dreaming and gazingour fill, hand in hand, our spirits rushing together.

  Once as we sat we heard the clatter of hoofs behind us, and there was atroop of my old regiment out exercising. Invisible to all but ourselves,and each other, we watched the wanton troopers riding by on their meekblack chargers.

  First came the cornet--a sunny-haired Apollo, a gilded youth, gracefuland magnificent to the eye--careless, fearless, but stupid, harsh, andproud--an English Phebus de Chateaupers--the son of a great contractor;I remembered him well, and that he loved me not. Then the rank and filein stable jackets, most of them (but for a stalwart corporal here andthere) raw, lanky youths, giving promise of much future strength, andeach leading a second horse; and among them, longest and lankiest ofthem all, but ruddy as a ploughboy, and stolidly whistling _"On revienttoujours a ses premiers amours,"_ rode my former self--a sight (orsound) that seemed to touch some tender chord in Mary's nature, wherethere were so many, since it filled her eyes with tears.

  To describe in full a honey-moon filled with such adventures, and thatlasted for three years, is unnecessary. It would be but anothersuperficial record of travel, by another unskilled pen. And what a penis wanted for such a theme! It was not mere life, it was the very creamand essence of life, that we shared with each other--all the toil andtrouble, the friction and fatigue, left out. The necessary earthlyjourney through time and space from one joy to another was omitted,unless such a journey were a joy in itself.

  For instance, a pleasant hour can be spent on the deck of a splendidsteamer, as it cleaves its way through a sapphire tropical sea, boundfor some lovely West Indian islet; with a good cigar and the dearestcompanion in the world, watching the dolphins and the flying-fish, andmildly interesting one's self in one's fellow-passengers, the captain,the crew. And then, the hour spent and the cigar smoked out, it is wellto shut one's eyes and have one's self quietly lowered down the side ofthe vessel into a beautiful sledge, and then, half smothered in costlyfurs, to be whirled along the frozen Neva to a ball at the WinterPalace, there to valse with one's Mary among all the beauty and chivalryof St. Petersburg, and never a soul to find fault with one's valsing,which at first was far from perfect, or one's attire, which was not thatof the fashionable world of the day, nor was Mary's either. We wereaesthetic people, and very Greek, who made for ourselves fashions of ourown, which I will not describe.

  ]

  Where have we not waltzed together, from Buckingham Palace downward? Iconfess I grew to take a delight in valsing, or waltzing, or whatever itis properly called; and although it is not much to boast of, I may saythat after a year or two no better dancer than I was to be found inall Vienna.

  And here, by the way, I may mention what pleasure it gave me (hand inhand with Mary, of course, as usual) to renew and improve myacquaintance with our British aristocracy, begun so agreeably many yearsago at Lady Cray's concert.

  Our British aristocracy does not waltz well by any means, and lackslightness generally; but it may gratify and encourage some of itsmembers to hear that Peter Ibbetson (ex-private soldier, architect andsurveyor, convict and criminal lunatic), who has had unrivalledopportunities for mixing with the cream of European society, considersour British aristocracy quite the best-looking, best-dressed, andbest-behaved aristocracy of them all, and the most sensible and theleast exclusive--perhaps the most sensible _because_ the leastexclusive.

  It often snubs, but does not altogether repulse, those gifted andprivileged outsiders who (just for the honor and glory of the thing) areever so ready to flatter and instruct and amuse it, and run itserrands, and fetch and carry, and tumble for its pleasure, and even tomarry such of its "ugly ducklings" (or shall we say such of its"unprepossessing cygnets?") as cannot hope to mate with birds of theirown feather.

  For it has the true English eye for physical beauty.

  Indeed, it is much given to throw the handkerchief--successfully, ofcourse--and, most fortunately for itself, beyond the pale of its ownnarrow precincts--nay, beyond the broad Atlantic, even, to the landwhere beauty and dollars are to be found in such happy combination.

