Zazen

“ Zeen opened his eyes—two green, glazed eyes, which no longer saw things—and wriggled his arms from under the clothes:
“Why don’t you make the goat stop bleating?” he stammered.
They looked at one another.
“Zalia, why won’t you speak to me?... And what are all these people doing here?... I don’t want any one to help me die!... I and Zalia.... I and Zalia.... Look, how beautiful! Zalia, the procession’s going up the wall there.... Why don’t you look?... It’s so beautiful!... And I, I’m the only ugly one in it....”
“He’s wandering,” whispered Treze. ”

“ As I own the ship, I shall decide what to do with her."
"What do you want to do?"
"Go back to the middle of the Indian Ocean. There is a man there who needs help."
"Daughter, Zaza, my poor girl! Your mind has left you. Don't be so absurd. He is dead. He could not have lived. You know I'm sorry. I'll never forgive myself. But this will do no good."
"He is not dead. He is calling me all the time. I hear it strongest as I waken from sleep. I hear it as I have heard it all my life. He calls me the name I called myself when little, before I knew my own name. I called myself Zenie. ”

“ Let her, Zai thinks; she has never felt so much distaste to accepting Lord Delaval’s offer as she does at this moment, when her heart is so sore and her spirit so humiliated.
“I won’t cry any more!” she exclaims, feigning to be indifferent, but in reality anxious to change the subject. “I must look well before the Royalties to-night, you know! The Prince was very nice to me at Caryllon House, and said I was the belle of the room! What are you going to wear, Gabrielle?”
“Black lace—and you, I suppose, are going to wear sackcloth and ashes!” ”

“ It was Zeen, trying to scramble to his feet when he heard her come in.
“Zeen!” she cried.
“Yes,” moaned Zeen.
“How are you? No better yet? Where are you?... Why are you lying flat on the floor like this?”
“Zalia, I’m so ill ... my stomach and....”
“You’ve never been ill yet, Zeen! It won’t be anything this time.”
“I’m ill now, Zalia.”
“Wait, I’ll get a light. Why aren’t you in bed?”
“In bed, in bed ... then it’ll be for good, Zalia; I’m afraid of my bed.”
She felt along the ceiling for the lamp, then in the corner of the hearth for the tinder-box; she struck fire and lit up. ”

“ Come, let me introduce Jonathan's friend, Wetzel!"
Helen looked up and held out her hand. She saw a very tall man with extremely broad shoulders, a mass of raven-black hair, and a white face. He stepped forward, and took her hand in his huge, horny palm, pressing it, he stepped back without speaking. Colonel Zane talked to her in a soothing voice; but she failed to hear what he said. This Wetzel, this Indian-hunter whom she had heard called "Deathwind of the Border," this companion, guide, teacher of Jonathan Zane, this borderman of wonderful deeds, stood before her. ”

“ She stands as white as an image of marble and as motionless as if she were rooted to the ground—with the glad laugh on her pretty lips hushed into an awful silence, and with a terrible fear filling her big grey eyes, as, slowly passing her, they bear their burden into the room, and place it upon the very couch where she had lain this afternoon full of hope and happiness and with the sunshine of life dancing in her eyes and breaking into smiles on her mouth, for Zai is young and lovely and rich, and she adores her husband and the child that God has given her. ”

“ But such as I have, I value, and I do not care to let them get a mistaken impression of me, or of the way I live.'
'Especially not the women amongst them,' Zoë added, half interrogatively.
'There are none,' said Zeno, as if to cut short the suggestion.
'I see. You do not want your men friends to know that there are women living in your house, do you? They are doubtless all grave and elderly persons, who would be much shocked and grieved to learn that you have bought a pretty Greek slave. ”

“ The name Gabrielle whispers has a magical charm about it, for besides the blush, it evokes the softest of love-lights into Zai’s grey eyes.
“I will go in with you if you like,” she says in a voice that sounds quite meek and deprecatory, and Gabrielle, as she glances at her, feels sorry that her careless words should hurt this loving, tender heart. If there is a soft spot in her heart for one of her own sex it is for this step-sister of hers. Trixy she hates, and Baby she despises, but Zai, although like the others, born and bred in Belgravia, is of quite another mould. ”

