4
But they sat on a bench, in the dark, not knowing that it was dark, for their eyes were full of the light. They sat against each other, silently at first, till, remembering that he had a voice and could still speak words, he said:
“I have never lived through such a moment as this. I forget where we are and who we are and that we are human. We were, were we not? I seem to remember that we once were?”
“Yes, but we are that no longer,” she said, smiling; and her eyes, grown big, looked into the darkness that was light.
“Once we were human, suffering and desiring, in a world where certainly much was beautiful, but where much also was ugly.”
“Why speak of that now?” she asked; and her voice sounded to herself as coming from very far and low beneath her.
“I seemed to remember it.”
“I wanted to forget it.”
“Then I will do so too. But may I not thank you in human speech for lifting me above humanity?”
“Have I done so?”
“Yes. May I thank you for it ... on my knees?”
He knelt down and reverently took her hands. He could just distinguish the outline of her figure, seated motionless and still upon the bench; above them was a pearl-grey twilight of stars, between the black boughs. She felt her hands in his and then his mouth, his kiss, upon her hand. Very gently, she released herself; and then, with a great soul of modesty, full of desireless happiness, very gently she bent her arms about his neck, took his head against her and kissed him on the forehead:
“And I, I thank you too!” she whispered, rapturously.
He was still; and she held him fast in her embrace.
“I thank you,” she said, “for teaching me this and how to be happy as we are and no otherwise. You see, when I still lived and was human, when I was a woman, I thought that I had lived before I met you, for I had had a husband and I had children of whom I was very fond. But from you I first learnt to live, to live without egoism and without desire; I learnt that from you this evening or ... this day, which is it? You have given me life and happiness and everything. And I thank you, I thank you! You see, you are so great and so strong and so clear and you have borne me towards your own happiness, which should also be mine, but it was so far above me that, without you, I should never have attained it! For there was a barrier for me which did not exist for you. You see, when I was still human”—and she laughed, clasping him more tightly—“I had a sister; and she too felt that there was a barrier between her happiness and herself; and she felt that she could not surmount this barrier and was so unhappy because of it that she feared lest she should go mad. But I, I do not know: I dreamed, I thought, I hoped, I waited, oh, I waited; and then you came; and you made me understand at once that you could be no man, no husband for me, but that you could be more for me: my angel, O my deliverer, who would take me in his arms and bear me over the barrier into his own heaven, where he himself was god, and make me his Madonna! Oh, I thank you, I thank you! I do not know how to thank you; I can only say that I love you, that I adore you, that I lay myself at your feet. Remain as you are and let me adore you, while you kneel where you are. I may adore you, may I not, while you yourself are kneeling? You see, I too must confess, as you used to do,” she continued, for now she could not but confess. “I have not always been straightforward with you; I have sometimes pretended to be the Madonna, knowing all the time that I was but an ordinary woman, a woman who frankly loved you. But I deceived you for your own happiness, did I not? You wished me so, you were happy when I was so and no otherwise. And now, now too you must forgive me, because now I need no longer pretend, because that is past and has died away, because I myself have died away from myself, because now I am no longer a woman, no longer human for myself, but only what you wish me to be: a Madonna and your creature, an atom of your own essence and divinity. So will you forgive me the past? May I thank you for my happiness, for my heaven, my light, O my master, for my joy, my great, my immeasurable joy?”
He rose and sat beside her, taking her gently in his arms:
“Are you happy?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said, laying her head on his shoulder in a giddiness of light. “And you?”
“Yes,” he answered; and he asked again, “And do you desire ... nothing more?”
“No, nothing!” she stammered. “I want nothing but this, nothing but what is mine, oh, nothing, nothing more!”
“Swear it to me ... by something sacred!”
“I swear it to you ... by yourself!” she declared.
He pressed her head to his shoulder again. He smiled; and she did not see that there was sadness in his laugh, for she was blinded with light.