CHAPTER II
A JUNE DAY-DREAM
Moment after moment passed, but we all sat silent and motionless.Through the open windows came a low, sweet monotone of the wind fromthe shadowing maples, sometimes swelling into a great depth of sound,and again dying to a whisper, and the effect seemed finer than that ofthe most skilfully touched organ. Occasionally an irascible humble-beewould dart in, and, after a moment of motionless poise, would dart outagain, as if in angry disdain of the quiet people. In its irate hum andsudden dartings I saw my own irritable fuming and nervous activity, andI blessed the Friends and their silent meeting. I blessed the fair Juneface, that was as far removed from the seething turmoil of my world asthe rosebuds under her home-windows.
Surely I had drifted out of the storm into the very haven of rest andpeace, and yet one might justly dread lest the beauty which bound myeyes every moment in a stronger fascination should evoke an unrest fromwhich there might be no haven. Young men, however, rarely shrink fromsuch perils, and I was no more prudent than my fellows. Indeed, I wasinclining toward the fancy that this June day was the day of destinywith me; and if such a creature were the remedy for my misshapen lifeit would be bliss to take it.
In our sweet silence, broken only by the voice of the wind, the twitterof birds beguiling perhaps with pretty nonsense the hours that wouldotherwise seem long to their brooding mates on the nests, and the humof insects, my fancy began to create a future for the fair stranger--afuture, rest assured, that did not leave the dreamer a calm anddisinterested observer.
"This day," I said mentally, "proves that there is a kindly andsuperintending Providence, and men are often led, like children in thedark, to just the thing they want. The wisdom of Solomon could not haveled me to a place more suited to my taste and need than have my blind,aimless steps; and before me are possibilities which suggest the vistathrough which Eve was led to Adam."
My constant contact with men who were keen, self-seeking, and oftenunscrupulous, inclined me toward cynicism and suspicion. My editoriallife made me an Arab in a sense, for if there were occasion, my handmight be against any man, if not every man. I certainly received manymerciless blows, and I was learning to return them with increasingzest. My column in the paper was often a tilting-ground, and whether orno I inflicted wounds that amounted to much, I received some that longrankled. A home such as yonder woman might make would be a bettersolace than newspaper files. Such lips as these might easily draw thepoison from any wound the world could make. Wintry firelight would bemore genial than even June sunlight, if her eyes would reflect in intomine. With such companionship, all the Gradgrinds in existence wouldprose in vain; life would never lose its ideality, nor the world becomea mere combination of things. Her woman's fancy would embroider myman's reason and make it beautiful, while not taking from its strength.Idiot that I was, in imagining that I alone could achieve success!Inevitably I could make but a half success, since the finer feminineelement would be wanting. Do I wish men only to read our paper? Am I aTurk, holding the doctrine that women have no souls, no minds? Theshade of my mother forbid! Then how was I, a man, to interpret theworld to women? Truly, I had been an owl of the night, and blind to thehonest light of truth when I yielded to the counsel of ambition, that Ihad no time for courtship and marriage. In my stupid haste I would tryto grope my way through subjects beyond a man's ken, rather than seeksome such guide as yonder maiden, whose intuitions would be unerringwhen the light of reason failed. In theory, I held the doctrine thatthere was sex in mind as truly as in the material form. Now I wasinclined to act as if my doctrine were true, and to seek to double mypower by winning the supplemental strength and grace of a woman's soul.
Indeed, my day-dream was becoming exceedingly thrifty in its character,and I assured ambition that the companionship of such a woman as yondermaiden must be might become the very corner-stone of success.