“ This occurred about the end of the first year of Zac's residence in the palace, and was really the beginning to him of another existence. For King Fridolin was so pleased with the alteration in the youth, that he thought he should like to see more of him. Having no son of his own, why should not the future husband of one of his daughters be as a son to him? Thus the result of his great idea might turn out altogether fortunate, and he should have conferred a benefit upon himself as well as Belinda after all. ”

“ Zai whispers back, colouring vividly.
“C. C., but not before Gabrielle and Trixy.”
Zai blushes more deeply still as she bends over her drawing, and wonders if the{87} letters C. C. will always send the blood surging over her face and set her pulses throbbing.
In spite of his heartless conduct at Elm Lodge she loves him dearly still, and lives from day to day in the hope that the clouds will clear away, and give her back the sunshine of life—Carl’s love and presence. ”

“ He took his knife and ripped Zoë's blue cotton tunic from her throat to her left shoulder and down her side, and she tried not even to shudder, for she did not know what was coming but she would die bravely; and when she was dead Zeno would come, and Gorlias, and they would avenge her. Death was but death, even by torture, and there were worse things in life which had been spared her. ”

“ There is in her none of the making of what we call a fast young lady. When time has fully opened the flower, it will be of a higher order than any of those gaudy blossoms. Only nineteen, she shows a grace and subtlety, and a savoir faire that astonishes Lord Delaval, and then, though beauty is only skin deep, Zai is so very beautiful. ”

“ Then she turned her eyes to him and smiled a little maliciously, he fancied, as if she had guessed his timidity from his silence.
'Who told you such nonsense?' Zeno asked, with a laugh, for her question had broken the ice—or perhaps had quenched the fire for a while. 'I am a man like any other!'
'That I doubt, sir,' answered Zoë, laughing too, though not much.
'You have no experience of men,' he said. 'They are all like me, I assure you. One sheep is not more like another in a flock.'
'I should not have taken you for one of the common herd. ”

“ She is thinking of him now under the arching elms. Athwart their fluttering leaves she can see his blond aristocratic face, and she longs to be back to hear his voice, the languid accents of which are harmony to her ears.
“Shall I go in now and say you prefer dreaming away the hours here to cotelettes soubise and cold chicken?” she asks, breaking in rather sharply on the long silence which has fallen, and during which she sees plainly enough that poor little love-sick Zai has entirely forgotten her proximity even. ”

“ Zeyn’s mother was alarmed, but the Sultan of the Genii immediately appearing dispelled her fear. “Madam,” said he to her, “I protect and love your son. I had a mind to try, whether, at his age, he could subdue himself. This is the ninth statue I designed for him. It is more rare and precious than the others. Live happy, Zeyn, with this your wife,” said he, directing his discourse to the young prince, “and if you would have 243her true and constant to you, love her always and love her only.” ”

“ When the season is over, they come down to Delaval Court—a magnificent place in Hampshire—and here among the beautiful sylvan shades, Zai discovers that she has really fallen over head and ears in love with{56} her handsome husband, but with a graver, even tenderer, sentiment than mere being “in love.” She is grown so fragile that she looks as if a breath of wind would blow her away, but her heart beats stronger than ever with two feelings—love for the man she has married, and love for the child which is to perfect her life ”

“ Women were different beings, however, so he made all allowances for them, and went to extreme lengths in estimating their necessities, as Omobono found to his cost. Yet with all his preoccupation for details, Zeno forgot that Zoë must have a woman to wait on her at once, and when he realised the omission, almost at the last minute, the future conqueror of the Genoese, the terror of the Mediterranean, the victorious general of the Paduan campaign, the hero of thirty pitched battles and a score of sea-fights, felt his heart sink with something like fear. ”

