Jess

Chapter 6

THE STORM BREAKS

"Do you know, you are a very odd person, Miss Jess," John said

presently, with a little laugh. "I don't think you can have a happy

mind."

She looked up. "A happy mind?" she said. "Who _can_ have a happy mind?

Nobody who feels. Supposing," she went on after a pause--"supposing one

puts oneself and one's own little interests and joys and sorrows quite

away, how is it possible to be happy, when one feels the breath of human

misery beating on one's face, and sees the tide of sorrow and suffering

creeping up to one's feet? You may be on a rock yourself and out of the

path of it, till the spring floods or the hurricane wave come to sweep

you away, or you may be afloat upon it: whichever it is, it is quite

impossible, if you have any heart, to be indifferent."

"Then only the indifferent are happy?"

"Yes, the indifferent and the selfish; but, after all, it is the same

thing: indifference is the perfection of selfishness."

"I am afraid that there must be lots of selfishness in the world, for

certainly there is plenty of happiness, all evil things notwithstanding.

I should have said that happiness springs from goodness and a sound

digestion."

Jess shook her head as she answered, "I may be wrong, but I don't

see how anybody who feels can be quite happy in a world of sickness,

suffering, slaughter, and death. I saw a Kafir woman die yesterday, and

her children crying over her. She was a poor creature and had a rough

lot, but she loved her life, and her children loved her. Who can be

happy and thank God for His creation when he has just seen such a thing?

But there, Captain Niel, my ideas are very crude, and I dare say very

wrong, and everybody has thought them before: at any rate, I am not

going to inflict them on you. What is the use of it?" and she went

on with a laugh: "what is the use of anything? The same old thoughts

passing through the same human minds from year to year and century to

century, just as the same clouds float across the same blue sky. The

clouds are born in the sky, and the thoughts are born in the brain, and

they both end in tears and re-arise in blind, bewildering mist, and this

is the beginning and end of thoughts and clouds. They arise out of the

blue; they overshadow and break into storms and tears, then they are

drawn up into the blue again, and the story begins afresh."

"So you don't think that one can be happy in this world?" he asked.

"I did not say that--I never said that. I do think that happiness is

possible. It is possible if one can love somebody so hard that one can

quite forget oneself and everything else except that person, and it

is possible if one can sacrifice oneself for others. There is no true

happiness outside of love and self-sacrifice, or rather outside of love,

for it includes the other. This is gold, and all the rest is gilt."

"How do you know that?" he asked quickly. "You have never been in love."

"No," she answered, "I have never been in love like that, but all the

happiness I have had in my life has come to me from loving. I believe

that love is the secret of the world: it is like the philosopher's stone

they used to look for, and almost as hard to find, but if you find it

it turns everything to gold. Perhaps," she went on with a little laugh,

"when the angels departed from the earth they left us love behind, that

by it and through it we may climb up to them again. It is the one thing

that lifts us above the brutes. Without love man is a brute, and nothing

but a brute; with love he draws near to God. When everything else falls

away the love will endure because it cannot die while there is any life,

if it is true love, for it is immortal. Only it must be true--you see it

must be true."

He had penetrated her reserve now; the ice of her manner broke up

beneath the warmth of her words, and her face, usually impassive, had

caught life and light from the eyes above, and acquired a certain beauty

of its own. John looked at it, and understood something of the untaught

and ill-regulated intensity and depth of the nature of this curious

girl. He met her eyes and they moved him strangely, though he was not

an emotional man, and was too old to experience spasmodic thrills at the

chance glances of a pretty woman. He moved towards her, looking at her

curiously.

"It would be worth living to be loved like that," he said, more to

himself than to her.

