Home Again Part 5

Walter had, just then, for the first time published a thing of his own.

That it should have arrested the eye of this lovely creature! He acknowledged that he had printed a trifle in "The Observatory."

"I was _charmed_ with it!" said the girl, the word charmingly drawled.

"The merest trifle!" remarked Walter. "It cost me nothing."

He meant what he said, unwilling to be judged by such a slight thing.

"That is the beauty of it!" she answered. "Your song left your soul as the thrush's leaves his throat. Should we prize the thrush's more if we came upon him practicing it?"

Walter laughed.

"But we are not meant to sing like the birds!"

"That you could write such a song without effort, shows you to possess the bird-gift of spontaneity."

Walter was surprised at her talk, and willing to believe it profound.

"The will and the deed in one may be the highest art!" he said. "I hardly know."

"May I write music to it?" asked Lady Lufa, with upward glance, sweet smile, and gently apologetic look.

"I am delighted you should think of doing so. It is more than it deserves!" answered Walter. "My only condition is, that you will let me hear it."

"That you have a right to. Besides, I dared not publish it without knowing you liked it."

"Thank you so much! To hear you sing it will let me know at once whether the song itself be genuine."

"No, no! I may fail in my part, and yours be all I take it to be. But I shall not fail. It holds me too fast for that!"

"Then I may hope for a summons?" said Walter, rising.

"Before long. One can not order the mood, you know!"

CHAPTER X.

THE ROUND OF THE WORLD.

Birds when they leave the nest carry, I presume, their hearts with them; not a few humans leave their hearts behind them--too often, alas! to be sent for afterward. The whole round of the world, many a cloud-rack on the ridge of it, and many a mist on the top of that, rises between them and the eyes and hearts which gave their very life that they might live.

Some as they approach middle age, some only when they are old, wake up to understand that they have parents. To some the perception comes with their children; to others with the pang of seeing them walk away light-hearted out into the world, as they themselves turned their backs on their parents: they had been all their own, and now they have done with them! Less or more, have we not all thus taken our journey into a far country? But many a man of sixty is more of a son to the father gone from the earth, than he was while under his roof. What a disintegrated ma.s.s were the world, what a lump of half-baked brick, if death were indeed the end of affection! if there were no chance more of setting right what was so wrong in the loveliest relations! How gladly would many a son who once thought it a weariness to serve his parents, minister now to their lightest need! and in the boundless eternity is there no help?

Walter was not a prodigal; he was a well-behaved youth. He was _only_ proud, _only_ thought much of himself; was _only_ pharisaical, not hypocritical; was _only_ neglectful of those nearest him, always polite to those comparatively nothing to him! Compa.s.sionate and generous to necessity, he let his father and his sister-cousin starve for the only real food a man can give, that is, _himself_. As to him who thought his very thoughts into him, he heeded him not at all, or mocked him by merest ceremony. There are who refuse G.o.d the draught of water He desires, on the ground that their vessel is not fit for Him to drink from: Walter thought his too good to fill with the water fit for G.o.d to drink.

He had the feeling, far from worded, not even formed, but certainly in him, that he was a superior man to his father. But it is a fundamental necessity of the kingdom of heaven, impossible as it must seem to all outside it, that each shall count other better than himself; it is the natural condition of the man G.o.d made, in relation to the other men G.o.d has made. Man is made, not to contemplate himself, but to behold in others the beauty of the Father. A man who lives to meditate upon and wors.h.i.+p himself, is in the slime of h.e.l.l. Walter knew his father a reading man, but because he had not been to a university, placed no value on his reading. Yet this father was a man who had intercourse with high countries, intercourse in which his son would not have perceived the presence of an idea.

In like manner, Richard's carriage of mind, and the expression of the same in his modes and behavior, must have been far other than objectionable to the ushers of those high countries; his was a certain quiet, simply, direct way, reminding one of Nathanael, in whom was no guile. In another man Walter would have called it bucolic; in his father he shut his eyes to it as well as he could, and was ashamed of it. He would scarcely, in his circle, be regarded as a gentleman! he would look odd! He therefore had not encouraged the idea of his coming to see him.

