THE MOORLAND OF THE APOCALYPSE
I reckoned that it would take me two or three days, leisurely walking, to reach Yellowsands.Rosalind would, of course, arrive there long before me; but that I did not regret, as I was in a mood to find company in my own thoughts.
Her story gave me plenty to think of.I dwelt particularly on the careless extravagance of the happy.Here were two people to whom life had given casually what I was compelled to go seeking lonely and footsore through the world, and with little hope of finding it at the end; and yet were they so little aware of their good fortune as to risk it over a trumpery theory, a shadow of pseudo-philosophy.Out of the deep dark ocean of life Love had brought them his great moon-pearl, and they sat on the boat's edge carelessly tossing it from one to the other, unmindful of the hungry fathoms on every side.A sudden slip, and they had lost it for ever, and might only watch its shimmering fall to the bottom of the world.Theories! Theories are for the unknown and the unhappy.Who will trouble to theorise about Heaven when he has found Heaven itself? Theories are for the poor- devil outcast,--for him who stands outside the confectioner's shop of life without a penny in his pocket, while the radiant purchasers pass in and out through the doors,--for him who watches with wistful eyes this and that sugared marvel taken out of the window by mysterious hands, to bless some happy customer inside.He is not fool enough even to hope for one of those glistering masterpieces of frosted sugar and silk flowers, which rise to pinnacles of snowy sweetness, white mountains of blessedness, rich inside, they say, with untold treasures for the tooth that is sweet.No! he craves nothing but a simple Bath-bun of happiness, and even that is denied him.
Would I ever find my Bath-bun? I disconsolately asked myself.Ihad been seeking it now for some little time, and seemed no nearer than when I set out.I had seen a good many Bath-buns on my pilgrimage, it is true.Some I have not had space to confide to the reader; but somehow or other they had not seemed the unmistakably predestined for which I was seeking.
And oh, how I could love a girl, if she would only give me the chance,--that is, be the right girl! Oh, Sylvia Joy! where art thou? Why so long dost thou remain hidden "in shady leaves of destiny"?
"Seest thou thy lover lowly laid, Hear'st thou the sighs that rend his breast?"And then, as the novelists say, "a strange thing happened."The road I was tramping at the moment was somewhat desolate.It ran up from a small market town through a dreary undulating moorland, forking off here and there to unknown villages of which the horizon gave no hint.Its cheerless hillocks were all but naked of vegetation, for a never very flourishing growth of heather had recently been burnt right down to the unkindly-looking earth, leaving a dwarf black forest of charred sticks very grim to the eye and heart; while the dull surface of a small lifeless-looking lake added the final touch to the Dead-Sea mournfulness of the prospect.
Suddenly I became aware of the fluttering of a grey dress a little ahead of me.Unconsciously I had been overtaking a tall young woman walking in the same direction as myself, with a fine athletic carriage of her figure and a noble movement of her limbs.
She walked manfully, and as I neared her I could hear the sturdy ring of her well-shod feet upon the road.There was an air of expectancy about her walk, as though she looked to be met presently by some one due from the opposite direction.
It was curious that I had not noticed her before, for she must have been in sight for some time.No doubt my melancholy abstraction accounted for that, and perhaps her presence there was to be explained by a London train which I had listlessly observed come in to the town an hour before.This surmise was confirmed, as presently,--over the brow of a distant undulation in the road, I descried a farmer's gig driven by another young woman.The gig immediately hoisted a handkerchief; so did my pedestrian.At this moment I was within a yard or two of overtaking her.And it was then the strange thing happened.
Distance had lent no enchantment which nearness did not a hundred times repay.The immediate impression of strength and distinction which the first glimpse of her had made upon me was more and more verified as I drew closer to her.The carriage of her head was no whit less noble than the queenly carriage of her limbs, and her glorious chestnut hair, full of warm tints of gold, was massed in a sumptuous simplicity above a neck that would have made an average woman's fortune.This glowing description, however, must be lowered or heightened in tone by the association of these characteristics with an undefinable simplicity of mien, a certain slight rusticity of effect.The town spoke in her well-cut gown and a few simple adornments, but the dryad still moved inside.
