Page:A Leaf in the Storm.djvu/98

 thrown the sweet blossom and the harsh words at me, leaned over the old gray, moss-grown wall. The lilac boughs were all about her—above, beneath, around. Her golden head glistened in the sunlight. She had a knot of lilacs in her breast.

Can I describe her? No: think of the woman who to you, above all others of her sex, has meant—Love.

She was but a young girl of the people, the orphan daughter of a poor wood-carver, simply clad in the garb of her province, spending a momentary rest from her daily labour in leaning over the old garden wall to watch the strange strollers pass by with pipe and beat of drum; but to me she became the world.

It is so strange! We see a million faces, we hear a million voices, we meet a million women with flowers in their breasts and light in their fair eyes, and they do not touch us. Then we see one, and she holds for us life or death, and plays with them idly so often—as idly as a child with toys. She is not nobler, better or more beautiful than were all those we passed, and yet the world is empty to us without her.

I went on up the street. I held the bough of lilac in my hand.

Yes: this bough, poor faded, scentless thing!