A Draught of the Blue, together with An Essence of the Dusk

by F. W. Bain

And the King sighed also, with relief: for he feared that his followers had found him in the wood. And then he said: Blue-eyes, hast thou a name? Then she said: I have only the name which was my mother's. And the King said: What was that? Then she said: Long ago, when my father first saw my mother in the wood, she was standing by a bush, which had just burst into blossom all over, as if by the touch of her foot.[[1]] And the bees were humming and bustling eagerly all about it and her, as if they wished to kiss her, and my father saw it, and he called her by a name of his own, that has come by inheritance also to me. For my father has never called me anything else. And the King said: And what then was the name? And she said: Alichumbitá.[[2]] And the King clapped his hands, and exclaimed: Certainly, thy father is admirable, and thy name appropriate. And sure I am, that there must be more than the name of relationship between that happy bush and thee. And I am tempted to believe that thy story of an Apsaras was false, and that thou hadst for a mother no other than the very indwelling spirit of that sweetly-scented, bee-haunted bush. Then she said: Nay, my mother was an Apsaras. And the King exclaimed: How shall I believe thee? For already I am beginning to doubt whether thou ever hadst either mother or father, and wert not rather directly compounded by the Deity himself in the form of a bee, going from flower to flower, and culling thy composition out of every flower's fragrant essence and every blossom's painted bloom. And she said laughing: And what then was thy composition? And the King looked at her joyously, and said: The Deity was thy creator, and thou art mine. For I never lived until this moment, and this is all thy doing. Thou hast found me like an empty shell, and filled me with colour and emotion and the salt of beauty and the sound of laughter and the tossing to and fro of the waves of pleasure and delight. Now put me to thy ear, and I shall echo like the sea. Then she said: Once more, I do not understand. And the King said: O ocean, no matter. But thy shell must murmur, being full of thee, whether it will or no. And yet, this at least now thou dost surely understand, that I was right, and that ages have elapsed, since we met each other a little while ago in the wood. For I have utterly forgotten every fragment of my life that went before, and as I said, I have begun to live, only since I saw thy face. And thou hast discovered that thy life in the wood was very lonely till I came. And it is as though we had both been sleeping, and had just waked up. And now we are playfellows, and I will be King, and thou shall be Queen. Or hast thou never heard of kings and queens? Then she said: Nay, I have heard. For formerly, before my father became so utterly devoted to asceticism, he used to tell me stories. And in almost every story, there was a king and queen. Then the King said: And if then I were king, wouldst thou come away with me and be my queen? And she laughed, and said: But what sort of queen should I be, that know nothing of the duties and behaviour of a queen?

Then he said: Sweet little Queen, although thou dost not know it, thy qualifications for the post of queen are such that they could not be surpassed. And the duties are easy to be learned, and the pleasures more than thou couldst dream. Only come with me, and I will show thee what they are. Or if thou wilt, I will draw thee a picture in the air, and hold it up before thee, to show thee as in a mirror thy life as a queen, and give thee a foretaste of its nectar. Hast thou never watched the bubbles on the surface of the stream? Dost thou not know how every bubble is like a little heaven, and glows for a moment with every colour of the sky, and bursts: but the sky remains? So is it with my picture. For like a bubble, it will burst as soon as painted, being only words: but the heaven which it shows thee in its mirror shall be thine, as long as life endures.

