His Sombre Rivals | Page 4

nor could the breath of Eve have been more
sweet than the fragrance exhaled. The air was soft with summer- like
mildness, and the breeze that fanned Graham's cheek brought no sense
of chilliness. The sunset hour, with its spring beauty, the song of
innumerable birds, and especially the strains of a wood-thrush, that,
like a _prima donna_, trilled her melody, clear, sweet and distinct
above the feathered chorus, penetrated his soul with subtle and
delicious influences. A vague longing for something he had never

known or felt, for something that books had never taught, or
experimental science revealed, throbbed in his heart. He felt that his life
was incomplete, and a deeper sense of isolation came over him than he
had ever experienced in foreign cities where every face was strange.
Unconsciously he was passing under the most subtle and powerful of
all spells, that of spring, when the impulse to mate comes not to the
birds alone.
It so happened that he was in just the condition to succumb to this
influence. His mental tension was relaxed. He had sat down by the
wayside of life to rest awhile. He had found that there was no need that
he should bestir himself in money-getting, and his mind refused to
return immediately to the deep abstractions of science. It pleaded
weariness of the world and of the pros and cons of conflicting theories
and questions. He admitted the plea and said:--
"My mind shall rest, and for a few days, possibly weeks, it shall be
passively receptive of just such influences as nature and circumstances
chance to bring to it. Who knows but that I may gain a deeper insight
into the hidden mysteries than if I were delving among the dusty tomes
of a university library? For some reason I feel to- night as if I could
look at that radiant, fragrant apple-tree and listen to the lullaby of the
birds forever. And yet their songs suggest a thought that awakens an
odd pain and dissatisfaction. Each one is singing to his mate. Each one
is giving expression to an overflowing fulness and completeness of life;
and never before have I felt my life so incomplete and isolated.
"I wish Hilland was here. He is such a true friend that his silence is
companionship, and his words never jar discordantly. It seems to me
that I miss him more to-night than I did during the first days after his
departure. It's odd that I should. I wonder if the friendship, the love of a
woman could be more to me than that of Hilland. What was that
paragraph from Emerson that once struck me so forcibly? My aunt is a
woman of solid reading; she must have Emerson. Yes, here in her
bookcase, meagre only in the number of volumes it contains, is what I
want," and he turned the leaves rapidly until his eyes lighted on the
following passage:--

"No man ever forgot the visitations of that power to his heart and brain
which created all things new; which was the dawn in him of music,
poetry, and art; which made the face of nature radiant with purple light,
the morning and the night varied enchantments; when a single tone of
one voice could make the heart bound, and the most trivial
circumstance associated with one form was put in the amber of memory;
when he became all eye when one was present, and all memory when
one was gone."
"Emerson never learned that at a university, German or otherwise. He
writes as if it were a common human experience, and yet I know no
more about it than of the sensations of a man who has lost an arm. I
suppose losing one's heart is much the same. As long as a man's limbs
are intact he is scarcely conscious of them, but when one is gone it
troubles him all the time, although it isn't there. Now when Hilland left
me I felt guilty at the ease with which I could forget him in the library
and laboratory. I did not become all memory. I knew he was my best,
my only friend; he is still; but he is not essential to my life. Clearly,
according to Emerson, I am as ignorant as a child of one of the deepest
experiences of life, and very probably had better remain so, and yet the
hour is playing strange tricks with my fancy."
Thus it may be perceived that Alford Graham was peculiarly open on
this deceitful May evening, which promised peace and security, to the
impending stroke of fate. Its harbinger first appeared in the form of a
white Spitz dog, barking vivaciously under the apple-tree, where a path
from a neighboring residence intersected the walk leading from