  Nor does it disdain the comeliness of the daughters of Israel, nor theirshekels, nor their brains, nor their ancient and most valuable blood. Itknows the secret virtue of that mechanical transfusion of fluidsfamiliar to science under the name of "endosmoses" and "exosmoses" (Ihope I have spelled them rightly), and practises the same. Whereby itshows itself wise in its generation, and will endure the longer, whichcannot be very long.

  Peter Ibbetson (etc., etc.), for one, wishes it no manner of harm.

  * * * * *

  But to return. With all these temptations of travel and amusement andsociety and the great world,
such was our insatiable fondness for "thepretty place of our childhood" and all its associations, that ourgreatest pleasure of all was to live our old life over again and again,and make Gogo and Mimsey and our parents and cousins and M. le Major gothrough their old paces once more; and to recall _new_ old paces forthem, which we were sometimes able to do, out of stray forgotten bits ofthe past; to hunt for which was the most exciting sport in the world.

  Our tenderness for these beloved shades increased with familiarity. Wecould see all the charm and goodness and kindness of these dear fathersand mothers of ours with the eyes of matured experience, for we werepretty much of an age with them now; no other children could ever say asmuch since the world began, and how few young parents could bear such ascrutiny as ours.

  Ah! what would we not have given to extort just a spark of recognition,but that was impossible; or to have been able to whisper just a word ofwarning, which would have averted the impending strokes of inexorablefate! They might have been alive now, perhaps--old indeed, but honoredand loved as no parents ever were before. How different everything wouldhave been! Alas! alas!

  And of all things in the world, we never tired of that walk through theavenue and park and Bois de Boulogne to the Mare d'Auteuil; strollingthere leisurely on an early spring afternoon, just in time to spend amidsummer hour or two on its bank, and watch the old water-rat and thedytiscus and the tadpoles and newts, and see the frogs jump; and thenwalking home at dusk in the school-room of my old home; and then back towar, well-lighted "Magna sed Apta" by moonlight through the avenue onNew Year's Eve, ankle-deep in snow; all in a few short hours.

  Dream winds and dream weathers--what an enchantment! And all real!

  Soft caressing rains that do not wet us if we do not wish them to; sharpfrosts that brace but never chill; blazing suns that neither scorchnor dazzle.

  Blustering winds of early spring, that seem to sweep right through thesesolid frames of ours, and thrill us to the very marrow with the oldheroic excitement and ecstasy we knew so well in happy childhood, butcan no longer feel now when awake!

  Bland summer breezes, heavy with the scent of long lost French woods andfields and gardens in full flower; swift, soft, moist equinoctial gales,blowing from the far-off orchards of Meudon, or the old market gardensof Suresnes in their autumnal decay, and laden, we do not know why, withstrange, mysterious, troubling reminiscence too subtle and elusive to beexpressed in any tongue--too sweet for any words! And then the darkDecember wind that comes down from the north, and brings the short,early twilights and the snow, and drives us home, pleasantly shivering,to the chimney-corner and the hissing logs--_chez nous!_

  It is the last night of an old year--_la veille du jour de l'an_.

  Ankle-deep in snow, we walk to warm, well-lighted "Magna sed Apta," upthe moonlit avenue. It is dream snow, and yet we feel it crunch beneathour feet; but if we turn to look, the tracks of our footsteps havedisappeared--and we cast no shadows, though the moon is full!

  M. le Major goes by, and Yverdon the postman, and Pere Francois, withhis big sabots, and others, and their footprints remain--and theirshadows are strong and sharp!

  They wish each other the compliments of the season as they meet andpass; they wish us nothing! We give them _la bonne annee_ at the tops ofour voices; they do not heed us in the least, though our voices are asresonant as theirs. We are wishing them a "Happy New Year," that dawnedfor good or evil nearly twenty years ago.

