Phantastes: A Faerie Romance for Men and Women Page 8

  CHAPTER VI

  “Ah, let a man beware, when his wishes, fulfilled, rain down upon him, and his happiness is unbounded.”

  “Thy red lips, like worms, Travel over my cheek.” --MOTHERWELL.

  But as I crossed the space between the foot of the hill and the forest,a vision of another kind delayed my steps. Through an opening tothe westward flowed, like a stream, the rays of the setting sun, andoverflowed with a ruddy splendour the open space where I was. And ridingas it were down this stream towards me, came a horseman in what appearedred armour. From frontlet to tail, the horse likewise shone red in thesunset. I felt as if I must have seen the knight before; but as he drewnear, I could recall no feature of his countenance. Ere he came upto me, however, I remembered the legend of Sir Percival in the rustyarmour, which I had left unfinished in the old book in the cottage: itwas of Sir Percival that he reminded me. And no wonder; for when he cameclose up to me, I saw that, from crest to heel, the whole surface of hisarmour was covered with a light rust. The golden spurs shone, but theiron greaves glowed in the sunlight. The MORNING STAR, which hung fromhis wrist, glittered and glowed with its silver and bronze. His wholeappearance was terrible; but his face did not answer to this appearance.It was sad, even to gloominess; and something of shame seemed to coverit. Yet it was noble and high, though thus beclouded; and the formlooked lofty, although the head drooped, and the whole frame was bowedas with an inward grief. The horse seemed to share in his master’sdejection, and walked spiritless and slow. I noticed, too, that thewhite plume on his helmet was discoloured and drooping. “He has fallenin a joust with spears,” I said to myself; “yet it becomes not a nobleknight to be conquered in spirit because his body hath fallen.” Heappeared not to observe me, for he was riding past without looking up,and started into a warlike attitude the moment the first sound of myvoice reached him. Then a flush, as of shame, covered all of his facethat the lifted beaver disclosed. He returned my greeting with distantcourtesy, and passed on. But suddenly, he reined up, sat a moment still,and then turning his horse, rode back to where I stood looking afterhim.

  “I am ashamed,” he said, “to appear a knight, and in such a guise; butit behoves me to tell you to take warning from me, lest the same evil,in his kind, overtake the singer that has befallen the knight. Hast thouever read the story of Sir Percival and the”--(here he shuddered, thathis armour rang)--“Maiden of the Alder-tree?”

  “In part, I have,” said I; “for yesterday, at the entrance of thisforest, I found in a cottage the volume wherein it is recorded.” “Thentake heed,” he rejoined; “for, see my armour--I put it off; and as itbefell to him, so has it befallen to me. I that was proud am humble now.Yet is she terribly beautiful--beware. Never,” he added, raising hishead, “shall this armour be furbished, but by the blows of knightlyencounter, until the last speck has disappeared from every spot wherethe battle-axe and sword of evil-doers, or noble foes, might fall; whenI shall again lift my head, and say to my squire, ‘Do thy duty oncemore, and make this armour shine.’”

  Before I could inquire further, he had struck spurs into his horse andgalloped away, shrouded from my voice in the noise of his armour. For Icalled after him, anxious to know more about this fearful enchantress;but in vain--he heard me not. “Yet,” I said to myself, “I have nowbeen often warned; surely I shall be well on my guard; and I am fullyresolved I shall not be ensnared by any beauty, however beautiful.Doubtless, some one man may escape, and I shall be he.” So I went oninto the wood, still hoping to find, in some one of its mysteriousrecesses, my lost lady of the marble. The sunny afternoon died intothe loveliest twilight. Great bats began to flit about with their ownnoiseless flight, seemingly purposeless, because its objects are unseen.The monotonous music of the owl issued from all unexpected quarters inthe half-darkness around me. The glow-worm was alight here and there,burning out into the great universe. The night-hawk heightened all theharmony and stillness with his oft-recurring, discordant jar.Numberless unknown sounds came out of the unknown dusk; but all were oftwilight-kind, oppressing the heart as with a condensed atmosphere ofdreamy undefined love and longing. The odours of night arose, and bathedme in that luxurious mournfulness peculiar to them, as if the plantswhence they floated had been watered with bygone tears. Earth drew metowards her bosom; I felt as if I could fall down and kiss her. I forgotI was in Fairy Land, and seemed to be walking in a perfect night ofour own old nursing earth. Great stems rose about me, uplifting a thickmultitudinous roof above me of branches, and twigs, and leaves--the birdand insect world uplifted over mine, with its own landscapes, its ownthickets, and paths, and glades, and dwellings; its own bird-ways andinsect-delights. Great boughs crossed my path; great roots based thetree-columns, and mightily clasped the earth, strong to lift and strongto uphold. It seemed an old, old forest, perfect in forest ways andpleasures. And when, in the midst of this ecstacy, I remembered thatunder some close canopy of leaves, by some giant stem, or in some mossycave, or beside some leafy well, sat the lady of the marble, whom mysongs had called forth into the outer world, waiting (might it notbe?) to meet and thank her deliverer in a twilight which would veil herconfusion, the whole night became one dream-realm of joy, the centralform of which was everywhere present, although unbeheld. Then,remembering how my songs seemed to have called her from the marble,piercing through the pearly shroud of alabaster--“Why,” thought I,“should not my voice reach her now, through the ebon night thatinwraps her.” My voice burst into song so spontaneously that it seemedinvoluntarily.

  “Not a sound But, echoing in me, Vibrates all around With a blind delight, Till it breaks on Thee, Queen of Night!

  Every tree, O’ershadowing with gloom, Seems to cover thee Secret, dark, love-still’d, In a holy room Silence-filled.

  “Let no moon Creep up the heaven to-night; I in darksome noon Walking hopefully, Seek my shrouded light-- Grope for thee!

  “Darker grow The borders of the dark! Through the branches glow, From the roof above, Star and diamond-sparks Light for love.”

  Scarcely had the last sounds floated away from the hearing of my ownears, when I heard instead a low delicious laugh near me. It was not thelaugh of one who would not be heard, but the laugh of one who has justreceived something long and patiently desired--a laugh that ends ina low musical moan. I started, and, turning sideways, saw a dim whitefigure seated beside an intertwining thicket of smaller trees andunderwood.

  “It is my white lady!” I said, and flung myself on the ground besideher; striving, through the gathering darkness, to get a glimpse of theform which had broken its marble prison at my call.

  “It is your white lady!” said the sweetest voice, in reply, sending athrill of speechless delight through a heart which all the love-charmsof the preceding day and evening had been tempering for this culminatinghour. Yet, if I would have confessed it, there was something either inthe sound of the voice, although it seemed sweetness itself, or else inthis yielding which awaited no gradation of gentle approaches, that didnot vibrate harmoniously with the beat of my inward music. And likewise,when, taking her hand in mine, I drew closer to her, looking for thebeauty of her face, which, indeed, I found too plenteously, a coldshiver ran through me; but “it is the marble,” I said to myself, andheeded it not.

  She withdrew her hand from mine, and after that would scarce allow me totouch her. It seemed strange, after the fulness of her first greeting,that she could not trust me to come close to her. Though her wordswere those of a lover, she kept herself withdrawn as if a mile of spaceinterposed between us.

  “Why did you run away from me when you woke in the cave?” I said.

  “Did I?” she returned. “That was very unkind of me; but I did not kno
wbetter.”

  “I wish I could see you. The night is very dark.”

  “So it is. Come to my grotto. There is light there.”

  “Have you another cave, then?”

  “Come and see.”

  But she did not move until I rose first, and then she was on her feetbefore I could offer my hand to help her. She came close to my side, andconducted me through the wood. But once or twice, when, involuntarilyalmost, I was about to put my arm around her as we walked on through thewarm gloom, she sprang away several paces, always keeping her face fulltowards me, and then stood looking at me, slightly stooping, in theattitude of one who fears some half-seen enemy. It was too dark todiscern the expression of her face. Then she would return and walk closebeside me again, as if nothing had happened. I thought this strange;but, besides that I had almost, as I said before, given up the attemptto account for appearances in Fairy Land, I judged that it would be veryunfair to expect from one who had slept so long and had been so suddenlyawakened, a behaviour correspondent to what I might unreflectingly lookfor. I knew not what she might have been dreaming about. Besides, it waspossible that, while her words were free, her sense of touch might beexquisitely delicate.