Jess did not answer, but she let her eyes rest on his. Indeed, she did

more, for she put her soul into them and gazed and gazed till John Niel

felt as though he were mesmerised. And as she gazed there rose up in her

breast a knowledge that if she willed it she could gain this man's heart

and hold it against all the world, for her nature was stronger than his

nature, and her mind, untrained though it be, encompassed his mind and

could pass over it and beat it down as the wind beats down the tossing

seas. All this she learnt in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye: she

could not tell how she knew it, but she did know it as surely as she

knew that the blue sky stretched overhead, and, what is more--for the

moment, at any rate--he knew it too. This strange strong certainty came

on her as a shock and a revelation, like the tidings of some great joy

or grief, and for a moment left her heart empty of all things else.

Jess dropped her eyes suddenly.

"I think," she said quietly, "that we have been talking a great deal of

nonsense, and that I want to finish my sketch."

He rose and left her, for he was wanted at home, saying as he went that

he thought there was a storm coming up; the air was so quiet, and the

wind had fallen as it does before an African tempest. Presently on

looking round she saw him slowly climbing the precipitous ascent to the

table-land above the gulf.

It was one of those glorious afternoons that sometimes come in the

African spring, although it was so intensely still. Everywhere appeared

the proofs of evidences of life. The winter was over, and now, from

the sadness and sterility of its withered age, sprang youth and lovely

summer clad in sunshine, bediamonded with dew, and fragrant with the

breath of flowers. Jess lay back and looked up into the infinite depths

above. How blue they were, and how measureless! She could not see the

angry clouds that lay like visible omens on the horizon. Look, there,

miles above her, was one tiny circling speck. It was a vulture, watching

her from his airy heights and descending a little to see if she were

dead, or only sleeping.

Involuntarily she shuddered. The bird of death reminded her of Death

himself also hanging high up yonder in the blue and waiting his

opportunity to fall upon the sleeper. Then her eyes fell upon a bough of

the glorious flowering bush under which she rested. It was not more than

four feet above her head, but she lay so still and motionless that a

jewelled honeysucker came and hovered over the flowers, darting from one

to another like a many-coloured flash. Thence her glance travelled to

the great column of boulders that towered above her, and that seemed to

say, "I am very old. I have seen many springs and many winters, and

have looked down on many sleeping maids, and where are they now?

All dead--all dead," and an old baboon in the rocks with startling

suddenness barked out "_all dead_" in answer.

Around her were the blooming lilies and the lustiness of springing life;

the heavy air was sweet with the odour of ferns and the mimosa flowers.

The running water splashed and musically fell; the sunlight shot in

golden bars athwart the shade, like the memory of happy days in the

grey vista of a life; away in the cliffs yonder, the rock-doves were

preparing to nest by hundreds, and waking the silence with their cooing

and the flutter of their wings. Even the grim old eagle perched on

the pinnacle of the peak was pruning himself, contentedly happy in

the knowledge that his mate had laid an egg in that dark corner of the

cliff. All things rejoiced and cried aloud that summer was at hand and

that it was time to bloom and love and nest. Soon it would be winter

again, when things died, and next summer other things would live under

the sun, and these perchance would be forgotten. That was what they

seemed to say.

And as Jess lay and heard, her youthful blood, drawn by Nature's

magnetic force, as the moon draws the tides, rose in her veins like the

sap in the budding trees, and stirred her virginal serenity. All the

bodily natural part of her caught the tones of Nature's happy voice that

bade her break her bonds, live and love, and be a woman. And lo! the

spirit within her answered to it, flinging wide her bosom's doors, and

of a sudden, as it were, something quickened and lived in her heart that

was of her and yet had its own life--a life apart; something that sprang

from her and another, which would always be with her now and could

never die. She rose pale and trembling, as a woman trembles at the first

stirring of the child that she shall bear, and clung to the flowery

bough of the beautiful bush above, then sank down again, feeling that

the spirit of her girlhood had departed from her, and another angel had

entered there; knowing that she loved with heart and soul and body, and

was a very woman.

She had called to Love as the wretched call to Death, and Love had come

in his strength and possessed her utterly; and now for a little while

she was afraid to pass into the shadow of his wings, as the wretched

who call to Death fear him when they feel his icy fingers. But the fear

passed, and the great joy and the new consciousness of power and of

identity that the inspiration of a true passion gives to some strong

deep natures remained, and after a while Jess prepared to make her way

home across the mountain-top, feeling as though she were another being.