  Out comes Gogo from the Seraskiers', with Mimsey. He makes a snowballand throws it. It flies straight through me, and splashes itself on PereFrancois's broad back. "Ah, ce polisson de Monsieur Gogo ... attendez unpeu!" and Pere Francois returns the compliment--straight through meagain, as it seems; and I do not even feel it! Mary and I are as solidto each other as flesh and blood can make us. We cannot even touch thesedream people without their melting away into thin air; we can only hearand see them, but that in perfection!

  There goes that little Andre Corbin, the poulterer's son, running alongthe slippery top of Madame Pele's garden wall, which is nearly tenfeet high.

  "Good heavens," cries Mary, "stop him! Don't you remember? When he getsto the corner he'll fall down and break both his legs!"

  I rush and bellow out to him--

  "Descends donc, malheureux; tu vas te casser les deux jambes! Saute!saute!" ... I cry, holding out my arms. He does not pay the slightestattention: he reaches the corner, followed low down by Gogo and Mimsey,who are beside themselves with generous envy and admiration. Stimulatedby their applause, he becomes more foolhardy than ever, and even triesto be droll, and standing on one leg, sings a little song that begins--

  _"Maman m'a donne quat' sous Pour m'en aller a la foire, Non pas pourmanger ni boire, Alais pour m'regaler d'joujoux!"_

  Then suddenly down he slips, poor boy, and breaks both his legs belowthe knee on an iron rail, whereby he becomes a cripple for life.

  All this sad little tragedy of a New-year's Eve plays itself anew. Thesympathetic crowd collects; Mimsey and Gogo weep; the heart-brokenparents arrive, and the good little doctor Larcher; and Mary and I lookon like criminals, so impossible it seems not to feel that we might haveprevented it all!

  We two alone are alive and substantial in all this strange world ofshadows, who seem, as far as we can hear and see, no less substantialand alive than ourselves. They exist for us; we do not exist for them.We exist for each other only, waking or sleeping; for even the peopleamong whom our waking life is spent know hardly more of us, and what ourreal existence is, than poor little Andre Corbin, who has just brokenhis legs for us over again!

  And so, back to "Magna sed Apta," both saddened by this deplorablemisadventure, to muse and talk and marvel over these wonders; penetratedto the very heart's core by a dim sense of some vast, mysterious power,latent in the sub-consciousness of man--unheard of, undreamed of as yet,but linking him with the Infinite and the Eternal.

  And how many things we always had to talk about besides!

  Heaven knows, I am not a brilliant conversationalist, but she was themost easily amusable person in the world--interested in everything thatinterested me, and I disdamaged myself (to use one of herAnglo-Gallicisms) of the sulky silence of years.

  Of her as a companion it is not for me to speak. It would beimpertinent, and even ludicrous, for a person in my position to dilateon the social gifts of the famous Duchess of Towers.

  Incredible as it may appear, however, most of our conversation was aboutvery common and earthly topics--her homes and refuges, the difficultiesof their management, her eternal want of money, her many schemes andplans and experiments and failures and disenchantments--in all of whichI naturally took a very warm interest. And then my jail, and all thatoccurred there--in all of which I became interested myself because itinterested her so passionately; she knew every corner of it that I knew,every detail of the life there--the name, appearance, and history ofalmost every inmate, and criticised its internal economy with apractical knowledge of affairs; a business-like sagacity at which Inever ceased to marvel.

  One of my drollest recollections is of a visit shepaid there _in the flesh_, by some famous philanthropists of both sexes.I was interviewed by them all as the model prisoner, who, for hisunorthodoxy, was a credit to the institution. She listened demurely tomy intelligent answers when I was questioned as to my bodily health,etc., and asked whether I had any complaints to make. Complaints! Neverwas jail-bird so thoroughly satisfied with his nest--so healthy, sohappy, so well-behaved. She took notes all the time.

  MARY, DUCHESS OF TOWERS. From a photograph byStrlkzchuski, Warsaw.]

  Eight hours before we had been strolling hand in hand through the UffiziGallery in Florence; eight hours later we should be in eachother's arms.

