CHAPTER X
As the day drew near upon which Pearl expected to meet Hanson again allthings seemed, as if by some special arrangement with the Fates, toaccommodate themselves to her plans. She had intended to ask Seagreavefor the use of his private parlor among the pines, intimating that shedesired to retire thither to practice some new steps, and, lo! the nightbefore, after discussing weather probabilities with her father and Jose,he had decided to spend the greater part of the day in the villagelaying in a full stock of winter provisions.
Hughie also would be in the village, making arrangements for the eventof the evening and seeing that the piano was properly installed andtuned. Gallito would of course be at the Mont d'Or, and as for Jose, hehad announced his intention of assisting Mrs. Thomas in the making ofsome delicate and elaborate cakes, difficult of composition and of whichPearl was especially fond, and also of constructing certain deliciouspastries. No one could think of Jose as merely cooking; the results ofhis genius justified the use of such high-sounding words as "composing"or "constructing." Thus, his morning would be fully occupied.
Propitious Fates! Her pathway was smoothed before her; yet, alas! suchis the perversity of the human mind, that as the morning dawned, as theminutes ticked themselves away on the clock, as the hour drew near whenshe should again meet Hanson, after all these months of separation, herspirit grew heavier instead of lighter. There was a return oflistlessness and an indifference to his coming which constantlyincreased. She even felt indifferent to her own appearance.
At last, reluctantly, she threw a lace scarf about her head and,wrapping a long, crimson cloak about her, she left the cottage and tookher way slowly up the hill.
As it was yet far too early for her rendezvous she turned aside from themain road and followed the narrow mountain trail which led to the cabinoccupied by Mrs. Nitschkan and Mrs. Thomas. The gypsy, in her usualcareless, almost masculine attire, stood in the door of her cabin gazingout at the mountains in all their mellow and triumphant glory, theevanescent glory of late autumn. A pick and fishing rod lay across thedoor sill and a lean, flea-bitten dog dozed at her feet. Her arms wereakimbo and a pipe was thrust between her teeth.
Her quick ear caught the sound of Pearl's approach and suddenly herblue, twinkling gaze dropped from the hills to the trail which led toher door. Seeing who her visitor was, a smile of blended curiosity andwelcome crossed her face. "Howdy, Pearl," she called jovially, "come andset a spell." She removed the pick and fishing rod and dragged the dogout of the way. Through the open doorway Mrs. Thomas and Jose might beseen in the room beyond, bending over a table, evidently deeplyengrossed in the composition of some cakes.
"I can only stay a minute; I got a notion to walk this morning." Therewas a cool deviltry in the slanting gaze with which she surveyed theother woman.
"Seagreave, I'll bet," returned Mrs. Nitschkan frankly. "It ain't ineither you or Marthy Thomas to let a man alone. What possesses you,anyway?"
Pearl continued to regard her with that subtle, burning, mocking look."Your kind can never know," she taunted.
"Mebbe," said Mrs. Nitschkan laconically, "but you're different fromMarthy. She's just mush. She'll be thinkin' now that she's cracked aboutJose. If it wasn't him it would be your father, and if there wasn't noman up here at all, she'd hoist that crepe veil on her head, stick a redor blue bow at her neck and go swingin' down to camp, tryin' to persuadeherself an' me that all she went for was a package of tea or some bacon.But you're different, always a yellin' about bein' free and yet always atryin' to get tangled up."
Again Pearl laughed wickedly. "You tramp woman! Why would you ratherhunt bear or mountain lions than shoot squirrels? Because there's dangerin it." She laughed mirthlessly. "I guess it's for the same reason thatI got to hunt the biggest game there is--man, and he hunts me."
Mrs. Nitschkan relighted her pipe. "Bob Flick's your best bet," sheremarked impersonally.
"Talk about guns and fishing rods and dogs, something you know about,"said Pearl scornfully, touching the dozing dog lightly with her foot. Hegrowled angrily, resenting the liberty.