Still she did not go, but lay there with closed eyes and drank of this

new intoxicating wine. So absorbed was she that she did not notice

that the doves had ceased to call, and that the eagle had fled away for

shelter. She was not aware of the great and solemn hush which had taken

the place of the merry voice of beast and bird and preceded the breaking

of the gathered storm.

At last as she rose to go Jess opened her dark eyes, which, for the most

part, had been shut while this great change was passing over her, and

with a natural impulse turned to look once more on the place where her

happiness had found her, then sank down again with a little exclamation.

Where was the light and the glory and all the happiness of the life that

moved and grew around her? Gone, and in its place darkness and rising

mist and deep and ominous shadows. While she lay and thought, the sun

had sunk behind the hill and left the great gulf nearly dark, and, as is

common in South Africa, the heavy storm-cloud had crept across the blue

sky and sealed the light from above. A drear wind came moaning up the

gorge from the plains beyond; the heavy rain-drops began to fall one

by one; the lightning flickered fitfully in the belly of the advancing

cloud. The storm that John had feared was upon her.

Then came a dreadful hush. Jess had recovered herself by now, and,

knowing what to expect, she snatched up her sketching-block and hurried

into the shelter of a little cave hollowed by water in the side of the

cliff. And now with a rush of ice-cold air the tempest burst. Down came

the rain in a sheet; then flash upon flash gleaming fiercely through the

vapour-laden air; and roar upon roar echoing along the rocky cavities in

volumes of fearful sound. Then another pause and space of utter silence,

followed by a blaze of light that dazed and blinded her, and suddenly

one of the piled-up columns to her left swayed to and fro like a poplar

in a breeze, to fall headlong with a crash which almost mastered the

awful crackling of the thunder overhead and the shrieking of the baboons

scared from their crannies in the cliff. Down it rushed beneath the

stroke of that fiery sword, the brave old pillar that had lasted out so

many centuries, sending clouds of dust and fragments high up into the

blinding rain, and carrying awe and wonder to the heart of the girl who

watched its fall. Away rolled the storm as quickly as it had come, with

a sound like the passing of the artillery of an embattled host; then a

grey rain set in, blotting the outlines of everything, like an endless

absorbing grief, dulling the edge and temper of a life. Through it Jess,

scared and wet to the skin, managed to climb up the natural steps, now

made almost impassable by the prevailing gloom and the rush of water

from the table-top of the mountain, and on across the sodden plain, down

the rocky path on the farther side, past the little walled-in cemetery

with the four red gums planted at its corners, in which a stranger who

had died at Mooifontein lay buried, and so, just as the darkness of the

wet night came down like a cloud, home at last. At the back-door stood

her old uncle with a lantern.

"Is that you, Jess?" he called out in his stentorian tones. "Lord! what

a sight!" as she emerged, her sodden dress clinging to her slight form,

her hands torn with clambering over the rocks, her curling hair which

had broken loose hanging down her back and half covering her face.

"Lord! what a sight!" he ejaculated again. "Why, Jess, where have you

been? Captain Niel has gone out to look for you with the Kafirs."

"I have been sketching in Leeuwen Kloof, and got caught in the storm.

There, uncle, let me pass, I want to take these wet things off. It is

a bitter night," and she ran to her room, leaving a long trail of water

behind her as she passed. The old man entered the house, shut the door,

and blew out the lantern.

"Now, what is it she reminds me of?" he said aloud as he groped his way

down the passage to the sitting-room. "Ah, I know, that night when she

first came here out of the rain leading Bessie by the hand. What can the

girl have been thinking of, not to see the thunder coming up? She ought

to know the signs of the weather here by now. Dreaming, I suppose,

dreaming. She's an odd woman, Jess, very." Perhaps he did not quite know

how accurate his guess was, and how true the conclusion he drew from it.

