Robert Hichens

“ Valentine replied, buttoning slowly and carefully the last button of the second glove. "Only, Cuckoo Bright is beyond aid. She can neither help herself nor any one else."
"How do you know, Cresswell?"
"Because I have observed, doctor. Once I, too, thought that even Cuckoo might—might—well, have some fight in her. I know now that she has not. Her corruption of body has led to worse than corruption of mind, to corruption of will. Cuckoo Bright is as helpless as is a seabird with a shot through its wings, upon the sea. She can only drift in the present—die in the future." ”

“ Val, there must be a few people in the world with great power over others. You are one. Marr was another, and—" He paused.
"And what?" Valentine said rather loudly.
"Well," Julian paused again, as if conscious that he was about to say something that would seem ridiculous, "Cuckoo—"
"Is a third! You think it reasonable to bracket me with a woman like that, to compare my will, mine, who have lived the life of thought as well as the life of action, who have trained my powers to the highest point, and offered up sacrifices—yes, sacrifices—to my will, to that degraded, powerless creature! Julian!" ”

“ Then Valentine lost his fear, and could have been angry that such a scarecrow was the creature selected by Fate to draw a sword against him. He chose to forget the vision in the mirror when he struck at the staring reflection of the lady of the feathers and shivered under the influence of a cold terror. He chose to remember only the thin and fearful woman who had given her body to the world, and so had surely given her soul to a mill that had long ago ground it to powder.
There is nothing so terrible to one screwed up to the highest pitch of action as a monotony of waiting. ”

“ Julian, you may think you know women. You don't. I said just now that a woman like Cuckoo Bright is nothing, but I said it for the sake of uttering a paradox. No woman is ever nothing in a world that is full of the things called men. No woman's ever nothing so long as there is a bottle of hair-dye, a rouge-pot, a dressmaker, and—a man within reach. She may be in the very gutter. That doesn't matter. For from the very gutter she can see—not the stars, but the twinkling vanities of men, and they will light her on her way to Mayfair drawing-rooms, even, perhaps, to Court. ”

“ Most men have seen a man crumble gradually, through the action of some vice, as a wall crumbles through the action of time, falls into dust and decay, filters away into the weed-choked ditches of utter ruin and degradation. Most women have watched some woman slip from the purity and hope and innocence of girlhood into the faded hunger and painted and wrinkled energies of animalism. Such tragedies are no more unfamiliar to us than are the tragedies of Shakespeare. And such a tragedy—not complete yet, but at a third-act point, perhaps—now faced Doctor Levillier in Julian. ”

“ It is ghastly to be so idiotically dependent. Yet who, at some time, is not? And those who are independent lose, by their power, their possible Paradise. But such a time of uncertainty as that which Julian must now endure is a great penalty to pay for even the greatest joy, when the joy is past. He had his trance of the mind. He was hypnotized by his ignorance whether Valentine were alive or dead. And so he sat motionless, making the tour of an eternity of suffering, of wonder, of doubt, and hope, and yet, through it all, in some strange, indefinite way, numb, phlegmatic, and actually stupid. ”

“ Egoism developed to the utmost limits, is that the Devil? The doctor asked himself the question, and the great shadow that dogs the steps of life went by him on its black mission in the likeness of Valentine singing. And all the modern world stood still to hear and whispered: "Hark! It is an angel singing! If we but echo the song we touch the stars. If we but echo the song we, who are weary of time, shall know eternity. If we but echo the song we shall lay grief to rest beneath many roses, and draw from its sculptured sepulchre the radiant form of joy. We shall sing that we shall be great." ”

“ Julian's tired eyes glittered greedily.
"To be happy, I'd commit any crime," he said.
"Crime is merely opinion," Valentine answered. "Everything is opinion.
You will commit crimes probably. Most brave men do."
"But shall I be happy?"
"You are greedy, Julian, greedy of everything, knowledge of life, lust, joy. You are never satisfied. That's because you and I fasted for so long; and the greedy man is never quite happy while he is eating, for he is always anticipating the next course. And, let philosophers say what they will, happiness does not lie in anticipation. ”

“ As he spoke he looked into the hollow eyes of Cuckoo, seeming, strangely, to seek in them the will-o'-the-wisp of which he spoke.
"Never look for it in unfurnished rooms," Valentine exclaimed with sudden violence.
This glance of Julian, so the doctor judged, precipitated his curious and subtle insanity towards an outburst.
"You will find it in the thing that is most definite, not in the thing that is most indefinite. Isn't it so, doctor? Happiness lies in the positive, not in the negative."
"Happiness lies in many places. Each finds it in a different house." ”

“ I was Marr."
"Marr!" Julian said slowly. "You!"
"And Marr, too, was my prey. Like Valentine he was not content with himself. His weakness of discontent was my opportunity. I expelled his will, for mine was stronger than his. I lived in his body until the time came for me to be with you. Have you ever read of vampires?"
Julian muttered a hoarse assent. He seemed bound by a strange spell, inert, paralysed almost.
"There are vampires in the modern world who feed, not upon bodies, but upon souls, wills. And each soul they feed upon gives to them greater strength, a longer reign upon the earth. ”

“ Levillier answered.
He was looking at Valentine, who, apparently quite unconscious of their presence, was still playing rather softly. Julian followed his eyes.
The light in the room was dim, a carefully manufactured twilight. It is strange how many things, and how slight, stir, control, influence in one direction or another, the emotions. Light and the absence of light can divert a heart as easily as the pressing of a button can give a warship to the sea. Twilight and music can change a beast into a man, a man into an angel, for the moment. ”

“ But you have thrown yourself to the wolves, and they have torn you till you are only a skeleton. And how can a soul dwell in a skeleton? Your soul, your will, is as useless as that vagrant soul of Valentine, which I expelled into the air and into the night. It can do nothing; you can do nothing either. If I have ever feared you, and hated you because I feared you, I have fooled myself. I have divined your thoughts. I have known your enmity against me, and your love—yours!—for Julian. But if the soul and the will of Valentine could not save Julian from my possession, how can yours? ”

“ Only the red cloud spoke like a dull voice, and Doctor Levillier sat and listened to it, until he felt as if he began to know a new Valentine. There is an influence that emanates from lifeless things, strong, subtle, and penetrating; an influence in form, in colour, in scent, even in juxtaposition. And such influence is like a voice speaking to the soul. There was a voice in that empty room; and the words it uttered stirred the doctor to a greater surprise, a greater dread than the words of Cuckoo. Her painted lips related that which might well be a legend of her fancy or of her hate. ”

“ Then, to sit between the man she loved and the man she loathed, thus in the blackness, was a nerve-shaking experience which her preceding fainting-fit did not deprive of its normal terrors. The hand of Valentine and the hand of Julian were as ice and as fire to her. The darkness seemed crowded with nameless things. She could fancy that she heard it whisper incessantly in her ear.
But the real interest of this sitting, to any little demon gifted with a miraculous power of pushing its detective way into the minds of the sitters, would have lain, perhaps, chiefly in the mind of Doctor Levillier. ”

“ Julian never knew how long that vigil lasted. It might have been five minutes, or a lifetime. The vehemence of his mental debate slew his power of observation of normal things. He forgot what he was waiting for. He forgot to expect Dr. Levillier. Two visions alternated in glaring contrast before the eyes of his brain—life with Valentine, and life without him. It is so we watch the trance, or death,—we know not which,—of those whom we love, with a greedy, beautiful selfishness. They are themselves only in relation to us. They live, they die, in that wonderful relation. To live is to be with us ”

“ He saw Valentine singing while he and Julian listened. And the eyes of Valentine were as the eyes of a saint, but now he knew that behind them crouched a soul that was filled with evil. Slowly the air grew heavy. Slumber paced in the tiny room. The doctor struggled against it. But the colours of the brain-pictures faded. He saw them still, but only as one sees the world in a fog; looming forms that have lost their true character, that have assumed a vagueness of mystery, outlines at once heavy and remote, suggestive yet indefinite. And still the spirit of sleep keep vigil by Cuckoo. ”

“ There comes in the power of the body, which is very great. I believe, as you know, absolutely in the existence of the soul, and in its immortal destiny; but that does not blind me to the extraordinary influence, the extraordinary kingship, which a mere body, a mere husk and shell, as some good people call it—I don't feel with them—can obtain not only over another body, but, strangely, over the soul which is in that body. Your influence over Addison has been, and is, immense. Do you imagine that it is simply your nature which governs him? ”

“ That is what I wish to find out by going into the world with different eyes. I have been living in the arts, Julian. But is that living at all?"
Julian got up and stood by the fire. Valentine excited him. He leaned one arm on the mantelpiece. His right hand kept closing and unclosing as he talked.
"Such a life is natural to you," he said. "And you have made me love it."
"I sometimes wonder," responded Valentine, "whether I have not trained my head to slay my heart. Men of intellect are often strangely inhuman. Besides, what you call my purity and my refinement are due perhaps to my cowardice. ”

“ The doctor said nothing, but at her last speech his face had lit up with a sort of excitement. For had she not described in those few ill-chosen words the very mental position of the former Valentine? A saint at first with his will, a saint at last against his will—and now a saint no more. That was, perhaps, the key to the whole matter. A good man prays to be no longer good. His prayer is granted. His grievous desire is fulfilled. And then he may pray forever in vain to be as he once was. Yet the change in Valentine was more even than this, more than the gliding from white purity to black sin. ”

“ The soul that sighed in sorrow as it contemplated its own loveliness had been expelled by the soul that was completely satisfied with its own hatefulness. The weakness of the flame of purity had built up the strength of the flame of impurity. And so beauty was driven out to wander in the wilderness of the air, and ugliness dwelled in its body, its temple swept and garnished, like the seven devils of the Scripture. For how long a time had the wandering flame or soul of beauty been helpless, impotent, tortured by the appalling deception of the soul of Julian, whom it could no longer protect! ”

“ On the hearth flickered a fire, before which lay Valentine's fox-terrier, Rip. Julian was half lying down on a divan in an unbuttoned attitude. Valentine leaned forward in an arm-chair. They were smoking cigarettes.
"Julian," Valentine said, meditatively, "I sometimes wonder why you and
I are such great friends."
"How abominable of you! To seek a reason for friendship is as inhuman as to probe for the causes of love. Don't, for goodness' sake, let your intellect triumph over your humanity, Valentine. Of all modern vices, that seems to me the most loathsome. ”

“ Never had Cuckoo felt more lonely than in these days, though a vast loneliness is the constant companion of her large sisterhood. Even Jessie failed to comfort her, and she could find little courage within herself. And yet there were moments when the vigour that had led her once to defy Valentine, when the fire that had sprung up in her, as a flame may burst forth in a swamp, seemed to be near to her again. She felt a new possibility within her, stirring, striving. It was at such moments that she longed to see the doctor, and could have cursed him for not coming to her. ”

“ Let us be quiet, and feel the rustle of spring over the gas-lamps, and hear the pulsing of the hearts around us."
He put his arm through Julian's as they leaned out on the sill of the window, and to Julian his arm was like a line of living fire, compelling that which touched it to a speechless fever of excitement. Was this man Valentine? Julian's pulses throbbed and hammered as he looked upon the street, and he seemed to see all the passers-by with eyes from which scales had fallen. If to die should be nothing to the wise man, to live should be much. ”

“ Yet fear fought this growing, stirring, strange warm influence that burned like a fire at Cuckoo's heart. She flushed and she paled as she lay there, with down-drawn brows and enlaced hands, her yellow hair falling over the hard, shiny horsehair of the sofa. She longed for some one to come to her who would give her counsel, help, courage, that she might fight for Julian, who was too spell-bound to fight for himself, and who was falling so fast, so terribly fast, into the abyss where men crawl like insects and women are as poisonous weeds in the slime of the pit. ”

“ But, though he blamed himself, his regret for what was irrevocable had none of the poignancy of Cuckoo's. For a long time he had gloried in living in a cloister with Valentine. Now he had left the cloister, he did not look back to it with the curious pathos which so often gathers like moss upon even a dull and vacant past. He did not, for the moment, look back at all. Action had lifted scales from his eyes, had stirred the youth in him, had stung him as if with bright fire, and given him, at a breath, a thousand thoughts, visions, curiosities. A sense of power came to him. ”

“ And the doctor knew that the secret of Cuckoo's grand influence to succour lay in her completeness. Degraded, wretched, soiled, ignorant, pent within the prison-house of lust—yet she loved completely. And because she loved completely, the sad, wandering, driven soul of Valentine chose her from all the world to help him in the rescue of Julian. For she, like the widow, had given her all to feed the poor. Her starvation had set her on high, more than the starvation and the mortification of saints and hermits. For they crucify the flesh for the good of their own souls. ”