"You better leave Flip alone," cautioned Mrs. Nitschkan; "he's liable tobite anybody but me. Always be kind to dumb animals, 'specially crossdogs. And, say, Pearl, I been running the cards this morning. It wassuch a dandy day that I didn't know whether I'd do some assessment workor spend the day fishin'; the cards decided in favor of fishin'. I hadto get some light so's I could tell how to go ahead. How any one can getalong without a pack of cards! It's sure a lamp to the feet. If you waita minute I'll run 'em for you."
She vanished inside and returned immediately with a board and awell-worn pack of cards. These she shuffled and, after Pearl had cutthem several times, she began to lay them out in neat rows on the boardon her knee, uttering a strange, crooning sound the while and studyingeach card as it fell with the most absorbed interest.
"Um-mmm!" with a heavy sigh and shaking her head forebodingly. "Youbetter go home, girl, as fast as you can and shut yourself up in thecabin all day. Did you ever see anything like that?" pointing to thecards. "Trouble, trouble, nothin' but trouble. If it ain't actual murderan' death, it's too near it to be any joke. Look how them spades turnsup every whipstitch. How can folks doubt!"
But the cards of evil omen lying there on the board before had rousedall of Pearl's inherent superstition and stirred her swift anger againstMrs. Nitschkan. "Parrot-croaker!" she exclaimed angrily, and followedthis with a string of Spanish oaths and expletives. "Trouble is over forme."
Mrs. Nitschkan was on her feet in a minute. The board and the cards fellunheeded to the ground. Her small, quick eyes began to roll ominouslyand show red, and her relaxed figure became immediately tense and alertas that of a panther on guard.
"Trouble's just beginnin' for you," her voice was a mere guttural growl."A little more sass from you, you double-j'inted jumpin'-jack dancer,and I'll jerk you to the edge of that cliff yonder and throw you down.I'm feelin' particularly good right now," rolling up her sleeves andshowing the great knots of swelling muscles on her arms. "Get out of myway."
With one big sweep of her arm she brushed her companion aside as if shehad been a fly; but with incredible rapidity Pearl recovered herself andsprang directly before her.
"Then get me out," she taunted, "try it, try it. I'd slip through yourfingers like oil. It's no good to flash your over-sized man-muscles onme; I'm made of whip-cord and whalebone. Do you get that?"
Mrs. Nitschkan's courage sprang from a sense of trained and responsivemuscles and of tremendous physical strength, but at the sound of thatcool voice, those mocking, unwavering eyes, there swept over her an aweof the slighter woman's far higher courage. It was an almostsuperstitious fear and respect which chilled the hot blood of herpassion, the instinctive obedience of the flesh to the indomitablespirit. Reluctantly, against her will and in spite of her anger, thefighting gipsy paid deference to the steel-like, unflinching quality ofthe Pearl, when, rising above her slender physique, she faced unafraidthe brute strength which threatened her, and dominated the situation bysheer consciousness of power.
The gypsy, chilled and subdued, confused by forces she could notunderstand, fell back a step or two and Pearl seized this opportunity toslip away, calling a careless good-by over her shoulder.
But the depression which had touched her from the time she wakened nowlay heavier on her spirit. Her mind reverted to the cards of ill omenand she shivered with a faint chill of apprehension. And as she walkedon it seemed to her that the atmosphere was in tune with her mood.
The air was soft, and yet sharp enough to quicken the color in hercheeks, but still indefinably wistful. The song of the wind among thepines, that mountain wind which never ceases to blow, had a sort ofsighing pensiveness in its falling cadences. The deep, blue sky dreamedover the russet tree tops and the yellow leaves filled the forest withtheir flying gold.