Time passed, and still no one was "moved." Was my presence the cause ofthe spiritual paralysis? I think not, for I was becoming conscious ofreverent feeling and deeper motives. If the fair face was my Gospelmessage, it was already leading me beyond the thoughts of success andambition, of mental power and artistic grace. Her womanly beauty beganto awaken my moral nature, and her pure face, that looked as free fromguile as any daisy with its eye turned to the sun, led me to ask, "Whatright have you to approach such a creature? Think of her needs, of herbeing first, and not your own. Would you drag her into the turmoil ofyour world because she would be a solace? Would you disturb themaidenly serenity of that brow with knowledge of evil and misery, thenightly record of which you have collated so long that you are callous?You, whose business it is to look behind the scenes of life, will youdisenchant her also? It is your duty to unmask hypocrisy, and to draghidden evil to light, but will you teach her to suspect and distrust?Should you not yourself become a better, truer, purer man before youlook into the clear depths of her blue eyes? Beware, lest thoughtlesslyor selfishly you sully their limpid truth."
"If she could be God's evangel to me, I might indeed be a better man,"I murmured.
"That is ever the way," suggested Conscience; "there is always an 'if'in the path of duty; and you make your change for the better depend onthe remote possibility that yonder maiden will ever look on you asother than a casual stranger that caused a slight disturbance in thewonted placidity of their meeting hour."
"Hush," I answered Conscience, imperiously; "since the old Friend ladywill not preach, I shall endure none of your homilies. I yield myselfto the influences of this day, and during this hour no curb shall beput on fancy. In my soul I know that I would be a better man if she iswhat she seems, and could be to me all that I have dreamed; and were Itenfold worse than I am, she would be the better for making me better.Did not Divine purity come the closest to sinful humanity? I shallapproach this maiden in fancy, and may seek her in reality, but itshall be with a respect so sincere and an homage so true as to rob mythoughts and quest of bold irreverence or of mere selfishness. SupposeI am seeking my own good, my own salvation it may be, I am not seekingto wrong her. Are not heaven's best gifts best won by giving all forthem? I would lay my manhood at her feet. I do not expect to earn heror buy her, giving a quid pro quo. A woman's love is like the grace ofheaven--a royal gift; and the spirit of the suitor is more regardedthan his desert. Moreover, I do not propose to soil her life with theevil world that I must daily brush against, but through her influenceto do a little toward purifying that world. Since this is but a dream,I shall dream it out to suit me.
"That stalwart and elderly Friend who led me to this choice point ofobservation is her father. The plump and motherly matron on the highseat, whose face alone is a remedy for care and worry, is her mother.They will invite me home with them when meeting is over. Already I seethe tree-embowered farmhouse, with its low, wide veranda, andold-fashioned roses climbing the lattice-work. In such a fragrant nook,or perhaps in the orchard back of the house, I shall explore thewonderland of this maiden's mind and heart. Beyond the innate reserveof an unsophisticated womanly nature there will be little reticence,and her thoughts will flow with the clearness and unpremeditation ofthe brook that I crossed on my way here. What a change they will befrom the world's blotted page that I have read too exclusively of late!
"Perhaps it will appear to her that I have become smirched by thesepages, and that my character has the aspect of a printer at the closeof his day's tasks.
"This source of fear, however, is also a source of hope. If she has thequickness of intuition to discover that I know the world too well, shewill also discern the truth that I would gladly escape from that whichmight eventually destroy my better nature, and that hers could be thehand which might rescue my manhood. To the degree that she is a genuinewoman there will be fascination in the power of making a man more manlyand worthy of respect. Especially will this be true if I have thesupreme good-fortune not to offend her woman's fancy, and to excite hersympathy; without awakening contempt.
"But I imagine I am giving he
r credit for more maturity of thought anddiscernment than her years permit. She must be young, and herexperiences would give her no means of understanding my life. She willlook at me with the frank, unsuspecting gaze of a child. She willexercise toward me that blessed phase of charity which thinketh no evilbecause ignorant of evil.
