Idolatry: Chapter 21

Chapter 21

WE PICK UP ANOTHER THREAD.

Darkness and silence reigned in the conservatory; the group of the
sleeping man and attendant woman was lost in the warm gloom, and
scarcely a motion--the low drawing of a breath--told of their
presence.

A great gray owl, which had passed the daylight in some obscure
corner, launched darkling forth on the air and winged hither and
thither,--once or twice fanning the sleeper's face with silent
pinions. The crocodile lazily edged off the stone, plumped quietly
into the water, and clambered up the hither margin of the pool, there
coming to another long pause. A snail, making a night-journey across
the floor, found in its path a diamond, sparkling with a light of its
own. The snail extended a cool cautious tentacle,--recoiled it
fastidiously and shaped a new course. A broad petal from a tall
flowering-shrub dropped wavering down, and seemed about to light on
Balder's forehead; but, swerving at the last moment, came to rest on
the scaly head of the crocodile. The night waited and listened, as
though for something to happen,--for some one to appear! Salome, too,
was waiting for some one;--was it for the dead?

Meantime, pictures from the past glimmered through her memory. When,
in our magic mirror, we saw her struck down by the hand of her lover,
she was far from being the repulsive object she is now. Indeed, but
for that chance word let fall yesterday, about her having been badly
burnt, we might be at a loss to justify our recognition of her.

After Manetho's rude dismissal of her, she fled--not knowing whither
better--to Thor Helwyse, who was living widowed in his Brooklyn house,
with his infant son and daughter. Because she had been Helen's
attendant, she besought Helen's husband to give her a home. She was in
sore trouble, but said no more than this; and Thor, suspecting nothing
of her connection with Manetho, gladly received her as nurse to his
children.

But past sins and imprudences would find out Salome no less than
others. At the critical moment for herself and her fortunes, the house
took fire. She risked her life to save Thor's daughter, was herself
burned past recognition, and (one misfortune treading on another's
heels) balanced on death's verge for a month or two. She got well, in
part; but the faculty of speech had left her, and beauty of face and
figure was forever gone.

In her manifold wretchedness, and after such devotion shown, it was
not in Thor's warm heart to part with her; so, losing much, she gained
something. She remained with her benefactor, whose manly courtesy ever
forbore to probe the secret of her woman's heart, over which as over
her face she always wore a veil. The world saw Salome no more. She sat
in the nursery, watching year by year the dark-eyed little maiden
playing with the fair-haired boy. Broad-shouldered Thor would come in,
with his grand, kindly face and royal beard; would kiss the little
girl and tussle with the boy, mightily laughing the while at the
former's solicitude for her playmate; would throw himself on the
groaning sofa, and exclaim in his deep voice,--

"God bless their dear little souls! Why, Nurse! when did a brother and
sister ever love each other like that,--eh?"

Salome probably was not unhappy then; indeed,--whether she knew it or
not,--she was at her happiest. But new events were at hand; Thor,
growing yearly more restless, at length resolved to sell his house and
go to Europe, taking with him Salome and both the children. Everything
was ready, down to the packing of Salome's box. A day or two before
the sailing, Thor went to New Jersey, to bid farewell to his eccentric
brother-in-law. It was a warm summer day, and the children played from
morning till night in the front yard, while Nurse sat in the window
and kept her eye on them. Her thoughts, perhaps, travelled elsewhere.

Since her misfortune she had, no doubt, had more opportunity than most
women for reflection: silence breeds thought. What she thought about,
no one knew; but she could hardly have forgotten Manetho. On this last
evening, when at the point of leaving America forever, it would have
been strange had no memory of him passed through her mind.

She had not heard his name in the last four years, and she knew that
he suspected nothing of her whereabouts. Had he ever wished to see
her? she wondered and thought, "He would not know me if he did see
me!" With that came a tumultuous longing once more to look upon him.
Too late! Why had she not thought of this before? Now must her last
memory of him be still as when, disfigured by sudden rage, he turned
upon her and struck her on the bosom. There was the scar yet; the fire
had spared it! It was a keepsake which, as time passed, Salome
strangely learned to love!