And the spirit of the year seemed to have entered into Pearl. She was aswistful as the day, as pensive as the sighi
ng wind. She arrived early ather destination. The sun lay warm in her little bower of encirclingpines and she sat down on a fallen log to await Hanson's coming. Hecould not take her by surprise for, through a little opening in thetrees, she could see the trail, it was in plain view.
Sitting down then to wait, she rested her elbow on her knee and her chinin the palm of her hand. It seemed as if the power of anticipation weregone from her. She wondered dully at her own languor, not only of body,but of mind. In a few moments she would see again the man whom she hadpassionately loved, and in parting from whom she had not dreamed it tobe within human possibility so to suffer, and yet, at the prospect ofmeeting him again, her heart throbbed not one beat faster. She could noteven look forward to dancing that night with any excitement or pleasure.She wondered what Seagreave would think of her when he saw her; shewould be a vision far more brilliant than any spirit of the autumnwoods, and she would wear her emeralds again, the emeralds for which BobFlick had squandered a fortune. She put up her hand and touched themwhere they hung about her neck, concealed under her gown, for she worethem night and day, never allowing them to leave her person. Good oldBob! Seagreave had said there were only a few great dancers. Well, shewould show him. She could dance; no matter how critical he was, he wouldhave to admit that. And then her heart seemed suddenly to run down witha queer, cold little thrill.
There was Hanson ascending the trail. He was only a few feet away, andeven as she jumped to her feet he saw her and waved his hand. He pauseda moment for breath and then hurried on.
"Pearl!" he cried, and caught her in his arms, covering her face withkisses and crushing her against his heart. It seemed hours to her, butit was really only a moment before she pushed him from her, slipped fromhis arms, and stood panting and flushed before him.
"Pearl, O Pearl!" he cried again, and would once more have caught herdeftly to him, but again she slipped from him. "Sit down," she criedpetulantly, motioning to the fallen log. "You're out of breath, you'vehad a long climb." She herself sat down and he followed her example,encircling her with his arms; a tiny frown showed itself in her foreheadand she bent slightly forward as if to evade his clasp, folding her armsabout her knees.
"Gee! You bet it was a climb," he said, wiping his brow and stillbreathing a little hard. "But I'd have climbed right on up to heaven ifyou'd been there waiting for me. Lord, Pearl! if I'd had to wait muchlonger to see you it would have finished me, I do believe. Oh,sweetheart, you're lovelier than ever, and you're not going to punisheither of us any more, I can tell you that. You're coming down with meand we're going to live, Pearl, live, just as I told you we would, downthere in the palms in the desert. Now I'm telling you again among thepines, and this time you're going to listen and come. I guess we've bothof us pretty well found out that it's no use our trying to live apartany longer."
Her crimson cloak had fallen from her shoulders, and Hanson, holding herhand in his, had pushed up her sleeve and was kissing her arm, as hetalked, up as far as her elbow and down again to the tips of herfingers. She did not even attempt to draw her hand away, she was stillin that state of apathy, where all her senses seemed dulled; and so shelet him babble on, murmuring his adoration and his rose-colored dreamsof the future.
"By George!" he exclaimed, in sheer, sincere amazement. "To think ofyou, the Black Pearl, spending all these months up here in these deadold mountains without even a moving-picture show to look at. You got anawful will, girl."
She gazed with somber eyes beyond him. Life, did he say "life"? That waswhat she asked, what she demanded, life as glorious and as rich in coloras a full-blown rose. And only a little while ago she had dreamed thatshe could find it with him, that _that_ was what he offered to her. Sheremembered the question that Harry Seagreave had asked her. "What doeslife mean to you?" Ah, since that first night in the mountains lifeseemed to have expanded into infinite horizons before her wideningvision. She dreamed over them, forgetful for the moment of the manbeside her, until he, turning in the full tide of his talk, pressed hislips ardently, passionately to hers.
Taken by surprise, she uttered one of her fluent Spanish oaths and,springing to her feet, stood with her body slightly bent forward, herhands on her hips, gazing at him with her narrow, gleaming eyes. Herapathy was gone, she was alive now to her finger tips.
