Page:The Californian volume 1 issue 1.djvu/8

12 in the theatre, watching the ground and lofty tumbling, until the crowd and noise and bad air forced us to leave, when as I came out last of our party I nearly fell over him.

“Tong-ko-lin-sing !”

“Why all this trouble for a woman?” he asked, gravely. “Women are plenty, for to be- come one is a future punishment of ours for sin when men. I have seen her with you; she wore the tiger’s-claw jewelry you got through me. Like most American women she would not make a ‘mother of Meng,’ our wise woman, who has passed into a proverb. Then she wore black, which is ill luck for body and mind.”

Nothing could have better set off Elinor’s golden hair and fresh daisy-bloom than the soft laces and black velvet she had so often worn beside me at concert or play. I could almost see her again with me at the thought. I drew a deep sigh. “Where is Si-ki?” I cried, mak- ing a vain clutch at Tong-ko-lin-sing’s sleeve. But the others had turned back for me, and my Chinese teacher’s jacket and cap of black astrakhan fur soon melted into the darkness of some too near alley. Had he followed us all day from mere curiosity, or could he help us? We went to his door, but knocked in vain, though we all saw a line of light under his door as we went up-stairs, not there when we came down. Disheartened, we went home. Elinor had not changed. We could not try to sleep, but sat in my room.

“I wish,” said Brande, “you looked as full of life and joy as you did the last time I saw you come home with Miss Elinor.”

“O Noel!” I cried, “if I could but live over that last happy day, when to see her by me was thrilling as music, when to breathe the same air was exciting as wine!”

“Like Socrates under the plane-tree,” he mused, “‘borne away by a divine impression coming from this lovely place.’”

“Yes,” I said; “life was all changed, my soul was no more pent by bodily bounds, my eyes saw everything by an inner light which made all fair.”

“That reminds me,” said he, “of some verses about the picture over Miss Elinor’s piano.”

He searched his note-book, found, and read:

“Spirits in prison,’” said I; “where do you think they go when first set free?—to another world, or to the dearest friend in this?”

“That would depend,” he answered, “upon the kind of spirit that goes. One like Miss Elinor now—”

“Do not speak of’ her death;” I cried; “though I have thought before that you did not like her.”

“No,” said he, “I do not, but with no reason. It is a mere feeling that repels, and did at first sight, lovely as she is. I need not speak of her death to say that her spirit is one that would—”

I started. Elinor had come in at the door behind him, and stood looking at me, making a sign of caution as if she did not wish Brande to know of her presence. What had brought her to my room? She looked very shadowy in sweeping, misty robes and floating hair. Perhaps she was not in her right mind. I was sorely vexed to have Brande see her come to me. I had even wild thoughts of blindfolding him, while she should have time to flee.

- “What is it?” he asked. “You look as if you saw a ghost.”

“Nothing,” I faltered. While I wondered what was best to do, she looked anxiously at me, and made motions toward Brande as if I meant to do him mortal harm, as if warning me back from a crime. Such strange movements perplexed me, so that, seeing my absorbed gaze, Brande looked behind him.

“What do you see?” he cried, as he turned, and to my horror added, “there is nothing here!”

Had he gone mad or had I?

“Don’t you see her?” I gasped, hardly able to get on my feet, for a sinking at my heart seemed to root me to my chair.