It was growing dusk,--time for the children to come in. They were
sitting deep in the abundant grass, weaving necklaces out of
dandelion-stems. Nurse leaned out of window and beckoned to attract
their attention. But either they were too much absorbed to notice
her, or they were wilfully blind; so Nurse rose to go out and fetch
them.

Before reaching the open front door, she stopped short and her heart
seemed to turn over. A tall dark man was leaning over the fence,
talking with the little girl. Nurse shrank within the shadow of the
door, and thence peeped and listened,--as well as her beating pulses
would let her.

"I know where fairy-land is," says the man, in the soft, engaging tone
that the listener so well remembers. "Come! shall we go together and
visit it?"

"He come too?" asks the little maiden, nodding towards the boy, who is
portentously busy over his dandelions.

"He may if he likes," the man answers with a smile. "But we must make
haste, or fairy-land will be shut up!"

It flashes into Salome's head what this portends. She had heard this
man vow revenge on Thor long ago, and she now sees how he means to
keep his oath. He has shrewdly improved the opportunity of Thor's
absence, and has come intending to carry off either his son or his
daughter. Fortune, it seems, had chosen for him the dark-eyed little
girl. See! he stoops and lifts her gently over the wall, and they are
off for fairy-land!

Rush out, Salome! alarm the neighborhood and force the kidnapper to
give up his booty! After Thor's kindness to you, will you be false to
him? Besides, what motive have you for unfaithfulness? Grant that you
love Manetho,--what harm, save to his revengeful passion, could result
from thwarting him?

Salome acted oddly on this occasion,--it would seem, irrationally. But
that which appears to the spectator but a trivial modification may
have vital weight with the actor. Had Manetho taken Balder, for
example, Salome might have pursued another and more intelligible
course than the one she actually took. She hurried out of the door and
caught Manetho by the arm before he was twenty paces on his way. He
turned, savage but frightened, setting down the little girl but not
letting go her hand. She was in her happiest humor, and informed Nurse
that she was to be queen of fairy-land!

Nurse lifted the veil from her face and looked steadfastly at Manetho
with her one eye. It was enough,--he saw in her but a hideous
object,--would never know her for the bright girl he had once
professed to love. Salome gave one sob, containing more of womanly
emotion than could be written down in many words, and then was quiet
and self-possessed. Manetho did not offer to escape, but stood on his
guard; half prepared, however,--from something in the woman's
manner,--to find her a confederate.

"S'e come too?" chirped the unconscious little maiden.

But Manetho's attention was turned to some words that Salome was
writing in a little blank-book which she always carried in her pocket
She offered to help him carry off the child, on condition of being
herself one of the party!

He looked narrowly at the woman, but could make nothing by his
scrutiny. Was it love for the child that prompted her behavior? No;
for she could easily have raised the neighborhood against him. She
completely puzzled him, and she would give no explanations. What if he
should accept her offer? She would be an advantage as well as an
inconvenience. The child would have the care to which it had been
accustomed, and Manetho would thus be spared much embarrassment. When
the woman's help became superfluous, it would not be difficult to give
her the slip.

There was small leisure for reflection. An agreement was made,--on
Salome's part, with a secret sense of intense triumph, not unmixed
with fear and pain. She caught up Master Balder and his dandelions,
kissed and hugged him violently, and locked him into the nursery;
where he was found some hours afterwards by his father, in a state of
great hunger and indignation. But the little dark-haired maiden was no
more. She was gone to her kingdom of fairy-land, and Nurse with her.
Long mourned Balder for his vanished playmate!

Salome has kept her secret well. And now, there she sits, her
long-lost baby's head in her lap, thinking of old times; and the
longer she thinks, the more she softens and expands. Has she done a
great wrong in her life? Surely she has suffered greatly, and in a
manner that might well wither her to the core. But there must still
have been a germ of life in the shrivelled seed, which this
night--memorable in her existence--has begun to quicken.