"Moreover, while I am familiar with the sin of the world, and havecontributed my share toward it, I am not in love with it; and I canwell believe that such a love as she might inspire would cause me todetest it. If for her sake and other good motives, I should resolutelyand voluntarily; turn my back on evil, would I not have the right towalk at the side of one who, by the goodhap of her life, knows no evil?At any rate, I am not sufficiently magnanimous to forego theopportunity should it occur. Therefore, among the lengthening shadowsof this June day I shall woo with my utmost skill one who may be ableto banish the deeper shadows that are gathering around my life; and ifI fail I shall carry the truth of her spring-time beauty and girlishinnocence back to the city, and their memory will daily warn me tobeware lest I lose the power to love and appreciate that which is herpre-eminent charm.
"But enough of that phase of the question. There need be no failure inmy dream, however probable failure may be in reality. Let me imaginethat in her lovely face I may detect the slight curiosity inspired by astranger passing into interest. She will be shy and reserved at first;but as the delicious sense of being understood and admired gainsmastery, her thoughts will gradually reveal her heart like the openingpetals of a rose, and I can reverently gaze upon the rich treasures ofwhich she is the unconscious possessor, and which I may win withoutimpoverishing her.
"Her ready laugh, clear and mellow as the robin's song that woke methis morning, will be the index of an unfailing spring ofmirthfulness--of that breezy, piquant, laughing philosophy which givesto some women an indescribable charm, enabling them to render gloom anddespondency rare inmates of the home over which they preside. When Irecall what dark depths of perplexity and trouble my mother often hidwith her light laugh, I remember that I have never yet had a chanceeven to approach her in heroism. In my dream, at least, I can give tomy wife my mother's laugh and courage; and surely Nature, who hasendowed yonder maiden with so much beauty, has also bestowed everysuitable accompaniment. Wherefore I shall discover in her eyestreasures of sunshine that shall light my home on stormy days andwinter nights.
"As I vary our theme of talk from bright to sad experiences, I shallcatch a glimpse of that without which the world would become adesert--woman's sympathy. Possibly I may venture to suggest my own need,and emphasize it by a reference to Holy Writ. That would be appropriatein a Sunday wooing. Surely she would admit that if Adam could not endurebeing alone in Eden, a like fate would be far more deserving of pity insuch a wilderness as New York.
"Then, as a sequel to her sympathy, I may witness the awakening of thatnoble characteristic of woman--self-sacrifice--the generous impulse togive happiness, even though at cost to self.
"As the winged hours pass, and our glances, our words, our intuitions,and the subtle laws of magnetism that are so powerful, and yet soutterly beyond the ken of reason, reveal us to each other, I detect inthe depths of her blue eyes a light which vanishes when I seek it, butreturns again--a principle which she does not even recognize, much lessunderstand, and yet which she already unconsciously obeys. Her looksare less frank and open, her manner grows deliciously shy, shehesitates and chooses her words, but is not so happy in their choice aswhen she spoke without premeditation. Instead of the wonted bloom onher cheek her color comes and goes. Oh, most exquisite phase of humanpower! I control the fountain of her life; and by an act, a word, aglance even, can cause the crimson tide to rise even to her brow, andthen to ebb, leaving her sad and pale. Joy! joy! I have won that out ofwhich can be created the best thing of earth, and the type of heaven--ahome!"
At this supreme moment in my day-dream, an elderly Friend on the highseat gave his hand to another white-haired man who had, for the lasthour, leaned his chin on his stout cane, and meditated under the shadowof his broad-brimmed hat, and our silent meeting was over. Thepossessor of the exquisite profile who had led me through a flight ofromance such as I had never known before, turned and looked directly atme.
The breaking of my dream had been too sudden, and I had been caught toohigh up to alight again on the solid ground of reality with ease andgrace. The night-editor blushed like a school-girl under her glance, atwhich she seemed naturally surprised. She, of course, could imagine noreason why her brief look of curiosity should cause me confusion andbring a guilty crimson to my face. I took it as a good omen, however,and said mentally, as I passed out with the others,
"My thoughts have already established a subtle influence over her,drawing her eyes and the first delicate tendril of interest toward oneto whom she may cling for life."