The Worshipper of the Image | Page 8

Antony--and leave the world in darkness for your sake, another
hundred years."
"Tell me of your lovers, Silencieux."
"Nearly three thousand years ago I loved a woman of Mitylene, very
fair and made of fire. But she loved another more than I, and for his
sake threw herself from a rock into the sea. As she fell, the rose we had
made together fell from her bosom, and was torn to pieces by the sea.
Fishermen gathered here and there a petal floating on the waters,--but
what were they?--and the world has never known how wonderful was
that rose of our love which she took with her into the depths of the sea."
"You are faithful, Silencieux; you love her still."
"Yes, I love her still."

"And with whom did love come next, Silencieux?"
"Oh, I loved many those years, for the loss of a great love sends us
vainly from hand to hand of many lesser loves, to ease a little the great
ache; and at that time the world seemed full of my lovers. I have
forgotten none of them. They pass before me, a fair frieze of
unforgotten faces; but most I loved a Roman poet, because, perhaps, he
loved so well the memory of her I had loved, and knew so skilfully to
make bloom again among his own red roses those petals of passionate
ivory which the fishermen of Lesbos had recovered from the sea."
"Tell me of your lovers, Silencieux," said Antony again.
"Hundreds of years after, I loved in Florence a young poet with a face
of silver. His soul was given to a little red-cheeked girl. She died, and
then I took him to my bosom, and loved him on through the years, till
his face had grown iron with many sorrows. Now at last, his baby-girl
by his side, he sits in heaven, with a face of gold. In Paris," she went on,
"have I been wonderfully beloved, and in northern lands near the
pole--"
"But--England?" said Antony. "Tell me of your English lovers."
"Best of them I love two: one a laughing giant who loved me three
hundred years ago, and the other a little London boy with large eyes of
velvet, who mid all the gloom of your great city saw and loved my face,
as none had seen and loved it since she of Mitylene. I found the giant
sitting by a country stream, holding a daffodil in his mighty hands and
whistling to the birds. He took and wore me like a flower. I was to him
as a nightingale that sang from his sleeve, for he loved so much besides.
Yet me he loved best, as those who can read his secret poems
understand. But my little London boy loved me only. For him the world
held nothing but my face, and it was of his great love for me that he
died."
"But these were all poets," said Antony.
"Yes, poets are the greatest of all lovers. Though all who since the

world began have been the makers of beautiful things have loved me, I
love my poets best. Sweeter than marble or many colours to my eyes is
the sound of a poet singing in my ears--"
"For whom, Silencieux, did you step down into the sad waters of the
Seine?"
"It was a young poet of Paris, beloved of many women, a drunkard of
strange dreams. He too died because he loved me, and when he died
there was none left whose voice seemed sweet after his. So I died with
him. I died with him," she repeated, "to come to life again with you.
Many lips have been pressed to mine, Antony, since the cold sleep of
the Seine fell over me, but none were warm and wild like yours. I loved
my sleep while the others kissed me, but with the touch of your lips the
dreams of life began to stir within me again. O Antony, be great
enough, be all mine, that we may fulfil our dream; and perhaps, Antony,
I will die with you--and leave the world in darkness for your sake,
another hundred years."
Exalted above the earth with the joy of Silencieux's words, Antony
pressed his lips to hers in an ecstasy, and vowed his life and all within
it inviolably to her.
CHAPTER VIII
A STRANGE KISS FOR SILENCIEUX
One hot August afternoon Antony took Silencieux with him to a
bramble-covered corner of the dark moor which bounded his little
wood. A ruined bank soaked with sunshine, a haunt of lizards, a
catacomb of little lives that creep and run and whisper, made their seat.
Silencieux's face, out there under the open sky and in the full blaze of
the sun, at once lost and gained in