The Bride of Dreams

by Frederik van Eeden

"What!" said Lucia, with vehement and happy amazement. "Is it nothing more? A spirit friendship?"

"A spirit love, I would rather say."

"With a hotel maid? I believe you, Vico; you do not lie. I know you as a man of honor. Men have such phantasies. And ? and ?" with whispered emphasis and wide, searching eyes: "will it remain so?"

"No, Lucia, I don't want to deceive you. It certainly will not remain so."

Then she rose and walked about the room in violent emotion.

"Oh, but my God, Vico, what possesses you? You are contemplating the greatest wrong, the deepest offence to me, the disgrace of your family, the eternal ruin of your soul - you can easily turn back, nothing yet is lost, and you don't want to! You don't want to! Is this woman a witch then? An enchantress? Oh, now I know that you have no religion! Now I see what it is to have no religion."

I did not answer, and in my mind I compared the two spirit-worlds that here confronted one another, weighing the one against the other. And there is none who reads this and has read the preceding chapter, not even you, dear reader of original mind, but shall waver on this subtle boundary line. And yet in his heart he shall have to choose and range himself on one side or the other. For we human beings may proudly raise ourselves above good and evil, saying that no sin may be accounted as guilt to our frail short-sighted nature - the choice, the terrible irrevocable choice, with every irrevocable second, is not spared us, and must be made.

My choice was made. I no longer wavered, but I pondered on the awful power that forces us to choose where we can yet distinguish so poorly, that relentlessly pushes us on into the dense fog with its dimly gleaming lights.

Lucia however interpreted my silence as irresolution, and with the exertion of all her powers she attempted a desperate attack upon my heart. She threw herself down on her knees before me, sobbing and crying and kissing my hands. She begged and implored me to have pity, if not with her then at least with the children and with myself.

Then I said: