Lucas Malet

“ He emerged from the confusion and lethargy which had oppressed him, quickened by that same outcry into newness and fullness of life. To him all this was as the drawing aside of some gloomy, jealously impenetrable curtain—the curtain of desolate gray mist, was it, blotting out the distance, the town, the great woods, and the noble freedom of the sea, when he walked in that ill-assorted funeral procession up the wet road behind Joanna's coffin?—a drawing of it aside and letting the glad and wholesome sunlight shine on him once more. He no longer felt a stranger to himself. ”

“ The curtain went up. As it did so a cold draught drew from regions behind the stage, laden with that indefinable odour of gas, glue, humanity, flagged stair and alleyways, paint, canvas, carpentry, and underground places the sun never penetrates, which haunts the working part of every theatre. Poppy smiled as she snuffed it, with a queer mingling of enjoyment and repulsion. For as is the smell of ocean to the seafarer, of mother-earth to the peasant, of incense to the priest, so is the smell of the theatre to the player. Nature may revolt; but the spell holds. Once an actor always an actor. ”

“ When you are absent, I become as the echo unevoked by any sound, as the shadow when neither sun or moon look forth to cast it, as the reflection in the mirror when that of which it was the image has moved away. Only my heart remains to me; and it, when you are absent, longs and searches, journeying from place to place, formless, wordless, and blind, sensible only of its own infelicity, while seeking that which alone can bring it ease and light."
"My poor love!" Laurence said gently, greatly moved; "my poor love!" ”

“ Those ranks of rosy cloud in infinite perspective, with spaces of clearest topaz and sapphire light between, converged to the glowing glory of the sun, the rim of which now touched the margin of the world. They were as ranks of worshippers, of blessed souls redeemed and sainted, united by a common act of adoration, every form clothed by reflection of His glory, every heart, every thought centred upon God.—Richard looked at all that, but it failed to speak to him. Then he saw Honoria resolutely turn her back upon the glory. ”

“ Half a mile ahead, pastel-tinted, green-shuttered houses—a village of a single straggling street—detached themselves in broken perspective from the purple of pine-crowned cliff and headland beyond. Behind them the western sky began to grow golden with the approach of sunset. The road lead straight towards that softly golden light—to St. Augustin. It led further, deeper into the gold, deeper, as one might fancy, into the heart of the coming sunset, namely to the world-famous seaport of Marseilles.
Damaris sought to stifle remembrance of this alluring fact, as soon as it occurred to her. ”

“ Now, leaning out of the high-set window, she gazed as far as sight carried, east, west, and north, while a vague, deep-seated excitement possessed her. It was as though she touched the verge of some extraordinary revelation, some tremendous crisis of the cosmic drama. Had universal paralysis seized the heart of things, she asked herself, of which this desert, voiceless Paris was the symbol? Had the ever-turning Wheel of Being ceased to turn, struck into immobility, as the world-famous city appeared to be, by some miracle of incalculable frost? ”

“ For when the nights are long and the days are short, and the sunlight is feeble as a sick man's smile, the North Wind wakes from his summer sleep and calls to his brother the East Wind, and they go forth over the earth driving the heavy-laden snow-clouds before them, and the pale snow-fairies who do their will. ”

“ The sick man spoke with a fierceness of conviction, his voice usually low and even swelling into full sonorous tones; his attenuated frame vibrant with energy; his face illuminated, as though a lamp burned behind that thin investiture of flesh and bone. Laurence saw in him, for the moment, a great orator, more probably a great preacher, wasted. And the thought of that waste of force, waste of power, stung him out of indolence, out of mere easy good nature. He, at least, would shilly-shally no more with life, but play the game—whatever the game presenting itself—whole-heartedly. ”

“ But Dominic Iglesias, though tired, was in no humour for sleep. He drew forward a leather-covered armchair and sat near the open window, in at which came a breathing of night wind. This was soothing, touching his forehead as with delicate pressure of a cool and sympathetic hand; so that, without any sense of surprising transition, he found himself in the garden of the little house in Holland Street, Kensington, once again. The laburnum was in full blossom, and the breeze uplifted the light drooping branches of it, making all their golden glory dance in the sunshine. ”

