Part 11 (1/2)
CHAPTER VI.
Miss Dodan came more and more frequently to see me. The thought of my physical depression, the revulsion of hopelessness over my changing lineaments made the love I bore her more painful and enervating. I tried hard to conceal my fears over my condition. But Miss Dodan had been observant. Her developing affections became daily more tender and delicate, and her solicitude evinced itself in many charming, thoughtful ways that added only a more poignant sadness to my sufferings.
I was, indeed, tortured by the conflicting aims life seemed to furnish me. On the one hand was the necessity of continuing, if I could, my communications with my father; on the other, the duty I owed myself to abandon all for the woman I truly loved, and to renovate and establish my health so that I might woo and win, and marry her.
It was, in a sense, an ethical question, but it was quite as hard to determine by ordinary arguments whether I could have any permission to violate my promise to my father, as it was to estimate the exact measure of my obligations to myself and Miss Dodan. An incident occurred that dissipated this dilemma, sent Miss Dodan to England, and left me at Christ Church to receive the last message from my father before the sickness had fully developed that now has laid its searching and remorseless veto upon any further life or happiness for me in this world.
Miss Dodan and myself were seated together upon a bench drawn up in the suns.h.i.+ne at the foot of the Observatory, watching with delight the distinct changing sea, the plumes of smoke from diminished steamers, and the white glory of full-rigged s.h.i.+ps. It was the autumn of the southern country, and the dreamy spell of the declining days fell softly upon the material tissues of nature, as well as on the acquiescent spirit of man.
”Father,” said Miss Dodan, uncertainly, while she formed her hand into an improvised tube, and looked through it on the peaceful scene at our feet, ”has been telling me of my birthplace in Devons.h.i.+re. It must be very beautiful, more beautiful than it is here. But there is no sea, and it seems to me now that I should die without it; it is the very soul and voice, too, of all this picture!” She spread out her arms, and half willfully threw back the one nearest me, until it swept over my head, and I caught and kissed the opened palm.
”Yes,” I replied, ”the sea relieves everything about or near it, from the humiliation of commonness. The stamp of distinction rests on its printless waves. It was the first surface of the earth, and its primal regency has never been lost or forfeited;” a suspicion crossed my mind: ”How was it your father spoke of Devons.h.i.+re. I never knew before that you came from that pearl of the countries of England. Would you like to see it?”
My voice half sank, and the hitherto unsuspected fact that Mr. Dodan had observed my physical danger, and now was planning to interrupt his daughter's intimacy and hallucination for a poor, failing man, struggling with an impossible problem, and a mortal malady, seemed suddenly understood by me. I turned to her a face of questioning concern. Her eyes were still fixed upon the distant, pulsating sea.
”No,” she answered, half nonchalantly. ”I suppose not, and yet--why not!
I have only known this country; to cross the great ocean, to see the capital of the world, to learn the great wonders of its palaces and temples, to see its mult.i.tudes, to see the Queen. Ah! to see the Queen!”
Her hands folded tightly together across her brow, she looked the very embodiment of reverent expectation, and the blus.h.i.+ng roses on her cheeks, the lovelight in her eyes seemed to deepen for an instant, and then pale slightly, as she turned to me only to see me bury my head in my hands, holding back the cry of stifled hope that often before had leaped to my lips, but never had before so nearly pa.s.sed them.
”Oh, Bradford,” she cried, ”would you mind so much! I would soon be back again. And then, you know, this awful telegraphic work would be over, and we could be happy together without a thought of that cold, far-away Mars!”
We talked on together till the dusky night had begun to gather its shadows about us, and Mars, that marvellous spot of light from whose untouched continents the waves of magnetic oscillation might even then be starting on their pathless transit across the abyss of s.p.a.ce, destined for my ear, began to s.h.i.+ne above us.
It was clear to me now that Mr. Dodan had been carefully nursing in his daughter a desire to see England and the Queen, and her own little birthplace, and that he had formed a resolution to separate us, for his daughter's best interests, as he thought.
