She - H. Rider Haggard (top 10 novels of all time txt) 📗

the job than anything I can think on—’Job, time’s up, Job; but I never did expect to have to come and hunt you out in this ‘ere place, Job. Such ado as I have had to nose you up; it wasn’t friendly to give your poor old father such a run, let alone that a wonderful lot of bad characters hail from this place Kôr.’”

“Regular cautions,” I suggested.

“Yes, sir—of course, sir, that’s just what he said they was—’cautions, downright scorchers’—sir, and I’m sure I don’t doubt it, seeing what I know of them, and their hot-potting ways,” went on Job sadly. “Anyway, he was sure that time was up, and went away saying that we should see more than we cared for of each other soon, and I suppose he was a-thinking of the fact that father and I never could hit it off together for longer nor three days, and I daresay that things will be similar when we meet again.”

“Surely,” I said, “you don’t think that you are going to die because you dreamed you saw your old father; if one dies because one dreams of one’s father, what happens to a man who dreams of his mother-in-law?”

“Ah, sir, you’re laughing at me,” said Job; “but, you see, you didn’t know my old father. If it had been anybody else—my Aunt Mary, for instance, who never made much of a job—I should not have thought so much of it; but my father was that idle, which he shouldn’t have been with seventeen children, that he would never have put himself out to come here just to see the place. No, sir; I know that he meant business. Well, sir, I can’t help it; I suppose every man must go some time or other, though it is a hard thing to die in a place like this, where Christian burial isn’t to be had for its weight in gold. I’ve tried to be a good man, sir, and do my duty honest, and if it wasn’t for the supercilus kind of way in which father carried on last night—a sort of sniffing at me as it were, as though he hadn’t no opinion of my references and testimonials—I should feel easy enough in my mind. Any way, sir, I’ve been a good servant to you and Mr. Leo, bless him!—why, it seems but the other day that I used to lead him about the streets with a penny whip;—and if ever you get out of this place—which, as father didn’t allude to you, perhaps you may—I hope you will think kindly of my whitened bones, and never have anything more to do with Greek writing on flower-pots, sir, if I may make so bold as to say so.”

“Come, come, Job,” I said seriously, “this is all nonsense, you know. You mustn’t be silly enough to go getting such ideas into your head. We’ve lived through some queer things, and I hope that we may go on doing so.”

“No, sir,” answered Job, in a tone of conviction that jarred on me unpleasantly, “it isn’t nonsense. I’m a doomed man, and I feel it, and a wonderful uncomfortable feeling it is, sir, for one can’t help wondering how it’s going to come about. If you are eating your dinner you think of poison and it goes against your stomach, and if you are walking along these dark rabbit-burrows you think of knives, and Lord, don’t you just shiver about the back! I ain’t particular, sir, provided it’s sharp, like that poor girl, who, now that she’s gone, I am sorry to have spoke hard on, though I don’t approve of her morals in getting married, which I consider too quick to be decent. Still, sir,” and poor Job turned a shade paler as he said it, “I do hope it won’t be that hot-pot game.”

“Nonsense,” I broke in angrily, “nonsense!”

“Very well, sir,” said Job, “it isn’t my place to differ from you, sir, but if you happen to be going anywhere, sir, I should be obliged if you could manage to take me with you, seeing that I shall be glad to have a friendly face to look at when the time comes, just to help one through, as it were. And now, sir, I’ll be getting the breakfast,” and he went, leaving me in a very uncomfortable state of mind. I was deeply attached to old Job, who was one of the best and honestest men I have ever had to do with in any class of life, and really more of a friend than a servant, and the mere idea of anything happening to him brought a lump into my throat. Beneath all his ludicrous talk I could see that he himself was quite convinced that something was going to happen, and though in most cases these convictions turn out to be utter moonshine—and this particular one especially was to be amply accounted for by the gloomy and unaccustomed surroundings in which its victim was placed—still it did more or less carry a chill to my heart, as any dread that is obviously a genuine object of belief is apt to do, however absurd the belief may be. Presently the breakfast arrived, and with it Leo, who had been taking a walk outside the cave—to clear his mind, he said—and very glad I was to see both, for they gave me a respite from my gloomy thoughts. After breakfast we went for another walk, and watched some of the Amahagger sowing a plot of ground with the grain from which they make their beer. This they did in scriptural fashion—a man with a bag made of goat’s hide fastened round his waist walking up and down the plot and scattering the seed as he went. It was a positive relief to see one of these dreadful people do anything so homely and pleasant as sow a field, perhaps because it seemed to link them, as it were, with the rest of humanity.

