"But it could not be done. He could not work. Somewhere in the world, he told me, was a spot where he could work, ... Where there were no memories. Somewhere in the seven seas lay the place. He would know it when he saw it. After so many years of exclusion, he was certain he would feel the atmosphere of the place where he could work. And there he would stay till he finished, till he produced the big thing that was in him. Thus, regilded, he would return to her again. One more effort, once more to feel his power, once more to hear the stimulating rush of praise, then he would give it up again, quite content to sit beneath his wine-glass till the end. But this first.
"So I put him down where I have told you, on a lonely island, somewhat north of the equator, ten thousand miles away from Her. Wistfully, he said it was quite the right spot; he could feel it. So we helped him, the China boys and I, to build a little hut, up on stilts, thatched with palm-leaves. Very desolate it is. On all sides the burnished ocean, hot and breathless, and the warm, moist heat close around. Still and stifling. Like a blanket, dense, enveloping. But he said it was the spot. I don't know. He has been there now three years. He said he could do it there, if ever. From time to time I stop there if the passengers are willing for a day or two's delay. He looks very old now and very thin, but he always say it's all right. Soon, very soon now, the manuscript will be ready; next time I stop, perhaps. Once I came upon him sobbing. Landing early in the morning—slipped ashore and found him sobbing, head in arms and shoulders shaking. It was early in the morning, and I think he'd sobbed all night. Somehow I think it was not for the gift he'd lost but for her.
"But he says over and over again that it is the right spot, the very right place in the world for such as he. Told me that I must not mind seeing him so lonely, so apparently depressed. That it was nothing. Just the Tropics, and being so far way, and perhaps thinking a little too much of things that did not concern his work. But the work would surely come on. Moods came on him from time to time that he recognized were quite the right moods in which to work, in which to produce great things. His genius was surely ripe now; he must just concentrate. Some day, very shortly, there would be a great rush; he would feel himself charged again with the old, fine fire. He would produce the great work of his life. He felt it coming on; it would be finished next time I called.
"This is the next time. Shall we go?" asked the captain.
Accordingly, within a day or two, the small coastwise steamer dropped her anchor in a shallow bay off a desert island marked with a cross on the captain's chart, and unmarked upon all other charts of the same waters. All around lay the tranquil spaces of a desolate ocean, and on the island the thatched roof of a solitary hut showed among the palms. The captain went ashore by himself, and presently, after a little lapse of time, he returned.
"It is finished," he announced briefly; "the great work is finished. I think it must have been completed several weeks ago. He must have died several weeks ago, possibly soon after my last call."
He held out a sheet of paper on which was written one word, "Beloved."
A THING OF BEAUTY[19]
By ELIAS LIEBERMAN