“ I heard Zizi boasting to her, in a whisper, “it is forbidden for women to come alone to this café. But I am an honest girl. The gérant knows me. They make no objection to me or to my friends. Adieu, madame. Au revoir, proche,”—this last to me. Proche, indeed! But in the Latin Quarter the word is often used as a substitute for voisin. Then Zizi took her small self off, followed by Germaine.
“Well,” I queried, as soon as Elinor and I were alone, “is your thirst for experience satisfied? Are you happy at last?” ”

“ God has said that Zion shall be as a city set upon a hill, whose light can not be hid. We are called to be the children of Zion. The Lord has declared that Zion consists of the pure in heart. He has said, further, that the nations of the earth have corrupted their way before him, and, referring to Babylon, his command to his Saints is—"Come out of her, O my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, that ye receive not of her plagues." ”

“ You will not be long in Czernova without learning who Zabern is. He is the Warden of the Charter, the most subtle character in the cabinet, the idol of the Czernovese Poles, whose motto is 'Trust in God and Zabern—especially Zabern.' Ask the Muscovites who Zabern is, and they will blaspheme and tell you that he is the incarnation of the devil. And as the slaying of the devil would be a holy act, their pious attentions in this respect have compelled the marshal to go about with chain-mail beneath his clothing. ”

“ I must tell you something about Zizi, as I have known her.
Long before our personal acquaintance began I used to see her here and there in the Quarter: at the Bullier balls, or the Café Vachette, or in the Luxembourg or the Boule-Miche when the weather was fine: and to admire her as a singularly inoffensive specimen of her class. Those were her palmy days. Her “friend” was a student of law, from the Quartier Marbouf, with a pocketful of money and a pointed beard. She was the smallest of possible little women, no higher than her law-student’s heart, if he had one ”

“ Cowardice in man or woman is the biggest crime in my eyes,” Gabrielle says with a dare-devil glance.
“But,” replies Zai, “why on earth should you consider it necessary to warn me of your project, I, who have no{15} interest in the matter except to wish you happy?”
“Simply because I should wish the point made clear to you, so that you may not think me deceitful in the end. I owe the world—your world of Belgravia—nothing. But I have determined to take all I can gain from it by my woman’s wit.”
“Follow Trixy’s example, and sell yourself to the highest bidder you can find in my world, then!” ”

“ Prince Zeyn was not pleased with his dream. "Alas!" thought he to himself when he awoke, "how much was I mistaken! That old man is no other than the production of my disturbed imagination. My fancy was so full of him that it is no wonder I have seen him again. I had best return to Bussorah. What should I do here any longer? It is fortunate that I told none but my mother the motive of my journey. I should become a jest to my people were they to know it."
Accordingly, he set out for his kingdom, and as soon as he arrived there the queen asked him whether he returned well pleased. ”

“ The position of Zeno was quite clear to Zoë now, and a great wave of happiness lifted her and bore her on with it as she realised that she might save his life just when his chances looked most hopeless, and that whether she succeeded or failed her own must certainly be staked for his. Heroism is nearer the surface in women than in most men, and often goes quite as deep.
Zoë had understood very suddenly how matters stood, and that Tocktamish and his men meant to let Zeno perish, simply because he might ruin them all if he regained his liberty ”

“ I have heard papa and mamma, and Gabrielle, and all the others talk of ‘common sense,’ but one grows tired sometimes of hearing the same thing.”
The tone of her voice tells more than her words; there is a betraying quiver in it that makes him turn quickly and look at her.
The eyes that meet his own have great glittering tears in them. Never in her life has Zai looked more lovely or more lovable{138} than at this moment, and Carl recognises fully all that he is sacrificing for money. ”

“ So Zai gives herself up to this delicious pastime, and, strangely enough, Carl does not appear as central figure. Possibly her earnest prayers for oblivion of him and his falsity have been answered; anyway it is a blond face with deep blue eyes and hair that shines up like gold under the sunbeams, that her mind’s eye sees, while her broad white lids are closed.
“Dreaming, my sweet! Is it of me?”
Some one bends over her. Some one’s hand drops softly on her shoulder, and when she looks up, some one’s handsome face is very close to her own. ”