20
The little parlor of the hotel was filled with guests, assembled there, as was the custom, waiting for the dining-room doors to be opened. Martin, standing in the hall, a living symbol of electric force, created a sensation. He drew nearer and took in the crowd of pale women, young, nervous, with mysterious ills they could not, or would not, explain to their doctor, who, for the lack of a suitable name, called the sickness “anæmia.” He looked them over with an experienced man’s compelling eyes. Some were very good-looking, would have been beautiful under favorable conditions, but they were pale, with white lips and drawn features, like plants in a dark cellar pining for the sun. He became amusedly conscious of being the only man; he finally espied in the garden a rheumatic old fellow, like the decayed trunk of a tree. He felt a battery of admiring glances leveled at him. He smiled, went to the foot of the staircase, waited for Julie.
They went in to dinner together. The table in a deep window at the far end of the room was decorated tonight with an abundance of flowers. Martin played with his food; he was too excited to eat, but he was in wonderful spirits. Julie had never seen him like that; she had a feeling of triumphant elation. He was handsome; the other women were envying her.
He laughingly remarked about the Eden with one Adam and many temptresses.
“They are all so white, as if frozen in ice; the Sun-God should come and melt them.” He squeezed her hand under the table. “I am sorry for the ‘good’ women. They sacrifice themselves for an illusion—chastity.”
She answered quickly. “The woman doesn’t think so. It is her religion. It may mean nothing to you, but for her it is a spiritual compensation.”
“Oh, that’s Catholic,” laughed Martin. She shivered, drew her cape around her.
Then he said, “Look how beautiful! The twilight is wonderful up here, light mixing with darkness like two souls. How the valley stretches out. Do you hear the rushing of waters? They are saying, ‘Give me your body, I will heal you.’ Look! The mountain has a halo of red; it catches at my throat and chokes me....”
He was poetic, inspired. He raised his glass. “The wine goes through my veins like warm blood. If I were a doctor, I’d prescribe it for the ladies.”
“Oh, oh,” laughed Julie, “forbidden fruit!”
“And you?” There was a laughing question in his eyes.
“I’m cured.” She drained the glass.
After dinner they walked up and down the terrace in front of the hotel, like old friends who had not met for some time and had much to say to each other. Gradually, the buzzing inside subsided, the pale creatures evaporated, lights were put out; one glimmered in each corridor.
He drew Julie into a small summer house covered with vines, at the end of the garden. The head waitress brought in wine. He thanked her—the Swiss know the hotel business. He slipped his arm under Julie’s cape. She resisted, but he held her close. She could hear his heart beating violently. Then it seemed as if it stood quite still, but it commenced soon to hammer again against hers.
“I must go in,” she whispered. “They close the house early.” She put her arms around his neck, raised her face to his.
“How dark it is.”
“Yes. It’s always so before the moon comes up.” Then she slipped away. He caught her back.
“Will you give me a signal?” It was a moment of suspense.
“Yes.”
He looked up at her room; there was a candle burning in the window.
“When you put out that light, I’ll come.”
He reluctantly let her go. She went up the stairs; he saw her at her window. There was a white spirit also watching—the moon, that “Orbèd Maiden,” chaste as the sleeping women within. Only those two were living; with them it was Flood-Tide.
The light in Julie’s window went out. It was dark now, the moon ashamed had turned away her face. He started to go; his feet were lead; his body weighed them down. What ailed him? He shook himself like an angry beast.
“Martin, don’t go.”
The voice was low, but very clear; did it come from without or within? He didn’t know.
“Martin, don’t commit this crime; don’t rob your friend. If you love the woman, do not destroy her; it is one throb more, one desire fulfilled—and then—the Price....”
At daybreak, the gardener, crawling about, found the stranger in the summer house, his head on the table, buried in his arms. He looked at the empty bottles. The wine of the Canton was strong; he shook the sleeping man, once, twice. Martin started up; where was he?...
The hotel was empty. The guests were at the Springs. A bath of mineral effervescent water refreshed him, but that strange feeling came again like a dream which returns in fitful flashes, fragments of color impossible to blend. He paced the room; his eyes fell upon the deerskin trunk he had brought with him. He opened it, took out the corduroy trousers, boots, shirt—examined them critically. His valet had pronounced them “only fit for the ash can,” but that didn’t influence Martin. He had them cleaned, folded, and put back into the box. He drew on the soft leather boots; they fitted him. The woollen shirt was light and warm. Looking at himself in the glass, he saw a man of the mountains—real, living. If a man buys a costume like that, it is only a masquerade; this was his inheritance.
The omnibus came back from the Springs; he went down and helped Julie out, seeking in her face the reproach he deserved. She smiled at him; how sweet of her! The fact was, when Julie reached her room the usual revulsion of feeling set in. She undressed quickly, dropping her clothing in a heap on the floor, blew out the candle. There was a dark form below—waiting—she stood breathless, her hand on the knob of the door. Then—she turned the key, crept to the window, pushed the bolt. She was securely locked in—she slipped into bed.
This morning she looked very girlish in a sport suit; the short skirt grazing the tops of very high tan leather boots. A soft hat, pulled down over one eye, gave her rosy face a touch of diablerie. She was all animation, joking about his Alpine costume, casting roguish glances at him; but he felt the undercurrent of emotion. He adored her.
“We are going out for a day in the woods.”
“You don’t ask, will I go.”
“No—but you will, won’t you?”
There was pathos in his voice, longing; she couldn’t resist him.
“Yes, but I must rest after the bath and dress lightly. The morning here is cold; at noon it gets very warm.”
He bent down and whispered, “Wear white like a bride.”
During the interval of waiting, Martin studied a map of the Canton, tracing lines from one Dorf to another, short walking tours through the woods; there were plenty of little inns where they could rest. He paced the terrace impatiently.
She came, all in white. A filmy scarf wound around her head, “à la turque,” accentuated the Oriental in her. She laughingly drew the long floating streamers across her face; her eyes shot fire through their soft transparency.
A little wagon drove up; the peasant boy cracked his whip and they started off. The road was smooth, sunlit. They stopped at the Springs, where Julie made him drink the unsavory water “to clear his complexion.” They were in high spirits, laughing at simple things, like two children. When they reached the chasm, the road became steep, narrow, with dark overhanging trees. Martin drew Julie close to him; a mysterious something hovered about them, intangible in its beauty, penetrating, wonderful.
The driveway ended there. The descent into the ravine must be finished on foot. The lad took a basket from the wagon and set it on the ground; then he cracked his whip and drove off.