“Suppose that you, in your boyhood, had wronged some woman, and suppose that woman had died. You might imagine that you had got rid of that woman. But if her love was very strong and her sense of outrage very bitter, I must tell you that you have not got rid of her by any means; moreover, you never will get rid of her. And why? Because her Soul, like all Souls, is imperishable. Now, putting it as a mere supposition, and for the sake of the argument, that you feel a certain admiration for the Princess Ziska, an admiration which might possibly deepen into something more than platonic, ...”—here Denzil Murray looked up, his eyes glowing with an angry pain as he fixed them on Gervase,—“why, then the Soul of the other woman you once wronged might come between you and the face of the new attraction and cause you to unconsciously paint the tortured look of the injured and unforgiving Spirit on the countenance of the lovely fascinator whose charms are just beginning to ensnare you. I repeat, I have known such cases.”
For it should be explained that, when Ziska gave the celebrated painter a sitting, he could produce nothing on his canvas, in spite of his genius, but a strange and awful face distorted with passion and pain, agony in every line of the features—“agony in which the traces of a divine beauty lingered only to render the whole countenance more repellent and terrific.”
Dr. Dean quickly comes to the conclusion, and very reasonably, that this is the most interesting problem he has ever had a chance of studying. It could be only one case out of thousands, he decides.
“Great heavens! Among what terrific unseen forces we live! And in exact proportion to every man’s arrogant denial of the ‘Divinity that shapes our ends,’ so will be measured out to him the revelation of the invisible. Strange that the human race has never entirely realized as yet the depth of the meaning in the words describing hell: ‘Where the worm dieth not, and where the flame is never quenched.’ The ‘worm’ is Retribution, the ‘flame’ is the immortal Spirit,—and the two are forever striving to escape from the other. Horrible! And yet there are men who believe in neither one thing nor the other, and reject the Redemption that does away with both! God forgive us all our sins—and especially the sins of pride and presumption!”
Other of the Doctor’s thoughtful utterances are well worth quoting. “To the wise student of things there is no time and no distance. All history from the very beginning is like a wonderful chain in which no link is ever really broken, and in which every part fits closely to the other part,—though why the chain should exist at all is a mystery we cannot solve. Yet, I am quite certain that even our late friend Araxes has his connection with the present, if only for the reason that he lived in the past.”
Armand asks him how he argues out that theory, and the Doctor replies:
“The question is, how can you argue at all about anything that is so plain and demonstrated a fact? The doctrine of evolution proves it. Everything that we were once has its part in us now. Suppose, if you like, that we were originally no more than shells on the shore,—some remnant of the nature of the shell must be in us at this moment. Nothing is lost,—nothing is wasted,—not even a thought. I carry my theories very far indeed, especially in regard to matters of love. I maintain that if it is decreed that the soul of a man and the soul of a woman must meet,—must rush together,—not all the forces of the universe can hinder them; aye, even if they were, for some conventional cause or circumstance, themselves reluctant to consummate their destiny, it would, nevertheless, despite them, be consummated. For mark you,—in some form or other they have rushed together before! Whether as flames in the air, or twining leaves on a tree, or flowers in a field, they have felt the sweetness and fitness of each other’s being in former lives,—and the craving sense of that sweetness and fitness can never be done away with,—never! Not as long as this present universe lasts! It is a terrible thing,” continued the Doctor in a lower tone, “a terrible fatality,—the desire of love. In some cases it is a curse; in others, a divine and priceless blessing. The results depend entirely on the temperaments of the human creatures possessed by its fever. When it kindles, rises, and burns towards Heaven in a steady flame of ever-brightening purity and faith, then it makes marriage the most perfect union on earth,—the sweetest and most blessed companionship; but when it is a mere gust of fire, bright and fierce as the sudden leaping light of a volcano, then it withers everything at a touch,—faith, honor, truth,—and dies into dull ashes in which no spark remains to warm or inspire man’s higher nature. Better death than such a love,—for it works misery on earth; but who can tell what horrors it may not create Hereafter!”
When the Princess Ziska betakes herself to the Mena House Hotel, near the Pyramids, Dr. Dean, Gervase Armand, and Denzil Murray follow her. She entertains them at dinner, and after dinner, while the Doctor and Armand are strolling without, Murray puts his fate to the touch, with results as might have been expected, for the Princess has displayed little emotion in respect to anybody save Armand, and in his case it is clear that her interest has a malignant foundation.
Armand comes after him, and, in a passionate scene, audaciously proposes to “play the part of Araxes over again.” Ziska promises to give him her answer on the morrow, and on the morrow Armand receives it.