CHAPTER IV
VENUS WITH THE ARMS RESTORED
AT Lord Ewald’s impulsive words a strange gleam, the light of genius, leaped into the professor’s gray eyes. He drew in his breath with a slight hissing sound which betrayed the deep emotion he was feeling. But the younger man was too absorbed ui his thoughts to heed these signs.
“Yes,” continued Lord Ewald, almost reminiscently, “I thought I could change her. I tried to give her healthy diversion; I treated her as a sick person.
“I hoped that traveling would educate and improve her mind. But, in Italy, in France, in Spain, it was just the same. She looked jealously at the masterpieces, which she thought deprived her, for the moment, of complete attention, without understanding that she, herself, was a part of the beauty of those masterpieces, without knowing that they were but mirrors, reflecting her own reflection, that I was showing her.
“In Switzerland, we watched the sun rising over the mountains, but, instead of being inspired by the sight, she cried out, with a smile that was as radiant as the sunshine itself: ‘Oh, I hate these mountains; they just seem to want to crush me.’
“In Florence, while we were standing before the wonders of the century of Leon X, she yawned slowly, and said: ‘Quite interesting, isn’t it?’
“Once we were at a concert, listening to Wagner. She wanted to leave before it was half over, exclaiming petulantly: ‘Oh, I can’t get the tune of this music. It is just a lot of bangs, just noise—it’s just crazy!’ If her sublime face could have portrayed the expression of her soul, she would have worn a distorted grimace.
“In Paris, I had the keenest desire to show this living woman the great statue of Venus—her very image. I wanted to see what she would say in the presence of her counterpart. I said to her, half jokingly: ‘Alicia, I am going to take you to the Louvre galleries, and I think that you will see something there that will surprise you.’
“We walked through the halls, and, then, quite suddenly, I led her into the presence of the eternal statue.
“This time she raised her veil and gazed at the marble figure with a degree of astonishment, as she cried out naively: ‘ Why, that’s me!’
“I said nothing. I waited. After a few moments’ stupefied pause, she looked at me and said: ‘ Yes, that’s me, except that I have not lost my arms, and I am much more aristocratic-looking.’ Then she shivered a little; she had withdrawn her hand from my arm and was holding the balustrade.
“She now took my arm again, and said, in a low tone: ‘ Oh, these statues, these stones here make me feel so cold. Come on, let’s leave.’
“Once outside the historical building, I glanced at her, for she had been silent for some minutes and I had a sort of hope that she had been stirred. She had been stirred, indeed, but—how? After thinking for some time, she came quite close to me and said: ‘ If they make so much fuss over that statue, I ought to be a tremendous success.’
“I confess that her words gave me a queer feeling. Her foolishness soared as high as the heavens; it seemed like a damnation. I simply said: ‘I hope so!’
“I escorted her to her hotel. This duty accomplished, I returned to the museum and again entered the sacred halls. I looked at the goddess, and, then, for the first time in my life, I felt my heart ready to burst with one of those mysterious dry sobs that stifle a human being.
“Picture, then, this woman, an animated duality which repelled and attracted me. My ardent love for her beautiful voice and her exterior charms is now entirely platonic.
“Her moral being has frozen the fires of my senses forever; they have become purely contemplative. I am only attached to her by a sorrowful admiration. I would like to see her dead, if Death would not efface those human features.
“There is nothing that can make Alicia Cleary worthy of a great love. My only wish for her now is to have her go on the stage to the career she desires, and then there will be nothing more in life for me.
“There you have the story. You can see there is no remedy. I must be going. This is good-by. I shall never return.”
“Wait a moment, my dear young friend,” said the professor sharply. “I can see that you are contemplating a serious step on account of a woman. Bah! It is nonsense.”
“I loved Alicia,” Lord Ewald declared quietly as he arose; “she represented to me everything that was divine and beautiful.”
The professor saw that the manly youth standing before him had the thought of suicide well defined in his mind.
“Lord Ewald,” he said, sternly, “you are only the victim of a youthful passion which you have idealized. Time will cure you. Go your way. Forget her.”
“Do you think me so inconsistent?”the young man demanded. “No, my nature is such that, while I am perfectly aware of the absurdity of this ‘passion,’ I do not suffer less.”
“Lord Ewald,” the professor remarked finally, “you amaze me. You are one of England’s richest and most distinguished peers. In your country there are many beautiful, eligible young women.
“You are a brilliant match, and you can certainly find some innocent, ideal girl whose love could only be given once in a lifetime. You could have a wonderful, happy future with such a wife.”