OUT OF THE PAST
"KIRKKALA, 7 May 1899."
"Dearest,—You will not be angry because I write to you? How could you, you who are so good! I would not have written, but I must, for there is so much to tell you. It is spring now, as it was then, and it has brought with it such a longing that I must turn to you, speak to you—and then I can wait again till next spring. You must have known that I have been with you—surely you felt it? And now here I am, having learned by chance where you are.
"Do you remember the story I told you? About the girl and her lover and the mark on her breast? And what I asked for then, and you gave me? I have often wondered since whether, perhaps, you might have misunderstood it all—when I was so serious and thoughtful about it—if you thought I was not certain of myself, not sure that I should always be yours, as I wished to be. But it was not so, dear Olof; I knew myself well enough even then, though not so deeply as I do now. How strong and deep love is! I read once in a poem—surely you know it too:
"'The lightning stroke falls swifter than breath,
But the tree that is struck bears the mark till its death.'"
And so it is—there is no more to add; it is as if written by the finger of God. And so it must be, or what would our love be worth?
"But it is not all who understand it, even the half. Human beings are so strange—wondering and asking always—people ask, for instance, why I am always so lonely…. They cannot see that I am not lonely at all.
"Olof, if you knew all I have felt and suffered in these years! I hardly know if I dare tell you. But I must—I only turn to you now to say it all, so that I may feel easier after. I have longed for you so—more than I can ever say; I wonder how I have been able to live at all. Olof, Olof, do not look at me! I have only come to whisper a little in your ear…. I have had such dreadful thoughts. As if someone were always behind me whispering, 'Look, there is a knife—it is a friend; take it and press it deep in your breast—it will feel like the softest touch of the evening wind. Look, the river is in flood….' And I have hardly dared to pass by the well, for it looked up at me so strangely with its dark eye. And I know I should have given way if you had not saved me. When I thought how you would feel if you heard what I had done, I seemed to see you so clearly; you looked at me reproachfully, only looked at me without a word, and I felt ashamed that I had ever thought of what would cause you sorrow. And you nodded, and forgave me, and all was well again.
"Then I took to hoping that some miracle should bring you back to me. I hoped something might happen to you, so that I could buy your life with mine. You might be bitten by a snake—it does happen sometimes. Coming up one night with the lumbermen, and then next morning the news would be all over the place, how you had been bitten, and were on the point of death; and I would hurry down with the rest to where you were, and bend down beside you, and press my lips to the place and draw the poison out. And then I could feel it passing with your blood into my veins, in a great wave of happiness. And soon I should sink down beside you on the grass; but you would be saved, and you would know I had been true to you until death.
"So I waited year after year. Then I wanted you to be ill—very, very ill for a long time, and weak, till your heart could hardly beat at all for want of blood, and you lay in a trance. Then the doctors would say, if anyone would give their blood he might come to life again. But no one could be found, for there were only strangers there. Then I hear about it, and come quickly, and the doctors start at once, for there is no time to be lost. And they draw off my blood and let it flow into your body, and it acts at once, and you move a little, though you are still in a trance. 'A little more,' say the doctors—'see, the girl is smiling; it will do her no harm.' And they only see that I smile, and do not know how weak I am already. And when you wake, I am cold and pale already, but happy as a bride, and you kiss me on the lips like a lover. For now I am your bride, and one with you for ever, and I cannot die, for my blood lives in you!
"But all this was only dreams. You were not ill, nor bitten by a snake, and at last I did not even know where you were. And then I wanted to die, for I felt so weak. And I waited for it day after day and month after month—I had already written to say good-bye to you. But death did not come—I had to go on living.
"I have been so ill, Olof—it is my heart. Perhaps I am too sensitive; they called me a dreamer when I was a child. And even now that I am older they have said the same. But how could I ever forget you, and the hours that were the confession and communion of my whole life? How could I forget those evenings when I sat at your feet and looked into your eyes? Olof, I can feel it all still, and tremble at the thought of it.
"You must forgive me all this. It feels easier now that I have spoken to you and told you about it all—how I still feel, grateful to you for all you gave me then. I was very childish and poor then, and had nothing to give you in return—now, afterwards, I could perhaps have given you something too. I should have been so happy if we could have been together always; earth would have been like heaven, and none but angels everywhere. And even now I can be so happy, though I only have you in secret. Secretly I say good-night to you, and kiss you, and no one knows that you rest every night in my arms. And, do you know, Olof, there is one thing that is so strange, I hardly know what it means. Now, just lately, I have felt sometimes that you were really here, your living self, sitting beside me and whispering that I was yours, your love, your friend. And it makes me so happy—but I always cry afterwards.
"There was one thing more—but I can't think what it was. Something about … yes, now I remember. The greatest and loveliest of all, that I asked you for Shall I tell you? The miracle has happened, though no one knows about it. You gave it me after all, that spring when I was so ill. And I could not live without it. He is two years old now—oh, if you could only see him! His eyes and his voice—they are just your very own. Do not be anxious about him. I will be so careful, and see that he grows up a fine man. I have sewed every stitch of his clothes myself, and he looks like a prince—there never was such a child. We are always together, and talking of you. I am sorry for mother sometimes; she looks so strangely at me, and says I go about talking to myself—but how could she know of my prince and his father, and why I talk? Talking to myself, she says. But I am talking to the child all the time.
"There, and what more was I going to say? I can't remember now. I feel so much better now I have told you all about it. And now the summer is coming—I always feel happier then. It was raining before, but now the sun has come out and the birds are singing. And so good-bye, my dearest, my sunshine, my summer.—Your own CLEMATIS.
"Do not write to me—I am better as I am. I know you have not forgotten me, that you could not forget … and that is all I ask."