Page:Avon Fantasy Reader 11 (1949).pdf/25

 girls with almond eyes, sleek black hair and vivid lips. Their gowns were silken and of every shade and hue, as soft as though they had been fashioned of moonbeams or flower petals. Flower petals they resembled in the manner in which they clove to the gorgeous golden bodies of the girls.

Kwoh Fan spoke English perfectly without the slightest suggestion of an accent, pronouncing each word distinctly as though it were a lovely jewel. His eyes were sombre languid, brooding, which was fitting; for he was a philosopher whose fame had spread throughout the length and breadth of China. In Mongolia, Manchuria and even into far Tibet and Nepal the Kwoh Fan legend was whispered unto little children. Some had it that he conversed with dragons, others that he disported with foxes in the moonlight, while again it was told how he climbed up the clouds in the evenings. Now as they sat sipping jasmine-scented tea, Coutts Cummings studied his host reflectively. At Peking he had heard the Kwoh Fan legend, though at Peking it had not been so fantastically distorted. According to the story there related, Kwoh Fan was a worshipper of all that was beautiful, of a dew-drenched blossom, of a glowing green emerald, or the pungent yellow body of an exquisite maiden. Kwoh Fan was intoxicated by loveliness. He tried to steep himself in it. Through loveliness he endeavored to banish everything harsh and sordid from his life. Fortunately he was immensely wealthy so he could afford to be eccentric in his enthusiasms. His palace was a veritable poem of soft tones and harmonies.

“For variation,” said Kwoh Fan, “a cup of pearl-orchid scented tea and I will be content.”

A girl brought him the tea as he spoke. He sighed softly as the tips of his fingers lightly touched her hand.

“Life itself,” he meditated, “in its fullest sense is naught but a flower.”

He quaffed languidly at his tea. “The tragedy of existence,” he continued, “is that few of us ever realize the attainment of one perfect hour until it has passed. Each of us has an allotment of one perfect hour, one perfect hour in an entire life. It is the memory of that hour which makes the balance of life worth living. Memory is best preserved in sweet perfume. Perfume and light are the only two things in the Universe comparable to color. The three are interchangeable, collectively making that divine thing—perfection. No flower is ever lost that once has bloomed, nor can a perfume ever vanish that has been breathed into the air. Perfumes can absorb pictures to smallest details. Not infrequently a piquant perfume floating to one's nostrils recalls the exotic vision of some beloved woman. One of your poets, Baudelaire, I believe, has fashioned this truth into verse that is lyrically beautiful. Lavender makes one think of old English ladies creeping softly through the ancient halls of gabled houses. Aloeswood brings poignantly to mind Oriental princesses. The bazaars of every country have their own particular odors. And in those odors are preserved pictures of the incidents and occurrences that have emerged from embryo there. Perfume possesses more divinity than any religion or any creed.”

Kwoh Fan rose abruptly to his feet.

“If you wish,” he said impulsively, “I will take you to a room like unto 23