as the train rushed along he explained to himself why he was going—why he had not merely sent the photograph. he wanted to see her, to brush away the cloud of illusion that the weeks had spun around her. he wanted to realise definitely the difference between the pale, silent, unformed new england girl and the fascinating personality of his picture. ever since he left her they had grown confused, these two that his common sense told him were so different, and he was beginning to dread the unavowed hope that for him, at least, they might be some day one. the same passionate power that had thrown mystery and beauty into colour on the canvas wove sweet,[61] wild dreams around what he contemptuously told himself was little better than a lay figure, but he yielded to it now as he had then.
when he told himself that he was going purposely to hear her talk, to see her flat, unlovely figure, to appreciate her utter lack of charm, of all vitality, he realised that it was a cruel errand. but when he felt the sharp thrill that he suffered even in anticipation as his quick imagination pictured the dream-cloud dropping off from her, actually before his eyes, he believed the journey more than ever a necessary one.
as he walked up the little country street his heart beat fast; the greening lawns, the fresh, faint odours, the ageless, unnamable appeal of the spring stirred his blood and thrilled him inexpressibly. he was yet in the first flush of his success; his whole nature was relaxed and sensitive to every joy; he let himself drift on the sweet confused expectancy, the delicious folly, the hope that he was to find his dream, his inspiration, his spirit of the wind and wood.
a child passed him with a great bunch of daf[62]fodils and stopped to watch him long after he had passed, wondering at the silver in her hand.
at the familiar gate a tall, thin woman's figure stopped his heart a second, and as a fitful gust blew out her apron and tossed her shawl over her head, he felt his breath come more quickly.
"good heavens!" he muttered, "what folly! am i never to see a woman's skirt blown without——"
she put the shawl back as he neared her—it was mrs. storrs's sister. she met his outstretched hand with a blank stare. suddenly her face twitched convulsively.
"o mr. willard! o mr. willard!" she cried, and burst into tears.
the wind blew sharper, the elm tree near the window creaked, a dull pain grew in him.
"what is it? what's the matter?" he said brusquely.
"i suppose you ain't heard—you wouldn't be apt to!" she sobbed, and pushing back the locks the wind drove into her reddened eyes, she broke into incoherent sentences: he heard her as one in a dream.
[63]
"and she would go—'twas the twenty-fifth—there was dozens o' trees blown down—'twas just before dark—her mother, she ran out after her as soon's she knew—she called, but she didn't hear—she saw her on the edge o' the rocks, an' she almost got up to her an' screamed, an' it scared her, we think—she turned 'round quick, an' she went right off the cliff an' her mother saw her go—'twas awful!"
willard's eyes went beyond her to the woods; the woman's voice, with its high, flat intonation, brought the past so vividly before him that he was unconscious of the actual scene—he lived through the quick, terrible drama with the intensity of a witness of it.
"no, they haven't found her yet—the surf's too high. we always had a feeling she wouldn't live—she wasn't like other girls——"
half unconsciously he unwrapped the photograph.
"i—i brought this," he said dully. the woman blanched and clutched the gate-post.
"oh, take it away! take it away!" she gasped,[64] a real terror in her eyes. "o mr. willard, how could you—it's awful! i—i wouldn't have her mother see it for all the world!" her sobs grew uncontrollable.
he bent it slowly across and thrust it in his pocket.
"no, no," he said soothingly, "of course not, of course not. i only wanted to tell—you all—that it took the prize i told you about and—and was a good thing for me. i hoped—i hoped——"
he saw that she was trembling in the sudden cold wind, and held out his hand.
"this has been a great shock to me," he said quietly, his eyes still on the woods. "please tell mrs. storrs how i sympathise—how startled i was. i am going abroad in a few days. i will send you my address, and if there is ever anything i can do, you will gratify me more than you can know by letting me help you in any way. give her these," and he thrust out the great bunch of daffodils to her. she took them, still crying softly, and turned towards the house.
later he found himself in the woods near the[65] great oak that lay just as it had fallen that night. beneath all the confused tumult of his thoughts one clear truth rang like a bell, one bitter-sweet certainty that caught him smiling strangely as he realised it! "she's won! she's won!"
there, while the branches swayed above him, and the surf, sinister and monotonous, pounded below, the vision that had made them both famous melted into the elusive reality, and he lived again with absolute abandonment that sweet mad night, he felt again her hair blown about his face as he lay on the windy cliff with the lady of his dreams.
for him her fate was not dreadful—she could not have died like other women. there was an intoxication in her sudden taking away: she was rapt out of life as she would have wished, he knew.
slowly there grew upon him a frightened wonder if she had lived for this. her actual life had been so empty, so unreal, so concentrated in those piercing stolen moments; she had ended it, once the heart of it had been caught and fixed to give to others faint thrills of all she had felt so utterly.
"she died for it!" he felt, with a kind of awe[66] that was far from all personal vanity—the blameless egoism of the artist.
he left the little town hardly consciously. on his outward voyage, when the gale beat the vessel and the wind howled to the thundering waves, he came to know that though a love more real, a passion less elusive, might one day hold him, there would rest always in his heart and brain one ceaseless inspiration, one strange, sweet memory that nothing could efface.