By and by come a few tears, with a struggle at first, then more
easily. Kind darkness lets us think of Salome bright and comely as in
the old days, with the added grace of inward beauty wrought by sad
experience. But, in truth, she is marred past earthly recovery.
Nothing removes a soul so far from human sympathy as
self-repression,--especially for any merely human end!

The night creeps reluctantly westward; the gray owl wings back to his
shady corner; the adventurous snail, half-way up the palm-tree, glues
himself to the bark and turns in for a nap. The crocodile has resumed
his old position on the rock in the pool, and the flower petal floats
on the water. Here comes the brilliant hoopoe with his smart crest and
clear chirrup, impatient to bid Gnulemah good morning! All is as
before, save that the group beneath the palm-trees has disappeared!

Balder slept late, yet, on awakening, he thought he must be dreaming
still. He could not distinguish imagination from reality. His mind had
temporarily lost its grasp, his will its authority. Where was he? Was
it years or hours since he had entered Boston harbor?

Suddenly rose before him the vision of the deadly struggle on the
midnight sea. Round this central point the rest crystallized in order.
His heart sank, and he sighed most heavily. But presently he rose to
his elbow and stared about in bewilderment. Had he ever seen this room
before? How came he here?

He was lying on a carved bedstead, furnished with sheets of fine linen
and a counterpane of blue embroidered satin; but all bearing an
appearance of great age. The room was oval, like a bird's-egg halved
lengthwise; the smoothly vaulted ceiling being frescoed with a crowd
of figures. The rich and costly furniture harmonized with the
bedstead, and bore the same marks of age. The chairs and lounge were
satin-covered; the sumptuous toilet-table was fitted with a mirror of
true crystal; the arched window was curtained with azure satin and
lace. It was a chamber fit for a princess of the old _r�gime_,
unaltered since its fair occupant last abode in it.

Balder now examined the frescos which covered wall and ceiling. The
subject seemed at the first glance to be a Last Judgment, or something
of that nature. A mingled rush of forms mounted on one side to the
bright zenith, and thence lapsed confusedly down the opposite descent.
The dark end of the room presented a cloud of gloomily fantastic
shapes, swerved from the main stream, and becoming darker and more
formless the farther they receded, till at the last they were lost in
a murky shadow. Not entirely lost, however; for as Balder gazed
awfully thitherward, the shadow seemed to resolve itself into a mass
of intertwined and struggling beings, neither animal nor human, but
combining the more unholy traits of both.

But from the centre of the upward stream shone forms and faces of
angelic beauty; yet, on looking more narrowly, Balder discerned in
each one some ghastly peculiarity, revealing itself just when
enjoyment of the beauty was on the point of becoming complete. Such
was the effect that the most angelic forms were translated into
mocking demons, and where the light seemed brightest there was the
spiritual darkness most profound.

In the zenith was a white lustre which obliterated distinction of form
as much as did the cloudy obscurity at the end of the room. Now the
design seemed about to unfold itself; then again it eluded the gazer's
grasp. Suddenly at length it stood revealed. A gigantic face, with
wide-floating hair and beard, looked down into Balder's own. Its
expression was of infinite malignity and despair. The impersonation of
all that is wicked and miserable, its place was at the top of Heaven;
it was moulded of those aspiring forms of light, and was the goal
which the brightest attained. Moreover, either by some ugly
coincidence or how otherwise he could not conceive, this countenance
of supreme evil was the very reflex of Balder's,--a portrait minutely
true, and, despite its satanic expression, growing every moment more
unmistakable.

Was this accident, or the contrivance of an unknown and unfathomable
malice? Balder, Lord of Heaven, instinct with the essence of Hell! A
grim satire on his religious speculations! But what satirist had been
bitter enough so to forestall the years?--for the painting must have
been designed while Balder was still an infant.