He was not satisfied with the father by whom the Father of fathers had sent him into the world! But Richard was the truest of gentlemen even in his outward carriage, for he was not only courteous and humble, but that rare thing--natural; and the natural, be it old as the Greek, must be beautiful. The natural dwells deep, and is not the careless, any more than the studied or a.s.sumed.

Walter loved his father, but the root of his love did not go deep enough to send aloft a fine flower: deep in is high out. He seldom wrote, and wrote briefly. He did not make a confidant of his father. He did not even tell him what he was doing, or what he hoped to do. He might mention a success, but of hopes, fears, aspirations, or defeats, or thoughts or desires, he said nothing. As to his theories, he never imagined his father entering into such things as occupied _his_ mind!

The ordinary young man takes it for granted that he and the world are far ahead of "the governor;" the father may have left behind him, as nebulae sinking below the horizon of youth, questions the world is but just waking to put.

The blame, however, may lie in part at the parent's door. The hearts of the fathers need turning to the children, as much as the hearts of the children need turning to the fathers. Few men open up to their children; and where a man does not, the schism, the separation begins with him, for all his love be deep and true. That it is unmanly to show one's feelings, is a superst.i.tion prevalent with all English-speaking people.

Now, wherever feeling means weakness, falsehood, or excitement, it ought not merely not be shown, but not to exist; but for a man to hide from his son his loving and his loathing, is to refuse him the divinest fas.h.i.+on of teaching. Richard read the best things, and loved best the best writers: never once had he read a poem with his son, or talked to him about any poet! If Walter had even suspected his father's insight into certain things, he would have loved him more. Closely bound as they were, neither knew the other. Each would have been astonished at what he might have found in the other. The father might have discovered many handles by which to lay hold of his son; the son might have seen the lamp bright in his father's chamber which he was but tr.i.m.m.i.n.g in his.

CHAPTER XI.

THE SONG.

AT length came the summons from Lady Lufa to hear her music to his verses.

It was not much of a song, neither did he think it was.

Mist and vapor and cloud Filled the earth and the air!

My heart was wrapt in a shroud.

And death was everywhere.

The sun went silently down To his rest in the unseen wave; But my heart, in its purple and crown.

Lay already in its grave.

For a cloud had darkened the brow Of the lady who is my queen; I had been a monarch, but now All things had only been!

I sprung from the couch of death: Who called my soul? Who spake?

No sound! no answer! no breath!

Yet my soul was wide awake!

And my heart began to blunder Into rhythmic pulse the while; I turned--away was the wonder-- My queen had begun to smile!

Outbrake the sun in the west!

Outlaughed the crested sea!

And my heart was alive in my breast With light, and love, and thee!

There was a little music in the verses, and they had a meaning--though not a very new or valuable one.

He went in the morning--the real, not the conventional--and was shown into the drawing-room, his heart beating with expectation. Lady Lufa was alone, and already at the piano. She was in a gray stuff with red rosebuds, and looked as simple as any country parson's daughter. She gave him no greeting beyond a little nod, at once struck a chord or two, and began to sing.

Walter was charmed. The singing, and the song through the singing, altogether exceeded his expectation. He had feared he should not be able to laud heartily, for he had not lost his desire to be truthful--but she was an artist! There was indeed nothing original in her music; it was mainly a reconstruction of common phrases afloat in the musical atmosphere; but she managed the slight dramatic element in the lyric with taste and skill, following tone and sentiment with chord and inflection; so that the music was worthy of the verses--which is not saying very much for either; while the expression the girl threw into the song went to the heart of the youth, and made him foolish.

She ceased; he was silent for a moment, then fervent in thanks and admiration.

"The verses are mine no more," he said. "I shall care for them now!"