Then she said: Draw, then, thy picture, and let me see thy heaven. And she settled herself to listen, leaning her cheek upon her hand, and looking at the King so sagely that he shook with agitation, so intense was his desire to take her in his arms. And he exclaimed: Blue eyes, come and be my Queen, and I will put thee in a palace, and build it for thee seven stories high, of ebony and sandalwood, and of silver and of gold. O come and be my Queen, and thou shalt walk on pavements more worthy of thy little feet than this rough ground, on marble of many colours, and on floors of precious stones. Only be my Queen, and I will strip thee of thy bark, and wrap thee in silky webs and tissues coloured like the rainbow, till like the moon behind a filmy cloud, thy symmetry shall borrow beauty from tell-tale veils of gossamer and envelopes of woven gauze. Ah! come with me and be my little Queen, and I will load thy neck and arms with jewels, and thou shall play with heaps of pearl, and coral, and all the riches of the sea. Aye, shouldst thou prick thy finger, I will mend it with a ruby, and shouldst thou drop a tear, I will redeem it with a diamond, and try in vain to match, with turquoise or lapis-lazuli or opal, the colour of thine eyes. Ah! come, and slaves shall serve my dainty Queen with food on golden plates, and snow cold drinks in crystal cups, and when thou wilt, pour music in thy little ear. And elephants shall carry thee about, or thou shall ride on horses, or float on silent pools starred like the sky with a multitude of lotuses, or lie on couches softer than a flower, fanned in the heat of noon with scented leaves, or listening at midnight to the moonstones, oozing as they swing in the window's trellised frames. Ah! Blue-eyes, come and be my Queen, for I cannot do without thee, and all that I have said is nothing, for it is only the casket for thy soul. For I will be there, and serve thee all day long upon my knees. Ah! I will take thy soul, and steep it in elixir, and drown it in the perfume and the fragrance of stories and of dreams, and dye it with the colour strained from the subtle essences of far-off lakes of passion and emotion, lying in the distant land beyond the blue horizon where the earth and heaven meet. Aye! I would turn the three worlds upside down, only to be near thee, and watch the shadow of the pleasures I would find there reflected in thine eyes, O thou naïvest and most exquisite of queens.

And she watched him as he spoke, and when he stopped, she continued to look at him in silence. And then to his amazement, she dropped her eyes, and the colour rose a very little in her cheek, that was overshadowed by her long soft lashes, and she said: Nay, thou art only laughing at me, knowing my inexperience. And as thou saidst, thy words are only bubbles, beautiful, and bursting as they jostle one another, and delusive. Nor is this the kind of queen that I would be. And the King said, with curiosity: And what then, O maiden difficult to please, is thy conception of a queen? And she waited for a moment, and she said, keeping her eyes fixed upon the ground: Once my father told me of a queen very different from thine. And I cannot tell thee the story as he told it, for I am not a pundit, as is he. But he told me of a king, who was set upon by enemies and driven from his throne. And when all the world abandoned him, a single friend remained to him, and that one was his queen: who followed him in exile, and lived with him in poverty, and wandered through the world behind him like his shadow, enjoying never one of the pleasures thou hast mentioned, but sharing all his evil fortune, a pleasure infinitely greater than them all. And when he died, she would not stay behind him, but followed him through the fire, into the other world.

[[1]] There is a beautiful Indian idea, that the foot of a pretty woman will cause a particular tree (I cannot recollect which) to break into blossom.

[[2]] "Kissed by the bees." (Note, that the third syllable rhymes, not with crumb, but with room, pronounced rather short.)

V

A PAINTED LADY

And the King listened with amazement, and when she ended, he looked at her with eyes that glistened, and a heart that swelled towards her as she sat with downcast eyes, as if ashamed of her words, before him on the ground. And he struck his hands together, and exclaimed to himself: Ha! very wonderful is the way of the Creator, who teaches all his creatures the law of their behaviour, without the means of any master. For this mud-born[[1]] pure white lotus of a maiden has understood without assistance and as it were by native instinct, the whole duty of a faithful wife, even before she has so much as seen a man. And then he said: Sweet little ascetic, apt pupil of a wise old father, whom thou dost resemble not only in thy hair, thou hast administered reproof to me, deservedly. And whereas I thought, in my folly, to instruct thee, it was I that received a lesson, in this matter of the way of queens. And now I see, that I spoke more truly than I knew, when I said that thou wert admirably fitted to be a queen. Now, therefore, thou art my guru, and I am thy disciple, and thou shalt teach me all that I do not know. Begin then, my pretty little guru: give me lessons, for I need them. And she laughed, and blushed, and said: Again thou art laughing at me: for how could a simple forest maiden teach anything to one, who like thyself, had lived in cities, and mixed with other men and women? And the King said quickly: Ah! dear Blue-eyes, just for that very reason is it that thou hast already taught me many things that I never knew before. For they who live in cities have their souls tainted as it were and poisoned by bad associations, whereas thine is as pure as the flowers in thy hair. And therefore, as thou hast taught me about queens, teach me also about kings. What should he be like, whom thou wouldst be willing to follow through the world?