He threw himself off the bed and stepped to the window, and saw the
blue sky and the river rhyming it. The breath of the orchard visited
him, and he was greeted by the green grass and trees, He sighed with
relief. There had been three mornings since his return to America. For
the first he had blessed his own senses; the second had looked him out
of countenance but the third came with a benediction, serene and
mighty, such as Balder's soul had not hitherto been open to.

"This is more than a plaster heaven," said he, looking up; "but I
fear, Balder Helwyse, your only heaven, thus far, has been of plaster.
You have seen this morning how the God of such a heaven looks. How
about the God of this larger Heaven, think you?"

Presently he turned away from the window; but he had quaffed so deeply
of the morning glory, that the sinister frescos no longer depressed
him. They were ridiculously unimportant,--nothing more than stains on
the wall, in fact. Balder could not tell why he felt light-hearted. It
was solemn light-heartedness,--not the gayety of sensuous spirits,
such as he had experienced heretofore. It had little to do with
physical well-being, for the young man was still faint and dizzy, and
weak from hunger. Behold, then, at the foot of the bed, a carved table
covered with a damask cloth and crowned with an abundant breakfast;
not an ordinary breakfast of coffee, rolls, omelette, and beefsteak,
but a pastoral breakfast,--fresh milk, bread and honey and fruit and
mellow cheese,--such food as Adam might have begun the day with.

In face of the yet unsolved mystery of his own presence in the room,
this new surprise caused Balder no special wonder. Beyond the
apparition of the ugly dumb woman, he recollected nothing of the
previous evening's experience. Could she have transported him hither?
Well, he would not let himself be disturbed by apparent miracles. "No
doubt the explanation is simple," thought he; and with that he began
his toilet. The dressing-table displayed a variety of dainty articles
such as a lady might be supposed to use,--pearl-handled brushes,
enamelled powder-boxes, slender vases of Meissen porcelain, a fanciful
ring-stand; from the half-open drawer a rich glimpse of an Indian fan;
a pair of delicate kid gloves, which only a woman's hands could have
worn, were thrown carelessly on the table. There were still the little
wrinkles in the fingers, but time had changed the pristine white to
dingy yellow.

"Whose hands could have worn them? whose chamber was this?" mused
Balder. "Not Gnulemah's; she knows nothing of kid gloves and powder!
and these things were in use before she was born. Whose face was
reflected in this glass, when those gloves were thrown down here? Was
that her marriage-bed? Were children born in it?"

His seizure of the night before must have dulled the edge of his wit,
else he had scarce asked questions which chance now answered for him.
A scratch on one corner of the polished mirror-surface showed, on
closer inspection, a name and a date written with a diamond. Shading
off the light with his hand, Balder read, "Helen, 1831."

"My mother's name; the year I was born. My mother!" he repeated
softly, taking up the old yellow gloves. "And this room was my
birthplace,--and my little sister's! My mother's things, as she left
them; for father once told me that he never entered her room after she
was buried. She died here; and here my little sister and I began to
live. And here I am, again,--really the same little helpless innocent
baby who cried on that bed so long ago. Only not innocent now!
Perhaps, not helpless, either!

"How happy that barber was yesterday! prattled about being born again.
Cannot I be born again,--to-day,--in this room? Here I first began,
and have come round the world to my starting-point. I will begin
afresh this morning."

And heavily as he was weighted in the new race, he would not be
disheartened. Unuttered resolves brightened his eyes and made his
courage high.

Before beginning breakfast, he returned to the window and drank again
of the divine blue and green. From the branch of a near tree the
hoopoe startled him and made him color. Was the bird an emissary from
Gnulemah? Balder's mouth drew back, and his chin and eyes
strengthened, as though some part of his unuttered resolves were
recalled by the thought of her.

When he was ready to go, he turned at the door, and threw a parting
glance round the dainty old-fashioned chamber, trying to gather into
one all the thoughts, memories, and resolves connected with it. He
had nearly forgotten the frescos; the victorious sunshine had reduced
the figures, satanic or beautiful, to a meaningless agglomeration of
wandering lines and faded colors. As for his own portrait, it was no
longer distinguishable.

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