He rose, too. "Honey, what is it?" he questioned dazedly. "What's gotyou now?"
"Don't touch me," she said tensely. "Don't dare to touch me."
He looked at her unbelievingly and then fell back a pace or two. "MyLord! What's the matter with you?" he cried.
"I don't know," she muttered wildly. Her eyes still measured him, hisbold, obvious good looks, his ruddy self-complacency, his habitual andshallow geniality, the satisfied vanity of a mouth steadily becominglooser; the depiction of years of self-indulgence in the little veins onhis highly colored cheeks; the sagging lines of his well-set-up figure,ever taking on more flesh.
So she saw him, not perhaps as he was, but in the light of her own harshand unmodified criticism, and mercilessly she reflected upon him all thescorn she felt for herself. She did not consider or even remember thatwith what strength of affection he possessed he had loved her; that,after his constitution he had given her of his best, all he had to give,in fact; that for her he had more than once faced danger, and just tosee her again was even now facing it, fearlessly.
He had grown to expect from her an infinite variety of moods, butsomething in her pose, her expression, frightened him now. "Honey, whatare you driving at?" he asked, a little tremulously, and stretched outhis hand to lay it on her shoulder.
But again an oath whipped from her lips, her glance darkened. She drewback from him with the horse-shoe frown showing plainly on her forehead.
He looked at her, his whole face broken up, his mouth trembling,something like tears in his eyes. "Why, Pearl," he faltered, "ain't youglad to see me? Why, here I been waiting all these damned, drearymonths, never thinking of any one but you, never even looking at anotherwoman, just dreaming of the moment when I could put my arms around youagain and know that you loved me and were mine."
A hard and bitter smile showed on her mouth. "Yours! Loved you!" shecried. "My God! You!"
Her unmistakable, unconcealed scorn was like a dagger thrust in theheart, and that stab of pain stirred his anger and restored him tohimself. His face went almost purple, his cold eyes blazed. "Say," hecried roughly, "what are you driving at, anyway? Come down to casesnow." He caught her by the wrist. "What did you let me come up here for?Just to make a monkey of me? Have you been treasuring spite against meall these months, and is this your way of getting even?"
She dragged her hand away from him and stepped back. "I let you come, ifyou want to know it, because I thought I was in love with you. Lord,think of it!" she laughed drearily. "I haven't fooled you any worse thanI have myself."
He rubbed his hand across his eyes. "It ain't true," he said loudly,positively, defiantly.
"Hush," she exclaimed, darting forward. "What was that?" There was asound as if some one had trod the underbrush not many feet away. Shelistened intently a moment, a wild fear at her heart that Seagreavemight have returned unexpectedly. It was probably some animal, for therewas no further sound. "Oh," she cried, in involuntary relief, "it musthave been Jose!"
A gleam came into his eyes, a light of triumph as at the remembrance ofsome potent weapon of which he had been carelessly forgetful. "And whois Jose?" he asked.
She lifted her startled gaze to his, the question recalled to her herown unthinking speech. "Oh, one of the miners," she said indifferently.
He knew her too well to fancy that he could trap her into any newadmissions, and he had no wish to arouse her suspicions. Therefore hedropped the subject, especially as he felt fully answered.
He leaned against a tree and, drawing a cigar from his pocket, lightedit, although the hand with which he did so trembled. "I guess someexplanations are in order between you and me," he said. "I guess it'sabout time that you beg
an to get it into your head that you can't make afool of me all the time. I'm ready and willing to admit that there wassome excuse for you down in the desert. I made a bad break there, whichI'm freely conceding was no way to treat a lady. But that don't explainor excuse the way you've treated me this morning," he laughed bitterly."There's no way to explain it unless living here in the mountains hasgone to your head or unless there's another man. Is there?" his eyespierced her. "Is there?"
