Part 23 (1/2)
”This is a drawing of her made by myself,” he said. ”It was done from memory, but is a good likeness. I needed no sitting to make her likeness.”
When he had shown Mr. Graham the picture, he hung it back in its place and a gentle hush fell upon the little group. Speech seemed out of place after the moving recital and the four sat gazing into the embers, each sunk in his or her own dreams.
The poet was the first to speak.
”Some music Sissy,” he said turning to Virginia. ”I want Mr. Graham to hear you.”
She arose at once and seating herself at the harp, struck some soft, bell-like chords while she waited for ”Buddie” to decide what she should sing.
”Let it be something sweet and low,” he said, ”and simple. Something of Tom Moore's, for instance. You know my theory, anything but the simplest music to be appreciated--to reach the soul--must be heard alone.”
The harp accompaniment rippled forth, and in a moment more melted into the rich, sweet pa.s.sionate tones of her voice as she told in musical numbers a heart-breaking story of love and parting.
Ballad after ballad followed while the little audience sat entranced.
Finally when the singer returned to her seat by the side of her husband, the conversation turned upon music. Mr. Graham commented upon his host's theory that all music but the simplest should, for its best effect, be listened to in solitude.
”Yes,” said The Dreamer, ”It is (like the happiness felt in the contemplation of natural scenery) much enhanced by seclusion. The man who would behold aright the glory of G.o.d as expressed in dark valleys, gray rocks, waters that silently smile and forests that sigh in uneasy slumbers, and the proud, watchful mountains that look down upon all--the man that would not only look upon these with his natural eye but feed his soul upon them as a sacrament, must do so in solitude. And so too, I hold, should one listen to the deep harmonies of music of the highest cla.s.s.”
At length the hour came when Mr. Graham felt that he must tear himself away--bring this strange visit to an end. Before going he felt moved by an impulse to express something of the effect it had had upon him.
”Mr. Poe,” he said, ”I wish to thank you for one of the most delightful evenings of my life and for having taken me into the heart of your home.
I can find no words in which to express my appreciation. Tonight, at your fireside, it seems to me that I have had for the first time in my life a clear understanding of the word happiness.”
Edgar Poe smiled, dreamily.
”Why should we not be happy here?” he answered. ”Concerning happiness, my dear Mr. Graham, I have a little creed of my own. If I could only persuade others to adopt it there would be more happy people--far more contented ones--in the world.”
”And the articles of your creed?” queried Mr. Graham.
”Are only four. First, free exercise in the open air, and plenty of it.
This brings health--which is a kind of happiness in itself--that attainable by any other means is scarcely worth the name. Second, love of woman. I need not tell you that my life fulfils that condition.” (As he spoke, his eyes, with an expression of ineffable tenderness, wandered for a moment--and it seemed involuntarily--in the direction of his wife). ”The third condition is contempt for ambition. Would that I could tell you that I have attained to that! When I do, there will be little in this world to be desired by me. The fourth and last is an object of unceasing pursuit. This is the most important of all, for I believe that the extent of one's happiness is in proportion to the spirituality of this object. In this I am especially fortunate, for no more elevating pursuit exists, I think, than that of systematically endeavoring to bring to its highest perfection the art of literature.”
”I notice you do not mention money in your creed,” remarked his guest.
”No, neither do I mention air. Both the one and the other are essential to life, and to the keeping together of body and soul. It goes without saying that the necessities of life are necessary to happiness. But money--meaning wealth--while it makes indulgence in pleasures possible, has nothing to do with happiness. Indeed the very pleasure it ensures often obscure highest happiness--the happiness of exaltation of the soul, of exercise of the intellect. What has money to do with happiness?
It is a happiness to wonder--it is a happiness to dream. Your over-fed, jewel-decked, pleasure-drunk rich man or woman is too deeply embedded in flesh and sense to do either. No”--he mused, his eyes on the glowing coals in the grate, ”No--I have no desire for wealth--for more than enough money to keep my wife and mother comfortable. They, like myself, have learned the lesson of being poor and happy. But I _must_ keep them above want--I _will_ keep them above want!” As he repeated the words the meditative mood dropped from him. He straightened himself in his chair with sudden energy, his voice trembled and sunk almost to a whisper, in place of the dreamy look his eyes flamed with pa.s.sion.
”Mr. Graham,” he exclaimed, ”to see those you love better than your own soul in want, and, in spite of working like mad, to be powerless to raise them out of it, is h.e.l.l!”
A second time the exquisite child-wife slipped quickly, noiselessly, to his side and with the same easy grace leaned over and touched his brow with her lips, but this time instead of moving away, remained hanging over the back of his chair, her fair hand gently toying with the ringlets on his brow. He was calm in an instant.
”I mean, of course, such a condition would be intolerable provided it should ever exist,” he added.
As the visitor stepped from the cottage door into the chill of the bright November night, and made his way down the little path of flagstones--irregularly shaped and clumsily laid down, so that mossy turf which was still green, appeared between them--he felt that he was stepping back into a flat, stale and unprofitable world from one of the enchanted regions, ”out of s.p.a.ce, out of time,” of Poe's own creation.
He had indeed, had a revelation of harmonious home-life such as he had not guessed existed in a work-a-day world--of the music, the poetry of living. He had had a glimpse into the Valley of the Many-Colored Gra.s.s.