The Woman Who Vowed Part 8

"We don't want Aunt Tiny to take you in hand for she is terribly persuasive"--the poor little thing giggled delightedly--"and we want you on our side."

"I don't mean to be on either side," I answered. "I am your guest, and, as such, must confine myself to stating facts; you will have to draw your own conclusions."

"That's right," said Neaera. "All we want are facts; the conclusion will be clear enough. For example, in your time, every man could choose his own occupation."

"Undoubtedly," answered I.

"And was not subjected to the humiliation of working in a factory because he would not be convenient to the party in control!" flashed out Neaera.

I nodded my head gravely in approval.

"Imagine any of the writers of your day compelled to work in a factory--Emerson, Browning, Longfellow!--and Tennyson--imagine Tennyson working in a factory!"

"Abominable!" responded Balbus. "Abominable and absurd!"

"Wasn't Burns a plough-boy?" said Ariston, "And Shakespeare a play-actor?"

"A second-rate play-actor, too," echoed Lydia First, "and ended by lending money at usurious interest!"

"He chose to be that," retorted Balbus. "What we are fighting for is the right to choose our calling."

"But haven't you chosen yours?" asked I. "Isn't journalism of your choosing?"

"But I have to work at the state factory at the bidding of the state,"

answered Balbus, "for half of every day."

I could not help comparing his lot with my own in Boston. I had never enjoyed the practice of law; indeed, I had adopted the profession because my father had a practice to hand down to me. And as I sat day after day listening to the often fancied grievances of my clients, their petty ambitions, narrow animosities, and, particularly in divorce cases, to the nasty disputes of their domestic life, I often felt as though my profession converted me into a sort of moral sewer into which every client poured his contribution. Had I really been free when I chose to devote my whole life to so pitiful a business!

"Some part of the day," I answered, thinking aloud, "must, I suppose, be devoted to the securing of food and clothing. In the savage state--in which some people contend liberty is most complete--the whole day is practically devoted to it. In our state it was much the same, except that a few were exempt because they made the many work for them. But only a very few enjoyed the privilege of idleness--or shall we call it 'liberty'?"

"No," answered Neaera, "it is quite unnecessary to confuse things; liberty is one thing and idleness is another. We want the liberty to choose our work--not the license to refuse it."

"Liberty, then," said Ariston, "is _our_ license; and license is other people's liberty!"

"Ingenious," retorted Neaera, "but not correct. Can't you see the difference between choosing work and refusing it?"

"Certainly," answered Ariston. "The work I should _choose_ would be lying on my back and 'thinking delicate thoughts,' like Hecate. The work I should refuse would be factory work, like _you_."

Neaera did not like to find herself without an answer; so she covered her defeat by taking a flower out of her bosom and throwing it at Ariston, who, picking it up, kissed it and fastened it to a fold of his chiton. Just then a strain, that reminded me of our negro melodies, being wafted to us through the trees, Balbus exclaimed, "Now, Neaera, a dance!"

She sprang up at once and began moving rhythmically to the music. It was a strange and beautiful dance, that had in it some of the quaint movement of a negro breakdown, and yet the gayety and grace of a Lydian measure.

Balbus clapped his hands to accentuate the broken time, and we all joined him; Neaera, stimulated by a murmur of applause, gave a significance to her movements; danced up to Ariston, then flinging her hands out at him in mock aversion, danced away again; next reversing her step danced back to him, and, s.n.a.t.c.hing the flower out of his chiton, tripped triumphantly off, throwing her head up in elation; and to increase Ariston's spite she made as though she would give it to Balbus; but upon his holding out his hand for it, danced away from him, and after raising hopes in others of our group by tentative movements in one direction and another, finally fixed her bright eyes on me, danced hither and thither as though uncertain, and then finally brought it to me, and daintily pressing it to her lips, put it with both hands and a pretty air of resolution into mine.

CHAPTER VII

A TRAGIC DENOUEMENT

Lydia could not disembarra.s.s herself of the feeling of guilt with which she awoke after her interview with Irene. She went to the temple for help and knelt before the story of Demeter's sorrows, which was told in sweeping frescoes on its walls. Chance so happened that she found herself before that part of the story which described the G.o.ddess forgetting her own sorrow in her devotion to the sick child of the woodman in his hut. The artist, in the reaction from the Greek method of treating this story which marked the narrative of Ovid as contrasted with that of Homer, had dwelt upon the humble conditions of the poor hut in which the light of Demeter's golden hair shone like a beneficent aureole; and the nascent maternal instinct in Lydia vibrated to the beauty of Demeter's task. Was she to renounce this highest standard of maternity? What though she did love Chairo, was it not this very love which the G.o.ddess bade her renounce? And was not the greater the love the n.o.bler the sacrifice?

She returned to the cloister weary with the struggle and strove to forget it by devoting herself to the duties of the hospital. As she cared for a sick child there, the fresco in the temple before which she had that morning kneeled came back to her, and in the memory of that hour and in the love that went out to the child she was nursing she found consolation.

