CHAPTER XXI - THE PRESCIENCE OF FATIGUE

The experience acquired by Vedrona on that eventful day, was, so far, only varied from the usual experience of humanity by reason of her position. The neutral, colourless draperies of youthful innocence and reserve had been drawn aside from an uneventful life, and at the call of duty her reluctant feet stepped across the Rubicon of publicity to find a thousand unanticipated attractions appealing to her rising enthusiasm. Intoxicated with the revelation, she had thrown herself into the arms of tempting pleasures with an abandoned zest that took no thought of consequences, until the nightfall chill of exhaustion swept the field of her enjoyment, causing her to shiver with hysteria, then fall into the oblivious arms of coma.

It was only the natural penalty of youth's sweet extravagance, but it leaves behind a black shadow of melancholy, measured in its depth by the balance swing from the height of our enjoyment.

She was at once conveyed to the more favourable atmosphere of a withdrawing room, and left in charge of Machaon and Tasha, with Æna and Zillah in attendance.

Thread by thread the bands of unconsciousness were snapped under the influence of the physician's restoratives, and the baton of her pulse began to beat the quickening time of life's returning symphony.

Then the wise Machaon withdrew, lest his presence should militate against the resuscitating luxury of an unrestrained flood of tears.

How anxiously did the weeping Tasha watch the gradual return of life!

The Princess moved! “Hush-sh,” was the almost inaudible caution whispered to the slaves.

She endeavoured to turn. “It is all right, darling. I am here.” In the utterance of that pronoun there was a yearning strength of maternal affection sufficient to woo a doubtful soul back to earth from Paradise.

Vedrona sighed - a deep, heavy, reviving sigh! “That is better, dearie! Keep quiet; all is well!”

The head half turned, and the languid, wondering eyes half opened, recognising the well loved face.

“What is it, Tasha? What has happened?” she murmured.

“You are tired, dear; and the heat was too much for you. It is over now!” “But Glarces! Where is he?”

“Not far away. You shall see him when you are a little better.”

“He is not dead?” she enquired, a spasm of alarm exciting her as a sudden gust of wind strikes a dry leaf. “No, love! He is well - or will be when he hears that you are better.”

“Send for him. I must see him.”

“Presently. When you are a little stronger.”

Again she shivered as if an icy blast swept across her sensitive frame. She convulsively grasped Tasha's hand.

“Take me home!” she exclaimed, wildly. “Take me home at once; I dare not stop here any longer.”

“Zillah! order the chair to be in readiness at once; then go forward and await our coming at home,” said Tasha. The Iberian frowned; such had not been her determination, but she must needs obey. She made no reply, though the vigour with which she drew aside the portiere was eloquent with anger, and in her haste she almost fell upon the statuesque form of Maphir, who, with folded arms, had placed himself on guard in case of need.

Zillah gone, Vedrona again requested “Let me see Glarces now.”

“Find the Prince, Æna and let him know that the Princess would see him at once.”

When they were quite alone, Vedrona crept still closer to her, and pleaded:

“Tell me, Tasha, what horrible thing has happened?”

“Nothing, dear, beyond your own weariness, which enabled the gods to seize and try to carry you away; but now you have returned all is well.”

“You will not tell me,” she answered, unable to accept the assurance. “But I know what it is: all the world has gone to pieces, and I have lost Glarces - everything.”

Then her feelings found vent in a flood of tears, which Tasha made no attempt to control, neither did she contradict her assertion. Being a woman of somewhat kindred temperament she knew the silver streak of composure that would presently fringe the unwelcome cloud, and wisely allowed the storm to take its natural course. When its violence was over she ventured to speak.

“You are tired to-night, dear, as you sometimes used to be when you were only a child, and I took you on my knee to tell some pretty story before you went to bed. I remember, but you forget, how sometimes you would think the tales were awful because my voice disturbed your sleep. In the morning, when you were rested, you would come to me and ask to hear it again, then you would say, “Oh, how sweet, it was the tired last night, not me.' Do you remember?”

“I think I do,” she answered, soothed by the ingenious harking back to childish memories.

“And that is just what you will think about to-night when to-morrow comes; but your fears are very real now.”

“I am sorry to be so much trouble to you,” she replied, with a truly penitential caress; “but I don't know how to help it.”

“Ah, my dear,” Tasha returned, with a deep drawn sigh, “you do not know me, even now, if you imagine that any service that I can render you is a trouble. The only trouble I have is to see you and your brother drifting away from me - knowing that others are taking my place and I am losing you.”

“No one can ever take your place with either Glarces or myself, Tasha. If we are not quite so demonstrative it is not because we love you less, or are in danger of forgetting, but rather that the stream of our affection runs deeper - beyond the reach of the surface influences of life.”

“And grows stronger and stronger as the days go by.” added Glarces, who had entered silently, and overheard both the regret and Vedrona's assurance. “But how is my love?” he asked anxiously, as he took his seat beside the couch. “No, Tasha, you must not go; we have no secrets from you, and I am not sure if you are not more necessary than I just now.”

“I am better now that I see you are safe;” and the lovelight that spread across her face almost eclipsed the last trace of her fear. “I am sorry I was so foolish, but I was so tired, and terribly afraid.”

“Afraid of what, dear?”

“I don't know. In that lies the greater part of my suffering. If the fear would only assume a definite form I might be able to conquer it; but while it remains a vague, intangible dread of some danger threatening you, I am powerless, except to endure its torment.”