  * * * * *

  Strange to relate, this happiness of ours--so deep, so acute, sotranscendent, so unmatched in all the history of human affection--wasnot always free of unreasonable longings and regrets. Man is never soblessed but w
hat he would have his blessedness still greater.

  The reality of our close companionship, of our true possession of eachother (during our allotted time), was absolute, complete, and thorough.No Darby that ever lived can ever have had sweeter, warmer, more tendermemories of any Joan than I have now of Mary Seraskier! Although eachwas, in a way, but a seeming illusion of the other's brain, the illusionwas no illusion for us. It was an illusion that showed the truth, asdoes the illusion of sight. Like twin kernels in one shell("Philipschen," as Mary called it), we touched at more points and werecloser than the rest of mankind (with each of them a separate shell ofhis own). We tried and tested this in every way we could devise, andnever found ourselves at fault, and never ceased to marvel at so great awonder. For instance, I received letters from her in jail (and answeredthem) in an intricate cipher we had invented and perfected togetherentirely during sleep, and referring to things that had happened to usboth when together.[A]

  [Footnote A: _Note_.--Several of these letters are in my possession.MADGE PLUNKET.]

  Our privileges were such as probably no human beings could have everenjoyed before. Time and space were annihilated for us at the mere wishof either--we lived in a palace of delight; all conceivable luxurieswere ours--and, better than all, and perennially, such freshness andelation as belong only to the morning of life--and such a love for eachother (the result of circumstances not to be paralleled) as time couldnever slake or quench till death should come and part us. All this, andmore, was our portion for eight hours out of twenty-four.

  So what must we do sometimes, but fret that the sixteen hours whichremained did not belong to us well; that we must live two-thirds of ourlives apart; that we could not share the toils and troubles of ourwork-a-day, waking existence, as we shared the blissful guerdon of ourseeming sleep--the glories of our common dream.

  And then we would lament the lost years we had spent in mutual ignoranceand separation--a deplorable waste of life; when life, sleeping orwaking, was so short.

  How different things might have been with us had we but known!

  We need never have lost sight and touch of each other; we might havegrown up, and learned and worked and struggled together from thefirst--boy and girl, brother and sister, lovers, man and wife--and yethave found our blessed dream-land and dwelt in it just the same.

  Children might have been born to us! Sweet children, _beaux comme lejour_, as in Madame Perrault's fairy tales; even beautiful and good astheir mother.

  And as we talked of these imaginary little beings and tried to picturethem, we felt in ourselves such a stupendous capacity for loving thesame that we would fall to weeping on each other's shoulders. Full wellI knew, even as if they had formed a part of my own personal experience,all the passion and tenderness, all the wasted anguish of her brief,ill-starred motherhood: the very ache of my jealousy that she shouldhave borne a child to another man was forgotten in that keen andthorough comprehension! Ah, yes ... that hungry love, that woful pity,which not to know is hardly quite to have lived! Childless as I am(though old enough to be a grandfather) I have it all by heart!

  Never could we hope for son or daughter of our own. For us the blessedflower of love in rich, profuse, unfading bloom; but its blessed fruitof life, never, never, never!

  Our only children were Mimsey and Gogo, between whom and ourselves wasan impassable gulf, and who were unconscious of our very existence,except for Mimsey's strange consciousness that a Fairy Tarapatapoum anda Prince Charming were watching over them.

  All this would always end, as it could not but end, in our realizing themore fully our utter dependence on each other for all that made life notonly worth living, ingrates that we were, but a heaven on earth for usboth; and, indeed, we could not but recognize that merely thus to loveand be loved was in itself a thing so immense (without all the otherblessings we had) that we were fain to tremble at our audacity in daringto wish for more.

  * * * * *

  Thus sped three years, and would have sped all the rest, perhaps, butfor an incident that made an epoch in our joint lives, and turned allour thoughts and energies in a new direction.