But perhaps she was most influenced by a certain capacity for pa.s.sive resistance in her, which unconsciously set her upon opposing the inclination to yield, whether to her love for Chairo or to the pleading of the priest. She could refuse to yield to both more easily than decide to yield to either. And so, many days pa.s.sed in the valley of indecision before she was lifted out of it by an unexpected event.

A novice came to her one morning and bade her go to Irene, who had asked for her. She had not seen Irene since the day they had spoken in the cloister and she had wondered; but something in her had secretly been satisfied. Irene would have challenged her to decide, and this was just what she was not prepared to do.

As she followed the novice to Irene's rooms the novice had told her that Irene was very ill and had moaned all night, begging for Lydia. Inquiry elicited that Irene was threatened and perhaps was actually suffering from congestion of the brain, and that she had been confined to her rooms ever since she had ministered with Lydia in the temple. When Lydia approached Irene's rooms a nurse stopped her by saying that Irene had just fallen into a sleep--the first for a fortnight--and must not be awakened. So Lydia remained in the sitting room, peeping occasionally through the curtain that separated it from the room in which Irene slept. For many hours Irene remained motionless, but at last as Lydia stood holding aside the curtain, Irene opened her eyes; her face was flushed; she sprang up in her bed, leaning on one hand, and glared at Lydia with eyes that lacked discourse of reason. Then, suddenly, she seemed to recognize her and a shriek rent the room and sent Lydia staggering back against the nurse who stood behind her. Putting both her hands over her eyes and ears Lydia dropped the curtain between herself and the raving Irene; but no hand could keep her from hearing the words that came through the curtain and pierced her brain:

"Go away! Go away!" shrieked Irene. "You have taken him from me! Stolen him!"

Irene's shriek sounded to Lydia like the crack of doom. Then came the words, "Stolen him," in the voice of the accusing angel--and as if it were in answer to her own shrinking gesture of protest behind the curtain, she heard Irene shriekingly repeat: "Stolen, yes, stolen!"

The nurse put Lydia into a chair and went to Irene; she found her risen from the bed, and, shrouded in her curtain of blue-black hair, with lunatic eyes, she was advancing slowly to the room where Lydia sat. When Irene saw the nurse she said, in low grave accents, "Not you--not you!"

and then with menacing significance added, almost in a whisper, "The other!"

The nurse tried to stop her and urge her back to her bed, but Irene swept her away with a single movement of her arm, and moved to the curtain which separated her from Lydia. But Lydia had by this time recovered control of herself; she knew that a maniac was approaching and she arose to await her. Irene pushed aside the curtain and confronted Lydia standing in the middle of the room, motionless and rigid as though changed to stone.

"Don't stand there, brazen-faced!" shrieked Irene. "Kneel--I say, kneel!"

But Lydia stood her ground unflinchingly.

Then Irene burst into a furious laugh: "Great mother," she began mockingly, and Lydia had to stand and listen while the maniac, with lurid eyes and frantic gesture, recited the most sacred of the prayers to Demeter--the prayer in which daily the vestal repeats her vows; but as the prayer came to a close the light went out of Irene's eyes, the fury out of her gesture; she slowly bent down upon her knees, and the last words of the prayer were, in a voice sinking to a whisper, addressed to Lydia as though she had been the G.o.ddess herself.

When Irene's voice died away it seemed as though the paroxysm was over; she remained kneeling, with her head bowed upon her breast.

Then Lydia thought to lift her up, and bent down to her. Irene looked up suddenly and shrieked as she recognized Lydia; she frantically waved her hands before her face as though to rid her eyes of the spectacle, and Lydia resumed her erect posture again.

By this time the nurse had returned to the room and tried to lead Irene away. At first she succeeded, but suddenly Irene swept her away, and confronted Lydia again:

"It hurts here," she said, clutching at her heart. "You'll know," she added, and laughed harshly. "You'll know!" she repeated, and throwing up her hands she clutched the air; then in an agony of paroxysm she whispered again in a faltering voice, "You'll know"--and suddenly sank a huddled heap upon the floor.

Lydia and the nurse ran to her and lifted her back upon the bed, and from that moment Lydia did not leave her side. For many days life hovered on the edge of Irene's lips, sometimes appearing to take flight altogether, and again returning to reanimate the clay. And Lydia with anguish in her heart bent over her night and day.

At last a crisis came and Irene fell into a profound and restful sleep; the fever left her, and the pulse slowly recovered regularity and strength; she seemed to recognize no one, and it was expected that for some weeks she would probably remain unaware of those around her. Lydia was advised to absent herself, lest to Irene, on recovering her reason, the shock of seeing Lydia prove dangerous; and so, one evening as the sun set, her strength shattered, she returned to her own rooms.

It happened that the following day was the ninth of the Eleusinian festival, on which, if at all, those to whom the mission had been tendered might accept or renounce it. Strange to say, with her waning strength ebbed also the power of pa.s.sive resistance which had kept Lydia from decision; she surrendered not to the exercise of a controlling will but to the suggesting influence of Irene's anguish; and on the next day in the temple, to the rage of some and to the deep concern of all, in the procession she wore the yellow veil which announced her as a bride of Demeter.

CHAPTER VIII

HOW THE CULT WAS FOUNDED