第 十八 章 · ZENOBIA'S DRAWING-ROOM

The remainder of the day, so far as I was concerned, was spent in

meditating on these recent incidents. I contrived, and alternately

rejected, innumerable methods of accounting for the presence of Zenobia

and Priscilla, and the connection of Westervelt with both. It must be

owned, too, that I had a keen, revengeful sense of the insult inflicted

by Zenobia's scornful recognition, and more particularly by her letting

down the curtain; as if such were the proper barrier to be interposed

between a character like hers and a perceptive faculty like mine. For,

was mine a mere vulgar curiosity? Zenobia should have known me better

than to suppose it. She should have been able to appreciate that

quality of the intellect and the heart which impelled me (often against

my own will, and to the detriment of my own comfort) to live in other

lives, and to endeavor--by generous sympathies, by delicate intuitions,

by taking note of things too slight for record, and by bringing my

human spirit into manifold accordance with the companions whom God

assigned me--to learn the secret which was hidden even from themselves.

Of all possible observers, methought a woman like Zenobia and a man

like Hollingsworth should have selected me. And now when the event has

long been past, I retain the same opinion of my fitness for the office.

True, I might have condemned them. Had I been judge as well as

witness, my sentence might have been stern as that of destiny itself.

But, still, no trait of original nobility of character, no struggle

against temptation,--no iron necessity of will, on the one hand, nor

extenuating circumstance to be derived from passion and despair, on the

other,--no remorse that might coexist with error, even if powerless to

prevent it,--no proud repentance that should claim retribution as a

meed,--would go unappreciated. True, again, I might give my full

assent to the punishment which was sure to follow. But it would be

given mournfully, and with undiminished love. And, after all was

finished, I would come as if to gather up the white ashes of those who

had perished at the stake, and to tell the world--the wrong being now

atoned for--how much had perished there which it had never yet known

how to praise.

I sat in my rocking-chair, too far withdrawn from the window to expose

myself to another rebuke like that already inflicted. My eyes still

wandered towards the opposite house, but without effecting any new

discoveries. Late in the afternoon, the weathercock on the church

spire indicated a change of wind; the sun shone dimly out, as if the

golden wine of its beams were mingled half-and-half with water.

Nevertheless, they kindled up the whole range of edifices, threw a glow

over the windows, glistened on the wet roofs, and, slowly withdrawing

upward, perched upon the chimney-tops; thence they took a higher

flight, and lingered an instant on the tip of the spire, making it the

final point of more cheerful light in the whole sombre scene. The next

moment, it was all gone. The twilight fell into the area like a shower

of dusky snow, and before it was quite dark, the gong of the hotel

summoned me to tea.

When I returned to my chamber, the glow of an astral lamp was

penetrating mistily through the white curtain of Zenobia's

drawing-room. The shadow of a passing figure was now and then cast

upon this medium, but with too vague an outline for even my adventurous

conjectures to read the hieroglyphic that it presented.

All at once, it occurred to me how very absurd was my behavior in thus

tormenting myself with crazy hypotheses as to what was going on within

that drawing-room, when it was at my option to be personally present

there, My relations with Zenobia, as yet unchanged,--as a familiar

friend, and associated in the same life-long enterprise,--gave me the

right, and made it no more than kindly courtesy demanded, to call on

her. Nothing, except our habitual independence of conventional rules

at Blithedale, could have kept me from sooner recognizing this duty.

At all events, it should now be performed.

In compliance with this sudden impulse, I soon found myself actually

within the house, the rear of which, for two days past, I had been so

sedulously watching. A servant took my card, and, immediately

returning, ushered me upstairs. On the way, I heard a rich, and, as it

were, triumphant burst of music from a piano, in which I felt Zenobia's

character, although heretofore I had known nothing of her skill upon

the instrument. Two or three canary-birds, excited by this gush of

sound, sang piercingly, and did their utmost to produce a kindred

melody. A bright illumination streamed through, the door of the front

drawing-room; and I had barely stept across the threshold before

Zenobia came forward to meet me, laughing, and with an extended hand.