  At length, after walking a long way in the woods, we arrived at anotherthicket, through the intertexture of which was glimmering a pale rosylight.

  “Push aside the branches,” she said, “and make room for us toenter.”

  I did as she told me.

  “Go in,” she said; “I will follow you.”

  I did as she desired, and found myself in a little cave, not very unlikethe marble cave. It was festooned and draperied with all kinds ofgreen that cling to shady rocks. In the furthest corner, half-hidden inleaves, through which it glowed, mingling lovely shadows between them,burned a bright rosy flame on a little earthen lamp. The lady glidedround by the wall from behind me, still keeping her face towards me, andseated herself in the furthest corner, with her back to the lamp, whichshe hid completely from my view. I then saw indeed a form of perfectloveliness before me. Almost it seemed as if the light of the rose-lampshone through her (for it could not be reflected from her); such adelicate shade of pink seemed to shadow what in itself must be a marblywhiteness of hue. I discovered afterwards, however, that there was onething in it I did not like; which was, that the white part of the eyewas tinged with the same slight roseate hue as the rest of the form. Itis strange that I cannot recall her features; but they, as well as hersomewhat girlish figure, left on me simply and only the impression ofintense loveliness. I lay down at her feet, and gazed up into her faceas I lay. She began, and told me a strange tale, which, likewise, Icannot recollect; but which, at every turn and every pause, somehow orother fixed my eyes and thoughts upon her extreme beauty; seeming alwaysto culminate in something that had a relation, revealed or hidden, butalways operative, with her own loveliness. I lay entranced. It was atale which brings back a feeling as of snows and tempests; torrentsand water-sprites; lovers parted for long, and meeting at last; with agorgeous summer night to close up the whole. I listened till she and Iwere blended with the tale; till she and I were the whole history. Andwe had met at last in this same cave of greenery, while the summer nighthung round us heavy with love, and the odours that crept through thesilence from the sleeping woods were the only signs of an outer worldthat invaded our solitude. What followed I cannot clearly remember. Thesucceeding horror almost obliterated it. I woke as a grey dawn stoleinto the cave. The damsel had disappeared; but in the shrubbery, at themouth of the cave, stood a strange horrible object. It looked like anopen coffin set up on one end; only that the part for the head andneck was defined from the shoulder-part. In fact, it was a roughrepresentation of the human frame, only hollow, as if made of decayingbark torn from a tree.

  It had arms, which were only slightly seamed, down from theshoulder-blade by the elbow, as if the bark had healed again from thecut of a knife. But the arms moved, and the hand and the fingers weretearing asunder a long silky tress of hair. The thing turned round--ithad for a face and front those of my enchantress, but now of a palegreenish hue in the light of the morning, and with dead lustreless eyes.In the horror of the moment, another fear invaded me. I put my hand tomy waist, and found indeed that my girdle of beech-leaves was gone.Hair again in her hands, she was tearing it fiercely. Once more, as sheturned, she laughed a low laugh, but now full of scorn and derision; andthen she said, as if to a companion with whom she had been talking whileI slept, “There he is; you can take him now.” I lay still, petrifiedwith dismay and fear; for I now saw another figure beside her, which,although vague and indistinct, I yet recognised but too well. It was theAsh-tree. My beauty was the Maid of the Alder! and she was givingme, spoiled of my only availing defence, into the hands of my awful foe.The Ash bent his Gorgon-head, and entered the cave. I could not stir.He drew near me. His ghoul-eyes and his ghastly face fascinated me.He came stooping, with the hideous hand outstretched, like a beast ofprey. I had given myself up to a death of unfathomable horror, when,suddenly, and just as he was on the point of seizing me, the dull,heavy blow of an axe echoed through the wood, followed by others inquick repetition. The Ash shuddered and groaned, withdrew theoutstretched hand, retreated backwards to the mouth of the cave, thenturned and disappeared amongst the trees. The other walking Deathlooked at me once, with a careless dislike on her beautifully mouldedfeatures; then, heedless any more to conceal her hollow deformity,turned her frightful back and likewise vanished amid the greenobscurity without. I lay and wept. The Maid of the Alder-tree hadbefooled me--nearly slain me--in spite of all the warnings I hadreceived from those who knew my danger.