She looked back at him with a hard, inscrutable smile, but she did notanswer.
Another man! He couldn't, wouldn't believe it. Why, it was onlyyesterday that they two had met and loved in the desert. Again he fellto pleading. "Oh, Pearl, be like what you were again. Don't stand offfrom me that way, honey. It ain't in you to be so cruel and hard. Comeback to me, here in my arms. Have your spells; treat me like you please;but come back to me. Oh, honey, come."
She looked beyond him, not at him, and then ground a little heap offreshly fallen pine needles beneath her heel.
"What's the use?" she said curtly. "It's over. We can quit right here,Rudolf. I'm done with you, for good."
His outstretched arms fell by his side, his jaw set. "I guess that'sright," he said viciously. "Any bigger fool than me could see that; andI'm not going to waste any more time crawling around on my hands andknees after you; I can tell you that. But you can't fool me on the otherman proposition."
"I'm not trying to," she interjected cruelly.
"Who is he?" his voice was ragged and uneven. "Not Flick, I'll bet myhat. He's been your dog too long for you to fling him anything but abone. You'll never tell me, though."
"Not I," she answered indifferently.
"Then I'll just satisfy myself--to-night."
She started and frowned. "You're not staying for that," harshly. "It'snot safe."
"Oh, yes, I am staying for that, just to satisfy a little curiosity I'vegot, and I guess I'll find it safe enough. I guess you've been playingwith kids so far in your career, Miss Pearl Gallito; but you'll findthat the old man's not quite so easy disposed of as you think. I've gotan idea that you'll be down on your knees trying to make terms with himbefore we're precisely 'quit' as you've just said."
"Bah!" she said. "Wind, wind. You can't frighten me with threats. Stayand watch me dance all you please. That's the only way you'll ever seeme again--from the audience." Without any appearance of haste, shelifted her scarf from the pine branch on which she had thrown it andtwisted it slowly about her head, then picking up her crimson cape fromthe ground, she shook the pine needles from it, wrapped it about her,and without another word to him, without even a look, took her way downthe trail.
She did not believe that he meant what he said, she did not believe thathe meant to stay and see her dance that evening. The thought that hewould do so had annoyed her at first, but as she walked downward throughthe wine-like amber air, she realized that she did not particularlycare. Her whole being seemed absorbed in the revelation which had cometo her in the first moment of her meeting with Hanson--her love forSeagreave. In this new, exclusive emotion, the recent interview and allthat had led up to it became to her a mere unpleasant episode, uponwhich her indifferent imagination refused to dwell. She wanted to bealone, that she might fully realize this stupendous change in herfeelings and in her entire outlook upon life. As she thought upon it shesaw that it was no sudden miracle, wrought in the twinkling of an eye,but an alteration of standards and emotion so gradual that she had notbeen aware of it.
Back in the cabin she luxuriated, exulted in the fact that she would bealone all day. She piled high the fire with logs, and threw herself inan easy chair. Thus she could dream undisturbed, could lie watching theleaping flames and vision for herself again that fair, regular, sereneface, that tall, strong, slender figure. She counted the hours until sheshould see him again, until she should dance for him, for it was forhim, him alone, that she would dance.
Thus she passed the greater part of the day, and even resented theintrusion upon her thoughts when her father returned a little earlierthan usual from the mine.
"I got a telegram from Bob to-day," he said. "All that was in it was,'Coming up to see Pearl dance to-night.'"
"What!" she cried, showing her dismay. "What is he doing that for?"
"What he says, I suppose," returned Gallito, "to see you dance."
She frowned vexedly, but said nothing.
Her father spoke again. "How are you going down? You will not walk withBob and Hugh, Mrs. Nitschkan and Mrs. Thomas?"
"No," she answered carelessly, although a deeper crimson showed in hercheek. "Mr. Seagreave said last night that he would take me down in hiscart."