I suffered from a very proud, sensitive nature, perhaps unwholesomely intensified by the lonely life I had led, and a peculiar sense of my difference from other people.
This revelation, so unwelcome, so fraught with painful antic.i.p.ations, roused my pride to a sharp climax of revolt, disdain and defiance. Miss Dodan should go,--I should urge it. I would applaud and hasten it, there would be no weakness, no supplication, no obstacles on my part. Let death write his inerrant claim to me, let it be recognized; Mr. Dodan need not be disturbed as to my absolute self-control.
The very acerbity of my coming misery, through Miss Dodan's absence, fully realized by me, seemed now only to add a desperation of a.s.sumed indifference and gayety to all my actions. I argued against delay, and dwelt with excellent effect upon the charms of the visit. I a.s.sumed that Miss Dodan needed the change, that the educational value of such an experience would be incalculable.
Mr. Dodan was frankly surprised and pleased. This unexpected support and enthusiastic commendation of his plan was something he gratefully accepted, and he a.s.sumed a new manner toward me. He ascribed to me a power of self-renunciation which won his ardent approval and admiration.
The day was at last fixed. Miss Dodan, young, appreciative, and curious, was elated at the prospect of the voyage, and, momentarily, at least, forgot her first reluctance to desert me. The preparations were all completed. I need not dwell upon all the detail of that last week.
It was a cruel ordeal for me, but no one would have suspected my real anguish. I seemed the most thoughtful of all, the most naturally buoyant and hopeful for the success of the trip. I forgot nothing. The telegraph station was not, however, neglected. I watched at night, and during the hours of my absence my a.s.sistant was persistently present in the tower.
At last the steamer sailed away from the wharf at Port Littelton. The last moments I pa.s.sed alone with Miss Dodan were sacred, sweet memories; all that I have now.
Mr. and Mrs. Dodan and Miss Dodan were waving their handkerchiefs from the deck as I turned sorrowfully back to Christ Church. I realized that I had seen Miss Dodan for the last time, and that when she returned to New Zealand, she would only find me gone. There was but one duty now. To resume, if possible, the communications with my father, and prepare the story of my experience and discoveries, and leave it to the world.
I went back to the Observatory. I was again alone. A reaction of despondency overwhelmed me, and it was coincident with a hemorrhage, which left me weak and nervous. I resumed my watching at the station. I seemed to antic.i.p.ate a new message. I endured peculiar and excruciating excitement, a tense suspense of desire and prevision that deprived me of appet.i.te and sleep, and accelerated the ravages of the disease, that now, victorious over my weakened, nervous force, began the last stages of its devastating advance.
It was a clear, cold night of exquisite severity and beauty--May 20, 1894, that the third message came from my father. It was announced, as had been all the others, by the sudden response of the Morse receiver. A few nights before, grasping at a vague hope that I might again reach him with the magnetic waves at my command, I had launched into s.p.a.ce the single sentence: ”Await me! Death is very near.” The message that now startled my ears began with an exact answer to that trans-abysmal despatch:
”My son, the thought of your death fills me with happiness. Surely you will come to this wonderful and unspeakable world, you will see me again, and I you, but under such new circ.u.mstances! My heart yearns for you immeasurably. Come! Come quickly! To press you to my heart, to speak with you, to teach you the new things, and Oh! more than all, to bring you to your mother. For, Tony, she is found; my search is ended. I have discovered her whom the cruel mystery of Death on earth so sharply removed from us, in youth and radiance. I have not yet revealed myself.
The joy of antic.i.p.ation surpa.s.ses thought or words. I have hastened back from seeing her, whom to leave in this paradise imparts the one pang I have known in this new life, hastened again to the Hill of Observation that now looks on the cruel ruin, the emptiness of desolation, where once was the City of Scandor. Let me tell you all:
”When I sent you my last message I was at the Tower of Observation. As the last wave was emitted from the transmitter, the hand of Superintendent Alca, whom I met at the mines, was laid upon my shoulder.