He laughed- a short random, defiant laugh. Vedrona was perhaps too weary, or, it may be, too engrossed with her fear to notice it; but Tasha looked at him with startled surprise at such an unexpected demonstration of levity. It was so foreign to his nature that she refused to accept the evidence of her ears. Sharp as was her action she failed to catch the expression on his face, but she saw the flush upon the cheek, the almost fierce passion flashing from his eyes, the exhilaration that made him so unlike himself. She could see that he too was worn out by his exertions of the day, but beyond this she was alarmed to notice the undoubted influence of the cup he had drained in his enthusiastic loyalty to Vedrona, Lais, and his guests alike.

It was only a momentary glance, but it revealed all this and more - it brought her within the shadow of Vedrona's fear for his safety; filled her with a wild desire to do something! But what! She was not a resourceful woman. In that lay her weakness. She had no idea what to do.

“Phantoms of the imagination have neither strength, bone, nor muscle, my beloved; therefore you need have no fear. I can well protect myself; but you need rest.”

“I know it, and if I were only sure that you were safe, I would take Tasha's advice and go home.”

“Your fear is nothing but a creation of your weariness. Do as Tasha asks you. She is a wise woman, gifted with the prescience of the gods, and cannot make a mistake.”

“If you really think so, perhaps you will let me advise you as well,” she replied, promptly. “You need rest quite as much as Vedrona - why not take it?”

“Because it is impossible, welcome as I willingly admit it would be. Vedrona must needs retire, but I must remain to do my duty.”

“Hear me, my love,” pleaded the Princess. “Don't send me home. I will rest here, but I cannot go away.”

“Why not?”

“Because I know how much you will need me. Tasha, Æna - anyone you will shall keep me company if you will only consent to my remaining. But you will want me, dear, and if I go away I shall never see you again.”

“Have you not conquered your fear yet?” he asked, tenderly.

“No! Nor can I until this night is past. Don't laugh at me, but I am confident we are face to face with the most awful trouble of our lives. I can feel it though I cannot see it. My heart stands still; my blood grows cold, and my soul is filled with a nameless horror, to which even death would be preferable! If we meet it together we are safe; if we part all is lost! As you love me, my brother, don't drive me away.”

She had risen from her couch and was clinging to him with all the intensity of a maddening despair. Tasha was almost beside herself with grief; Æna was terrified and helpless; and Glarces utterly bewildered.

“What is this remorseless devil who seeks to poison the last hour of this day's happiness? Give it some name, my love, and let me slay it ere it effects its purpose.”

“No, no! I cannot - dare not tell you,” she answered, stealing a wild and furtive look behind her towards the entrance.

“It may be, as you say, only a shadow cast by my weariness, and if you wish it I will go home.” She had released him and taken one or two steps backward, speaking her last words almost like one in a dream. “Yes! I will go home! But”- with a piercing shriek she awoke, and again threw herself upon him – “I shall never see you again - never see you again.”

“If you love me you will tell me what this is,” he demanded.

She started, each hand gripping his tunic convulsively, her eyes glaring wildly, and her face ashen as that of a corpse.

“If I love you!” Her voice was hoarse and cold. “Ah, ye gods! If I had loved less my suffering were not so great!

But hear me, Glarces, then understand my sorrow! In the darkness into which you thrust me I can see one form - oh, how I have loved her - waiting to slay me; and a thousand warning voices cry on every side - 'Beware of Lais! Beware of Lais!’”

Glarces' cheeks flushed, and he had some difficulty in restraining his impatience. He was not ignorant of the effect the wine had produced upon him - felt the added impetus it gave to every turn of his mind, making him singularly unlike his normal self both in feelings and language. If either side of his nature had an advantage of the other in that critical moment it was unfortunately the lighter, and the more solid part of him was consequently in repose. He could control himself, but it was always with a tendency towards buoyancy, and this naturally influenced him in favour of the stranger rather than the friend, the accused more than the accuser - Lais instead of Vedrona.

“This is unworthy of you after all that has passed,” he remonstrated; “and if I were sufficiently inconsiderate not to defend Lais against this injustice, prompted by fatigue, even you would despise me in the morning.”

The impetuous influence of the wine cut out of his remonstrance the usual endearing epithet which would have robbed it of its fatal sting, and the fretfulness of Vedrona's exhaustion fanned her rising jealousy by suggestive misrepresentation. O God, through wharf trifling crevices does ruin creep!

The correction - not quite so softly expressed as intended, not a tithe so harsh or unfeeling as imagined - roused hitherto unsuspected volumes of fury in the Princess, which for the instant conquered her weariness, and, under the strength its spasm lent, she made Glarces quail as he stood before her.

“I should at least be allowed to live till the morning in order to despise you,” she almost hissed, having stepped back a pace or two; “but you object to it, and order me away that I may go to death! I see it - know it now! At last my blinded eyes have been opened, and I am undeceived! Ye gods, what have I done - wherin have I transgressed that I deserve to be so treacherously betrayed? Is this the boasted climax of love - the apex of all joy - the great consummation of a woman's hopes? Is this the goal towards which I have so faithfully pressed forward? Ah! ha! I have solved the riddle - “ and she literally screamed with hysterical laughter - “I have possessed my self of the one enchantment of the gods!” Then turning fiercely upon him: “But I bid you beware, Glarces! You may despise me and throw me away, but I love you still - with a passion neither mankind, immortals, nor death have power to touch or modify, and though I die a thousand deaths I will come back again and take vengeance on Lais or any other fiend who dares to come between us!”

The spell of her vehemence was broken by this time, and her trembling, helpless body fell upon the couch nothing but a writhing mass of uncontrollable hysteria.

Glarces wisely left her to the tearful ministrations of Tasha and Æna who, with the powerful magic of woman's potent sympathy, exorcised the fury and wooed the repentant peri back again. In a flood of bitter tears the storm of passion passed away, the convulsive sobs died into distant, almost inaudible murmurs, and she opened her eyes to see only the two faithful women beside her.