Gallito nodded, apparently satisfied, and as Jose came in then toprepare supper, the matter was dropped.
As for Pearl, her vexation of the moment was gone; it could have noplace in her mood of exaltation, and when, a few minutes later, shegreeted Bob Flick, he thought that he had never seen her more gay. Allthrough supper, too, her mood of gayety continued, but immediately afterthat meal she drew Flick aside.
"Bob, I want to tell you something," she said. "No use Hughie, nor Pop,nor any of the rest of them knowing anything about it," she hesitated amoment, "but Hanson came up to-day."
There was no change in his impassive face, only a leap of hard light inhis eyes, and yet she knew that he was on guard in a moment. "Hanson?"
"Yes, and I saw him for a few moments," she lifted candid eyes to his,"and, honest, Bob, it's all over. I never expect to see him again, and Inever want to."
He looked at her, as if trying to read her soul. "Say, Pearl, what isthis," he asked, "straight?"
"It's what I'm telling you," she looked back at him, noddingemphatically, and then her face broke into a smile, her sweetest, hermost alluring smile. "Say, Bob, I got to thank you for a good manythings, not to speak of these," she touched the emeralds under her gown;"but the biggest thing you've ever done for me yet was to keep me fromrunning away with Hanson."
Her sincerity was undoubted, and a flush of pleasure rose on his cheek,and a light came into his eyes which only she could bring there. Hepressed her hands warmly, looking embarrassed and yet delighted. "Younever said anything in all your life, Pearl, that ever pleased me likethat."
She patted his arm lightly and caressingly, and smiled at him again,under her lashes. She couldn't help that with any man. "You're awfulgood to me, Bob; I guess you're the best and onliest friend I've got."
"I'm what you want me to be," he spoke a little sadly but very tenderly."It'll never make any difference to me what you do or what you don't do;there'll never be any change in me."
She let her fingers lie in his clasp, but her glance was absent now, herthoughts had flown again to Seagreave. "Goodness!" she exclaimed,rousing suddenly and glancing at the clock, "I've got to make a hustlefor it."
She was ready half an hour later when Seagreave stopped at the door.Hugh and Bob Flick had already gone, her father and Jose had settledthemselves for the evening over the cards, and Pearl stood before thefire, a long, dark cloak covering her from head to foot and a blackmantilla over her head. Jose's eyes were full of longing.
"Oh, that I might go, too," he cried. "The Black Pearl may dance, dance,after the spirit that is in her; may express her art, but I, although Igrow mad to express mine, must stay mewed up in these mountains withnothing to do but cook and play cards and talk to a half saint and astale, old sinner. If Nitschkan and the petite Thomas had not come, Ishould have died. Look at those!" he twinkled his long, delicate fingersin the air, "there is not such another pair of hands on a combinationlock in all this world."
Seagreave and Gallito laughed, but paid no further heed to him, andHarry turned to Pearl with a pretense of disappointment.
"I thought I should see a butterfly," he said, "a butterfly that hadflown up from the land of eternal summer, and you're only a chrysalis."
"It's too cold for butterflies up here," she laughed. "Wait until I getdown to the warm hall." But althoug
h she returned his banter, she didnot look at him, her eyes were downcast, and on the drive down the hillshe scarcely spoke. Seagreave was one of those rare persons who respectanother's mood of silence, and consequently he did not notice this newconstraint which had overfallen her.
The hall, lighted with bull's-eye lanterns, was crowded with people,every one of the chairs taken and every inch of standing room occupied.There was no platform, but the space upon which Pearl was to dance wasscreened off by red curtains.
But even before she entered the little dressing booth prepared for her,she hastened to peep through the curtains, scanning the audience with aneager eye. Her face fell as she saw that Hanson, true to his promise,was there, and on one of the front seats, not far from Seagreave and BobFlick, who were sitting together. His eyes were dull, his face flushed,and he lurched flaccidly in his chair; he had been drinking heavily allday.