Certainly she had been dreaming, and she was an odd woman.

Meanwhile Jess was rapidly changing her clothes and removing the traces

of her struggle with the elements. But of that other struggle she had

gone through she could not remove the traces. They and the love that

arose out of it would endure as long as she endured. It was her former

self that had been cast off in it and which now lay behind her, an empty

and unmeaning thing like the shapeless heap of garments. It was all very

strange. So John had gone to look for her and had not found her. She was

glad that he had gone. It made her happy to think of him searching

and calling in the wet and the night. She was only a woman, and it was

natural that she should feel thus. By-and-by he would come back and find

her clothed and in her right mind and ready to greet him. She was glad

that he had not seen her wet and dishevelled. A girl looks so unpleasant

like that. It might have set him against her. Men like women to look

nice and clean and pretty. That gave her an idea. She turned to her

glass and, holding the light above her head, studied her own face

attentively. She was a woman with as little vanity in her composition as

it is possible for a woman to have, and till now she had not given her

personal looks much consideration. They had not been of great importance

to her in the Wakkerstroom district of the Transvaal. But to-night all

of a sudden they became very important; and so she stood and looked at

her own wonderful eyes, at the masses of curling brown hair still damp

and shining from the rain, at the curious pallid face and clear-cut

determined mouth.

"If it were not for my eyes and hair, I should be very ugly," she said

to herself aloud. "If only I were beautiful like Bessie, now." The

thought of her sister gave her another idea. What if John were to prefer

Bessie? Now she remembered that he had been very attentive to Bessie.

A feeling of dreadful doubt and jealousy passed through her, for women

like Jess know what jealousy is in its bitterness. Supposing that it was

in vain, supposing that what she had given to-day--given utterly once

and for all, so that she could not take it back--had been given to a man

who loved another woman, and that woman her own dear sister! Supposing

that the fate of her love was to be like water falling unalteringly

on the hard rock that heeds it not and retains it not! True, the water

wears the rock away; but could she be satisfied with that? She could

master him, she knew; even if things were so, she could win him to

herself, she had read it in his eyes that afternoon; but could she, who

had promised to her dead mother to cherish and protect her sister, whom

till this day she had loved better than anything in the world, and

whom she still loved more dearly than her life--could she, if it should

happen to be thus, rob that sister of her lover? And if it should be so,

what would her life be like? It would be like the great pillar after the

lightning had smitten it, a pile of shattered smoking fragments, a very

heaped-up debris of a life. She could feel it even now. No wonder, then,

that Jess sat there upon the little white bed holding her hand against

her heart and feeling terribly afraid.

Just then she heard John's footsteps in the hall.

"I can't find her," he said in an anxious tone to some one as she rose,

taking her candle with her, and left the room. The light of it fell full

upon his face and dripping clothes. It was white and anxious, and she

was glad to see the anxiety.

"Oh, thank God! here you are!" he said, catching her hand. "I began to

think you were quite lost. I have been right down the Kloof after you,

and got a nasty fall over it."

"It is very good of you," she said in a low voice, and again their eyes

met, and again her glance thrilled him. There was such a wonderful light

in Jess's eyes that night.

Half an hour afterwards they sat down as usual to supper. Bessie did

not put in an appearance till it was a quarter over, and then sat

very silent through it. Jess narrated her adventure in the Kloof, and

everybody listened, but nobody said much. There seemed to be a shadow

over the house that evening, or perhaps it was that each party was

thinking of his own affairs. After supper old Silas Croft began talking

about the political state of the country, which gave him uneasiness.

He said that he believed the Boers really meant to rebel against the

Government this time. Frank Muller had told him so, and he always knew

what was going on. This announcement did not tend to raise anybody's

spirits, and the evening passed as silently as the meal had done. At

last Bessie got up, stretched her rounded arms, and said that she was

tired and going to bed.

"Come into my room," she whispered to her sister as she passed. "I want

to speak to you."