“ Quentin, on to the iron platform at the rear of the swaying car, and stood there under the stars. The mystery of these last, and of the dimly discerned and sleeping land, offered penetrating contrast to the sleeplessness of the hurrying train with its long, sinuous line of lighted windows, and to the sleeplessness of her own heart. The fret of human life is but as a little island in the great ocean of eternal peace—so she told herself—and then bade that sleepless heart of hers both still its passionate beating and take courage. ”

“ Thus did it come about that Damaris reposed in a deck chair, under the shade of the great ilex trees, gazing idly at the webs of steamer smoke hanging low in the southern sky, at the long yellow-grey ridge of the Bar between river and sea, and at the cormorants posturing in the hot afternoon sunshine upon the sand.
Truly she was free to send forth her soul upon whatever far fantastic journey she pleased. But souls are perverse, not to be driven at will, choosing their own times and seasons for travel. ”

“ La belle Gabrielle shook her head gently, smiling.
"No, no," she answered. "Not under compulsion, not out of pity, mon ami; but because I find nature is too strong for me. Because I find I too love, and find—since you will have me lay bare my heart and tell you everything—it is you, precisely and solely you, whom I love."
And from the inner room—into which Anastasia Beauchamp had passed unperceived by her two guests during this, for them, momentous colloquy—came strains of heroic music, good for the soul. ”

“ More than once before in the course of his laborious, monotonous, and, as men go, very virtuous life had this same thing happened to him—the tides of the obvious and accustomed suddenly receding and leaving him stranded, as on some barren sand-bank, uncertain whether the ship of his individual fate would lie there wind-swept and sun-bleached till rusty rivets fell out and planks parted, disclosing the ribs of her in unsightly nakedness, or whether the kindly tide, rising, would float her off into blue water and she would sail hopefully once again. ”

“ The brown of her hair, the warm pallor of her skin, the blue of her profound and now laughing eyes, the soft rose-red of her silken gown, defied the chill of the moonlight. And this, as Laurence moved towards her, deepened alike the charm and the mystery of her appearance. It captivated his imagination. It stimulated his ambition. It challenged the deep places of his love. The hopeless task must indeed be accomplished. The impossible must come to pass. Daring that which no other man had dared, he would earn a reward such as no other man had dreamed. ”

“ Katherine waited, her eyes full of laughter, until Mr. Caryll's footsteps died away on the stone quarries of the great hall within. Then she gently drew the heavy door to, and stepped out on to the centre of the terrace. The grass slopes of the park—dotted with thorn trees and beds of bracken,—the lime avenue running along the ridge of the hill, the ragged edge of the fir forest to the east, and the mass of the house, all these were softened to a vagueness—as the landscape in a dream—by the deepening twilight. ”

“ He looked her in the eyes, his own worshipful, ablaze at once with a great joy and a great anger; and then led her back, down the length of the aisle, through the west door into the liberty of the sunshine and the crisp northerly wind outside.
Standing here, the houses and trees of the village lay below them. The whole glinting expanse of the Haven was visible right up to the town of Marychurch gathered about its long-backed Abbey, whose tower, tall and in effect almost spectral, showed against the purple ridges of forest and moorland beyond. ”

“ In sharply green, grass-grown hollows ancient hawthorns, their tops clipped by the sea wind into quaint shapes, compact and ruddy, were dusted over by opening leaf-buds. High in air screaming gulls circled. The shadows were long, for the sun drew down toward its setting. Then, as once before to-day, the happy appeal of outward things—in which, as in glass, man may, if he will, catch some faint reflection of God's glory—made its voice heard, awakening Joanna Smyrthwaite from the fever-dreams of her almost maniacal egoism. ”

“ One morning in late June, standing in the bay-window, with the fragrance of the blossoming garden and the songs of awakening birds saluting them, he questioned her on this matter. Her hand rested in his—no longer perceptible as a mere pulsation, such as might be caused by the fluttering wings of a captive butterfly. It had substance now, actual, though very delicate, weight. And feeling this, amazement and ecstasy invaded Laurence. His eyes were alight and his blood hot.
"You are going?" he asked. "But why should you go? Stay and see the day in its beauty." ”