He was wondering dully as he sat there if she would enter in the sameindifferent manner that she had adopted the first night he had seen herdown in the desert. Probably she would; it had been very effective.
But the time for conjecture was over. The curtains were drawn aside, andHugh sat down at the piano and began to play a seductive, sensuousaccompaniment. Then through a crimson curtain at the rear Pearl flashedin as if blown by the mountain wind. The chrysalis had cast aside itsshell and this tropical butterfly had emerged. Her skirts were of yellowsatin, and from a black bodice her beautiful bare shoulders rose halfrevealed and half concealed by her rose-wreathed, white _manton deManila_. In her black, shining hair, just over one ear, was a bunch ofscarlet, artificial blossoms.
She floated about the floor for a moment or two like a thistle-downblown hither and thither by the caprice of the wind, scarcely seeming totouch the ground, upborne by the music-tide. Throughout her career shewas always at her best when she took those first few moments about thestage and waited for her inspiration.
Then she drifted nearer to Hughie and murmured, "The Tango." He changedhis tempo immediately, and almost without a pause of transition shebegan that provocative measure--the dance of desire. Thrilling with thejoy of expressing her love, her beautiful new love for Seagreave,through her art, she danced with a verve, an abandon, a more spontaneousimpulse than she had ever shown before. The Tango! She made it a thingof alluring advances, of stinging repulses, of sudden, fascinatingwithdrawals and exquisite ardors.
When the applause had finally died down, the hall was still noisy with ababel of voices; those who could, moved about in the crowded space, andlittle groups formed and broke up. Bob Flick, speaking to this or thatacquaintance, felt some one touch him lightly on the arm, and turnedsuddenly to see Hanson standing beside him.
"Hello, Flick," with a sort of swaggering bravado, "our old friend, theBlack Pearl, is going some to-night, ain't she?"
"I don't know you," drawled Flick, the liquid Southern intonations ofhis voice softened until they were almost silky, "and," his hand shotback to his hip with an almost unbelievable rapidity, "I'll give youjust three minutes to apologize for mentioning Miss Gallito's name, forspeaking to me, and for being here at all."
Hanson's face had turned a sickly white, more with anger than fear."Considering the argument you stand ready to offer," he said, "there'snothing to do but to apologize my humblest on all three counts. I hadhoped that you'd remember me and be willing to introduce me to yourfriend." He turned a cynical and evil glance upon Seagreave, who wastalking to some one a few feet away. "But since you won't, I'll go, justadding that you and your friend, there, are likely to meet me soonagain."
There was a touch of scorn in Flick's faint smile. "The three minutesare up," he said, and without a word Hanson turned and sought his seat.
The curtains parted now and Hugh again sat down to the piano, but hismusic had changed; it was no longer sensuous and provocative, butstrange, and curiously disturbing, with a peculiar, recurring,monotonous beat.
It was the voice of the desert full of a savage exultation in its ownloneliness and forsaken isolation, and through it rang a cry of deep,disdainful triumph, as if it said: "All puny races of men, come to me;embroider my vast surfaces with the green of your fields and gardens,build your houses upon my quiescent sand and dream that you haveconquered and tamed me. And I abide, I abide. Silent, brooding,unwitting of your noisy incursions, I lie absorbed in my dream under myown illimitable skies. But soon or late, when the moment comes, I wake,I rouse, I see my inviolate desolations invaded. Then I gather mystrength, I drown you with my torrential rivers, I torture you with myburning sun, I obliterate you with my flying sand. So shall my cactusbloom once more, my jeweled lizards crawl unmolested and the cry of thecoyote echo again through the vast, soundless spaces of my desolation.Then to my looms, to my looms and out of emptiness and silence andspace and light to weave all mysteries of color and all illusions ofbeauty."