"Ah, Mr. Coverdale," said she, still smiling, but, as I thought, with a

good deal of scornful anger underneath, "it has gratified me to see the

interest which you continue to take in my affairs! I have long

recognized you as a sort of transcendental Yankee, with all the native

propensity of your countrymen to investigate matters that come within

their range, but rendered almost poetical, in your case, by the refined

methods which you adopt for its gratification. After all, it was an

unjustifiable stroke, on my part,--was it not?--to let down the window

curtain!"

"I cannot call it a very wise one," returned I, with a secret

bitterness, which, no doubt, Zenobia appreciated. "It is really

impossible to hide anything in this world, to say nothing of the next.

All that we ought to ask, therefore, is, that the witnesses of our

conduct, and the speculators on our motives, should be capable of

taking the highest view which the circumstances of the case may admit.

So much being secured, I, for one, would be most happy in feeling

myself followed everywhere by an indefatigable human sympathy."

"We must trust for intelligent sympathy to our guardian angels, if any

there be," said Zenobia. "As long as the only spectator of my poor

tragedy is a young man at the window of his hotel, I must still claim

the liberty to drop the curtain."

While this passed, as Zenobia's hand was extended, I had applied the

very slightest touch of my fingers to her own. In spite of an external

freedom, her manner made me sensible that we stood upon no real terms

of confidence. The thought came sadly across me, how great was the

contrast betwixt this interview and our first meeting. Then, in the

warm light of the country fireside, Zenobia had greeted me cheerily and

hopefully, with a full sisterly grasp of the hand, conveying as much

kindness in it as other women could have evinced by the pressure of

both arms around my neck, or by yielding a cheek to the brotherly

salute. The difference was as complete as between her appearance at

that time--so simply attired, and with only the one superb flower in

her hair--and now, when her beauty was set off by all that dress and

ornament could do for it. And they did much. Not, indeed, that they

created or added anything to what Nature had lavishly done for Zenobia.

But, those costly robes which she had on, those flaming jewels on her

neck, served as lamps to display the personal advantages which required

nothing less than such an illumination to be fully seen. Even her

characteristic flower, though it seemed to be still there, had

undergone a cold and bright transfiguration; it was a flower

exquisitely imitated in jeweller's work, and imparting the last touch

that transformed Zenobia into a work of art.

"I scarcely feel," I could not forbear saying, "as if we had ever met

before. How many years ago it seems since we last sat beneath Eliot's

pulpit, with Hollingsworth extended on the fallen leaves, and Priscilla

at his feet! Can it be, Zenobia, that you ever really numbered

yourself with our little band of earnest, thoughtful, philanthropic

laborers?"

"Those ideas have their time and place," she answered coldly. "But I

fancy it must be a very circumscribed mind that can find room for no

other."

Her manner bewildered me. Literally, moreover, I was dazzled by the

brilliancy of the room. A chandelier hung down in the centre, glowing

with I know not how many lights; there were separate lamps, also, on

two or three tables, and on marble brackets, adding their white

radiance to that of the chandelier. The furniture was exceedingly

rich. Fresh from our old farmhouse, with its homely board and benches

in the dining-room, and a few wicker chairs in the best parlor, it

struck me that here was the fulfilment of every fantasy of an

imagination revelling in various methods of costly self-indulgence and

splendid ease. Pictures, marbles, vases,--in brief, more shapes of

luxury than there could be any object in enumerating, except for an

auctioneer's advertisement,--and the whole repeated and doubled by the

reflection of a great mirror, which showed me Zenobia's proud figure,

likewise, and my own. It cost me, I acknowledge, a bitter sense of

shame, to perceive in myself a positive effort to bear up against the

effect which Zenobia sought to impose on me. I reasoned against her,

in my secret mind, and strove so to keep my footing. In the

gorgeousness with which she had surrounded herself,--in the redundance

of personal ornament, which the largeness of her physical nature and

the rich type of her beauty caused to seem so suitable,--I malevolently

beheld the true character of the woman, passionate, luxurious, lacking

simplicity, not deeply refined, incapable of pure and perfect taste.

But, the next instant, she was too powerful for all my opposing

struggles. I saw how fit it was that she should make herself as

gorgeous as she pleased, and should do a thousand things that would

have been ridiculous in the poor, thin, weakly characters of other

women. To this day, however, I hardly know whether I then beheld

Zenobia in her truest attitude, or whether that were the truer one in

which she had presented herself at Blithedale. In both, there was

something like the illusion which a great actress flings around her.

