Moods
It was a strange and solemn thing to look so deeply into the private
experience of a fellow-being; to trace the birth and progress of
purposes and passions, the motives of action, the secret aspirations,
the besetting sins that made up the inner life he had been leading
beside her. Moor wrote with an eloquent sincerity, because he had put
himself into his book, as if feeling the need of some _confidante_ he
had chosen the only one that pardons egotism. Here, too, Sylvia saw her
chameleon self, etched with loving care, endowed with all gifts and
graces, studied with unflagging zeal, and made the idol of a life.
Often a tuneful spirit seemed to assert itself, and passing from smooth
prose to smoother poetry, sonnet, song, or psalm, flowed down the page
in cadences stately, sweet, or solemn, filling the reader with delight
at the discovery of a gift so genuine, yet so shyly folded up within
itself, unconscious that its modesty was the surest token of its worth.
More than once Sylvia laid her face into the book, and added her
involuntary comment on some poem or passage made pathetic by the
present; and more than once paused to wonder, with exceeding wonder, why
she could not give such genius and affection its reward. Had she needed
any confirmation of the fact so hard to teach herself, this opening of
his innermost would have given it. For while she bitterly grieved over
the death-blow she had dealt his happy hope, it no longer seemed a
possibility to change her stubborn heart, or lessen by a fraction the
debt which she sadly felt could only be repaid in friendship's silver,
not love's gold.
All night she lay there like some pictured Magdalene, purer but as
penitent as Correggio's Mary, with the book, the lamp, the melancholy
eyes, the golden hair that painters love. All night she read, gathering
courage, not consolation, from those pages, for seeing what she was not
showed her what she might become; and when she turned the little key
upon that story without an end, Sylvia the girl was dead, but Sylvia the
woman had begun to live.
Lying in the rosy hush of dawn, there came to her a sudden memory--
"If ever you need help that Geoffrey cannot give, remember cousin
Faith."
This was the hour Faith foresaw; Moor had gone to her with his trouble,
why not follow, and let this woman, wise, discreet, and gentle, show her
what should come next?
The newly risen sun saw Sylvia away upon her journey to Faith's home
among the hills. She lived alone, a cheerful, busy, solitary soul,
demanding little of others, yet giving freely to whomsoever asked an
alms of her.
Sylvia found the gray cottage nestled in a hollow of the mountain side;
a pleasant hermitage, secure and still. Mistress and maid composed the
household, but none of the gloom of isolation darkened the sunshine that
pervaded it; peace seemed to sit upon its threshold, content to brood
beneath its eaves, and the atmosphere of home to make it beautiful.
When some momentous purpose or event absorbs us we break through fears
and formalities, act out ourselves forgetful of reserve, and use the
plainest phrases to express emotions which need no ornament and little
aid from language. Sylvia illustrated this fact, then; for, without
hesitation or embarrassment, she entered Miss Dane's door, called no
servant to announce her, but went, as if by instinct, straight to the
room where Faith sat alone, and with the simplest greeting asked--
"Is Geoffrey here?"
"He was an hour ago, and will be an hour hence. I sent him out to rest,
for he cannot sleep. I am glad you came to him; he has not learned to do
without you yet."
With no bustle of surprise or sympathy Faith put away her work, took
off the hat and cloak, drew her guest beside her on the couch before the
one deep window looking down the valley, and gently chafing the chilly
hands in warm ones, said nothing more till Sylvia spoke.
"He has told you all the wrong I have done him?"
"Yes, and found a little comfort here. Do you need consolation also?"
"Can you ask? But I need something more, and no one can give it to me so
well as you. I want to be set right, to hear things called by their true
names, to be taken out of myself and made to see why I am always doing
wrong while trying to do well."
"Your father, sister, or brother are fitter for that task than I. Have
you tried them?"
"No, and I will not. They love me, but they could not help me; for they
would beg me to conceal if I cannot forget, to endure if I cannot
conquer, and abide by my mistake at all costs. That is not the help I
want. I desire to know the one just thing to be done, and to be made
brave enough to do it, though friends lament, gossips clamor, and the
heavens fall. I am in earnest now. Rate me sharply, drag out my
weaknesses, shame my follies, show no mercy to my selfish hopes; and
when I can no longer hide from myself put me in the way I should go, and
I will follow it though my feet bleed at every step."
She was in earnest now, terribly so, but still Faith drew back, though
her compassionate face belied her hesitating words.
"Go to Adam; who wiser or more just than he?"
"I cannot. He, as well as Geoffrey, loves me too well to decide for me.
You stand between them, wise as the one, gentle as the other, and you do
not care for me enough to let affection hoodwink reason. Faith, you
bade me come; do not cast me off, for if you shut your heart against me
I know not where to go."
Despairing she spoke, disconsolate she looked, and Faith's reluctance
vanished. The maternal aspect returned, her voice resumed its warmth,
her eye its benignity, and Sylvia was reassured before a word was
spoken.
"I do not cast you off, nor shut my heart against you. I only hesitated
to assume such responsibility, and shrunk from the task because of
compassion, not coldness. Sit here, and tell me all your trouble,
Sylvia?"
"That is so kind! It seems quite natural to turn to you as if I had a
claim upon you. Let me have, and if you can, love me a little, because I
have no mother, and need one very much."
"My child, you shall not need one any more."
"I feel that, and am comforted already. Faith, if you were me, and stood
where I stand, beloved by two men, either of whom any woman might be
proud to call husband, putting self away, to which should you cleave?"
"To neither."
Sylvia paled and trembled, as if the oracle she had invoked was an
unanswerable voice pronouncing the inevitable. She watched Faith's
countenance a moment, groping for her meaning, failed to find it, and
whispered below her breath--
"Can I know why?"
"Because your husband is, your lover _should_ be your friend and nothing
more. You have been hardly taught the lesson many have to learn, that
friendship cannot fill love's place, yet should be kept inviolate, and
served as an austerer mistress who can make life very beautiful to such
as feel her worth and deserve her delights. Adam taught me this, for
though Geoffrey took you from him, he still held fast his friend,
letting no disappointment sour, no envy alienate, no resentment destroy
the perfect friendship years of mutual fidelity have built up between
them."
"Yes!" cried Sylvia, "how I have honored Adam for that steadfastness,
and how I have despised myself, because I could not be as wise and
faithful in the earlier, safer sentiment I felt for Geoffrey."
"Be wise and faithful now; cease to be the wife, but remain the friend;
freely give all you can with honesty, not one jot more."
"Never did man possess a truer friend than I will be to him--if he will
let me. But, Faith, if I may be that to Geoffrey, may I not be something
nearer and dearer to Adam? Would not you dare to hope it, were you me?"
"No, Sylvia, never."
"Why not?"
"If you were blind, a cripple, or cursed with some incurable infirmity
of body, would not you hesitate to bind yourself and your affliction to
another?"
"You know I should not only hesitate, but utterly refuse."
"I do know it, therefore I venture to show you why, according to my
belief, you should not marry Adam. I cannot tell you as I ought, but
only try to show you where to seek the explanation of my seeming harsh
advice. There are diseases more subtle and dangerous than any that vex
our flesh; diseases that should be as carefully cured if curable, as
inexorably prevented from spreading as any malady we dread. A paralyzed
will, a morbid mind, a mad temper, a tainted heart, a blind soul, are
afflictions to be as much regarded as bodily infirmities. Nay, more,
inasmuch as souls are of greater value than perishable flesh. Where this
is religiously taught, believed, and practised, marriage becomes in
truth a sacrament blessed of God; children thank parents for the gift of
life; parents see in children living satisfactions and rewards, not
reproaches or retributions doubly heavy to be borne, for the knowledge
that where two sinned, many must inevitably suffer."
"You try to tell me gently, Faith, but I see that you consider me one of
the innocent unfortunates, who have no right to marry till they be
healed, perhaps never. I have dimly felt this during the past year, now
I know it, and thank God that I have no child to reproach me hereafter,
for bequeathing it the mental ills I have not yet outlived."
"Dear Sylvia, you are an exceptional case in all respects, because an
extreme one. The ancient theology of two contending spirits in one body,
is strangely exemplified in you, for each rules by turns, and each helps
or hinders as moods and circumstances lead. Even in the great event of a
woman's life, you were thwarted by conflicting powers; impulse and
ignorance, passion and pride, hope and despair. Now you stand at the
parting of the ways, looking wistfully along the pleasant one where Adam
seems to beckon, while I point down the rugged one where I have walked,
and though my heart aches as I do it, counsel you as I would a daughter
of my own."
"I thank you, I will follow you, but my life looks very barren if I must
relinquish my desire."
"Not as barren as if you possessed your desire, and found in it another
misery and mistake. Could you have loved Geoffrey, it might have been
safe and well with you; loving Adam, it is neither. Let me show you why.
He is an exception like yourself; perhaps that explains your attraction
for each other. In him the head rules, in Geoffrey the heart. The one
criticises, the other loves mankind. Geoffrey is proud and private in
all that lies nearest him, clings to persons, and is faithful as a
woman. Adam has only the pride of an intellect which tests all things,
and abides by its own insight. He clings to principles; persons are but
animated facts or ideas; he seizes, searches, uses them, and when they
have no more for him, drops them like the husk, whose kernel he has
secured; passing on to find and study other samples without regret, but
with unabated zeal. For life to him is perpetual progress, and he obeys
the law of his nature as steadily as sun or sea. Is not this so?"
"All true; what more, Faith?"
"Few women, if wise, would dare to marry this man, noble and love-worthy
as he is, till time has tamed and experience developed him. Even then
the risk is great, for he demands and unconsciously absorbs into himself
the personality of others, making large returns, but of a kind which
only those as strong, sagacious, and steadfast as himself can receive
and adapt to their individual uses, without being overcome and
possessed. That none of us should be, except by the Spirit stronger than
man, purer than woman. You feel, though you do not understand this
power. You know that his presence excites, yet wearies you; that, while
you love, you fear him, and even when you long to be all in all to him,