"Lord!" cried Bob Flick to Seagreave, "he's playing the desert. I'veseen her look just like the music sounds. That's a sand storm; there'sno other sound in the world like it." He turned his eyes full of apuzzled wonder on Seagreave. "How can he play all that so that you and Ican see it, when he can't see it himself?"
"But he does see it," insisted Seagreave; "never think that he doesn't,and sees it through finer avenues of sight than mere material organs ofvision. He sees the mountains, too. Why, he can play the very shadows onthe snow for me."
During the Spanish dances Seagreave had not shared the excitement of theaudience, and thus had maintained his usual serenity. He had beenintensely interested and appreciative and admiring; but emotionallyunmoved; but now, as this troubling music of Hughie's seemed to expressthe dominion of unsuspected but potent earth-forces, primitive, savageand forever irreclaimable, his calm became strangely disturbed. Dimly herealized that should every desert on the globe finally be subdued by theplow, the irrigating ditches and the pruning hook, they would stillremain as realities in the mind of man, forever clouding his aspirationstoward the mountain peaks and the stars. For the desert must ever remainan unsolved enigma, never to be reduced to a formula, never to beexplained by any human standards; now whispering to man of themysteries of the soul and revealing to him more of the infinite than hisfinite senses may grasp; and now mocking him with illusions, herbeautiful mirages wrought of airbeams and sunlight, and transforming himinto a beast of greed with her haunting intimations of hidden andinexhaustible treasure.
Thus Hughie's music; and presently Pearl floated out. She had changedher Spanish costume for the one of scarlet crepe in which Hanson hadfirst seen her, a crown of scarlet flowers on her dark hair. Her veryexpression, too, had changed, her eyes were elongated, her featuresseemed delicately Egyptian; the brooding sphynx look was on her face.
"She's great, ain't she?" asked Bob Flick.
Seagreave nodded. He had never seen her superior in technique. It tookcharacter, he appreciated that, to have endured the years of tiresome,mechanical practice, and to have undertaken it so intelligently that shehad achieved her marvelous results; and she had, beside, youth andbeauty and magnetism. All this alone would have made her a great dancer,but as he recognized, she had more, much more to bring to her art; acomplex nature which, in its unsounded depths ever held a vision ofbeauty, and a sense of this vision which amounted to unity with it, andtherefore gave her the power of expressing it. Her mind, too, wasplastic to all primitive impulses and to Nature; she blended with it.She was but little influenced by persons, her will was too dominating,her intelligence too quick, and--but here his analysis ceased.
The Pearl was dancing to Hugh's strange music, she was dancing thedesert for him--Seagreave. He knew it was for him, although she neverglanced in his direction. And as she danced, he grew to realize thatthis feat was not an intellectual one. She was not portraying the spiritof the desert as gleaned from study and observation and melted in thecrucible of her poetic imagination and molded by her fancy until it wasa thing of form in her thought. The Black Pearl danced the desertbecause in her was the power to be o
ne with it and live in its lifethrough every cell of her being. It was a matter of feeling with her,one phase of her affinity with the forces of earth; but because she hadthe artist's constructive imagination, she could put it into form anddance it, and by projecting her own feeling into it, convey it toothers.
The world with its round of outworn, hackneyed appeals, its wearisomerepetitions of crude and commonplace joys, its tawdry and limitedtemptations, had long ago fallen away from Seagreave--and left himnothing, but to-night a voice that he had long ignored, the voice oflife, commanded him.
"If the desert seems forever to claim her own, what is that to you! Yourwork is to reclaim and in the face of a thousand defeats and desolationsstill to reclaim, with the eternal faith that for you the wastes shallblossom like the rose. Work, no matter how brokenly, how futilely. Tobuild houses of sand is better than to sit in profitless dreams and livein an animal content."
When later he drove Pearl up the mountainside, almost in silence, asthey had come, after his few words of admiration and appreciation of herdancing, there was a shadow for the first time in Harry's clear eyes, ashadow which did not pass.