As we were returning Billali met us, and informed us that it was She’s pleasure that we should wait upon her, and accordingly we entered her presence, not without trepidation, for Ayesha was certainly an exception to the rule. Familiarity with her might and did breed passion and wonder and horror, but it certainly did not breed contempt.

We were as usual shown in by the mutes, and after these had retired Ayesha unveiled, and once more bade Leo embrace her, which, notwithstanding his heart-searchings of the previous night, he did with more alacrity and fervour than in strictness courtesy required.

She laid her white hand on his head, and looked him fondly in the eyes. “Dost thou wonder, my Kallikrates,” she said, “when thou shalt call me all thine own, and when we shall of a truth be for one another and to one another? I will tell thee. First, must thou be even as I am, not immortal indeed, for that I am not, but so cased and hardened against the attacks of Time that his arrows shall glance from the armour of thy vigorous life as the sunbeams glance from water. As yet I may not mate with thee, for thou and I are different, and the very brightness of my being would burn thee up, and perchance destroy thee. Thou couldst not even endure to look upon me for too long a time lest thine eyes should ache, and thy senses swim, and therefore” (with a little nod) “shall I presently veil myself again.” (This by the way she did not do.) “No: listen, thou shalt not be tried beyond endurance, for this very evening, an hour before the sun goes down, shall we start hence, and by to-morrow’s dark, if all goes well, and the road is not lost to me, which I pray it may not be, shall we stand in the place of Life, and thou shalt bathe in the fire, and come forth glorified, as no man ever was before thee, and then, Kallikrates, shalt thou call me wife, and I will call thee husband.”

Leo muttered something in answer to this astonishing statement, I do not know what, and she laughed a little at his confusion, and went on.

“And thou, too, oh Holly; on thee also will I confer this boon, and then of a truth shalt thou be evergreen, and this will I do—well, because thou hast pleased me, Holly, for thou art not altogether a fool, like most of the sons of men, and because, though thou hast a school of philosophy as full of nonsense as those of the old days, yet hast thou not forgotten how to turn a pretty phrase about a lady’s eyes.”

“Hulloa, old fellow!” whispered Leo, with a return of his old cheerfulness, “have you been paying compliments? I should never have thought it of you!”

“I thank thee, oh Ayesha,” I replied, with as much dignity as I could command, “but if there be such a place as thou dost describe, and if in this strange place there may be found a fiery virtue that can hold off Death when he comes to pluck us by the hand, yet would I none of it. For me, oh Ayesha, the world has not proved so soft a nest that I would lie in it for ever. A stony-hearted mother is our earth, and stones are the bread she gives her children for their daily food. Stones to eat and bitter water for their thirst, and stripes for tender nurture. Who would endure this for many lives? Who would so load up his back with memories of lost hours and loves, and of his neighbour’s sorrows that he cannot lessen, and wisdom that brings not consolation? Hard is it to die, because our delicate flesh doth shrink back from the worm it will not feel, and from that unknown which the winding-sheet doth curtain from our view. But harder still, to my fancy, would it be to live on, green in the leaf and fair, but dead and rotten at the core, and feel that other secret worm of recollection gnawing ever at the heart.”

“Bethink thee, Holly,” she said; “yet doth long life and strength and beauty beyond measure mean power and all things that are dear to man.”

“And what, oh Queen,” I answered, “are those things that are dear to man? Are they not bubbles? Is not ambition but an endless ladder by which no height is ever climbed till the last unreachable rung is mounted? For height leads on to height, and there is no resting-place upon them, and rung doth grow upon rung, and there is no limit to the number. Doth not wealth satiate, and become nauseous, and no longer serve to satisfy or pleasure, or to buy an hour’s peace of mind? And is there any end to wisdom that we may hope to reach it? Rather, the more we learn, shall we not thereby be able only to better compass out our ignorance? Did we live ten thousand years could we hope to solve the secrets of the suns, and of the space beyond the suns, and of the Hand that hung them in the heavens? Would not our wisdom be but as a gnawing hunger calling our consciousness day by day to a knowledge of the empty craving of our souls? Would it not be but as a light in one of these great caverns, that, though bright it burn, and brighter yet, doth but the more serve to show the depths of the gloom around it? And what good thing is there beyond that we may gain by length of days?”

“Nay, my Holly, there is love—love which makes all things beautiful, and doth breathe divinity into the very dust we tread. With love shall life roll gloriously on from year to year, like the voice of some great music that hath power to hold the hearer’s heart poised on