"Have you given up Blithedale forever?" I inquired.

"Why should you think so?" asked she.

"I cannot tell," answered I; "except that it appears all like a dream

that we were ever there together."

"It is not so to me," said Zenobia. "I should think it a poor and

meagre nature that is capable of but one set of forms, and must convert

all the past into a dream merely because the present happens to be

unlike it. Why should we be content with our homely life of a few

months past, to the exclusion of all other modes? It was good; but

there are other lives as good, or better. Not, you will understand,

that I condemn those who give themselves up to it more entirely than I,

for myself, should deem it wise to do."

It irritated me, this self-complacent, condescending, qualified

approval and criticism of a system to which many individuals--perhaps

as highly endowed as our gorgeous Zenobia--had contributed their all of

earthly endeavor, and their loftiest aspirations. I determined to make

proof if there were any spell that would exorcise her out of the part

which she seemed to be acting. She should be compelled to give me a

glimpse of something true; some nature, some passion, no matter whether

right or wrong, provided it were real.

"Your allusion to that class of circumscribed characters who can live

only in one mode of life," remarked I coolly, "reminds me of our poor

friend Hollingsworth. Possibly he was in your thoughts when you spoke

thus. Poor fellow! It is a pity that, by the fault of a narrow

education, he should have so completely immolated himself to that one

idea of his, especially as the slightest modicum of common-sense would

teach him its utter impracticability. Now that I have returned into

the world, and can look at his project from a distance, it requires

quite all my real regard for this respectable and well-intentioned man

to prevent me laughing at him,--as I find society at large does."

Zenobia's eyes darted lightning, her cheeks flushed, the vividness of

her expression was like the effect of a powerful light flaming up

suddenly within her. My experiment had fully succeeded. She had shown

me the true flesh and blood of her heart, by thus involuntarily

resenting my slight, pitying, half-kind, half-scornful mention of the

man who was all in all with her. She herself probably felt this; for

it was hardly a moment before she tranquillized her uneven breath, and

seemed as proud and self-possessed as ever.

"I rather imagine," said she quietly, "that your appreciation falls

short of Mr. Hollingsworth's just claims. Blind enthusiasm, absorption

in one idea, I grant, is generally ridiculous, and must be fatal to the

respectability of an ordinary man; it requires a very high and powerful

character to make it otherwise. But a great man--as, perhaps, you do

not know--attains his normal condition only through the inspiration of

one great idea. As a friend of Mr. Hollingsworth, and, at the same

time, a calm observer, I must tell you that he seems to me such a man.

But you are very pardonable for fancying him ridiculous. Doubtless, he

is so--to you! There can be no truer test of the noble and heroic, in

any individual, than the degree in which he possesses the faculty of

distinguishing heroism from absurdity."

I dared make no retort to Zenobia's concluding apothegm. In truth, I

admired her fidelity. It gave me a new sense of Hollingsworth's native

power, to discover that his influence was no less potent with this

beautiful woman here, in the midst of artificial life, than it had been

at the foot of the gray rock, and among the wild birch-trees of the

wood-path, when she so passionately pressed his hand against her heart.

The great, rude, shaggy, swarthy man! And Zenobia loved him!

"Did you bring Priscilla with you?" I resumed. "Do you know I have

sometimes fancied it not quite safe, considering the susceptibility of

her temperament, that she should be so constantly within the sphere of

a man like Hollingsworth. Such tender and delicate natures, among your

sex, have often, I believe, a very adequate appreciation of the heroic

element in men. But then, again, I should suppose them as likely as

any other women to make a reciprocal impression. Hollingsworth could

hardly give his affections to a person capable of taking an independent

stand, but only to one whom he might absorb into himself. He has

certainly shown great tenderness for Priscilla."

Zenobia had turned aside. But I caught the reflection of her face in

the mirror, and saw that it was very pale,--as pale, in her rich

attire, as if a shroud were round her.

"Priscilla is here," said she, her voice a little lower than usual.

"Have not you learnt as much from your chamber window? Would you like

to see her?"

She made a step or two into the back drawing-room, and

called,--"Priscilla! Dear Priscilla!"

XX.