CHAPTER VII

.*

She had arrived. She had trod on the flowers, like the Madonna who is going to perform a miracle; she had trod on a carpet of flowers. She had at last arrived! She had at last crossed the threshold!

And now, tired, happy, she presented to her lover's lips a face all bathed in tears, without speaking, with a gesture of inexpressible abandon. Tired, happy, she wept and smiled beneath the innumerable kisses of the adored one. What mattered the recollections of the days from which he had been absent? What mattered the miseries, the chagrins, the anxieties, the heart-breaking struggles against the inexorable brutalities of life? What mattered all the discouragements and all the despairs, in comparison with this supreme joy? She lived, she respired between her lover's arms; she felt herself infinitely loved. All else disappeared, returned to oblivion, seemed to have never existed.

"Oh, Hippolyte, Hippolyte! Oh, my soul! how much, how much I have longed for you! And here you are! And now, you will stay with me a long, long time, will you not? Before leaving me, you will kill me."

And he kissed her on the mouth, on the cheeks, on the neck, on the eyes, insatiable, profoundly thrilled every time he met a tear. Those tears, that smile, that expression of felicity on the tired-looking face, the thought that this woman had not hesitated for a second in consenting; the thought that she had come to him from a great distance, and that, after a fatiguing journey, she wept beneath his kisses, powerless to say a word because her heart was too full--all these passionate and delightful things refined his sensations, freed his desire from impurity, gave him an emotion of almost chaste love, exalted his soul.

Removing the long pin that fastened the hat and veil, he said:

"How tired you must be, my poor Hippolyte! You are very pale!"

Her veil was raised on her brow; she still had on her travelling cloak and her gloves. He removed the veil and hat, with a gesture that was customary with him. The beautiful brown head appeared, unencumbered, with that simple coiffure which made of the hair a sort of adherent helmet, without altering the delicate and elegant outline of the occiput, without hiding any of the nape of the neck.

She wore a gorget of white lace, and a narrow black velvet ribbon which was defined with exquisite violence against the whiteness of the skin. Under the cloak could be seen a gray cloth dress--the dress of the memorable Albano days. She spread around her a faint odor of violets, the familiar perfume.

George's lips became more ardent, and, as she used to say, more _voracious_. He checked himself; he removed her cloak; he helped her to remove her gloves; he took her bare hands and pressed them against his temples, in a mad desire to be caressed. And Hippolyte, holding him thus by the temples, drew him towards her, enveloped him in a long caress, passed over his entire face a mouth which, languishing and warm, crept along in a multiple kiss. George recognized the divine, the incomparable mouth, the mouth which, he had thought so often, felt as if it rested on the surface of his soul, for a voluptuousness which would surpass carnal sensibility and would communicate itself to an ultra-sensible element of the inner being.

"You will kill me," he murmured, vibrating like a bundle of stretched cords, feeling at the back of his neck a lancinating cold which, from vertebra to vertebra, was propagated through all the marrow.

And, at the bottom of himself, he noticed a vague movement of that instinctive terror which he had already observed under other circumstances.

Hippolyte disengaged herself.

"Now, I'll leave you," she said. "Where is--my room? Oh, George, how comfortable we shall be here."

She glanced around her, smiling. She made a few steps towards the threshold, stooped to gather a handful of furze, breathed in the perfume with visible sensual pleasure. She once more felt agitated, and as if intoxicated by this sovereign homage, by this fragrant glory which George had scattered along her path. Was she not dreaming? Was it she herself--was it really Hippolyte Sanzio who, in this unknown place, in this magic landscape, found herself surrounded and glorified by all this poesy?

Suddenly, with new tears in her eyes, she threw her arms around George's neck, and said:

"How grateful I am to you."

This poesy intoxicated her heart. She felt herself lifted above her humble existence by the ideal apotheosis which enveloped her lover; she felt that she lived another life, a superior life which at times gave to her soul that kind of choking sensation which a strong wind provokes in a breast accustomed to breathe an impoverished air.

"How proud I am to belong to you! You are my pride. One single minute passed near you suffices to make me feel another woman, absolutely other. You suddenly communicate to me another blood and another mind. I am no longer Hippolyte, the Hippolyte of yesterday. Give me a new name."

He named her:

"Soul!"

They fell into each other's arms in a furious embrace, as if to pluck and unroot the kisses which blossomed on their lips. Then Hippolyte disengaged herself, and repeated:

"Now, I'll leave you. Where's my room? Let me see it."

George passed an arm around her waist and led her into the bedroom. She gave a cry of admiration when she perceived the _thalamus thalamorum_, draped with a large yellow damask counterpane.

"But we shall get lost in it!"

And she laughed as she walked all round the monument.

"The most difficult thing will be to get into it."

"First, you'll place your foot upon my knee, in accordance with the old-time custom of the peasants in these parts."

"What a lot of saints!" she exclaimed, looking at the long line of pious images on the wall, at the head of the bed.

"They must be covered."

"Yes, you are right."

Both had difficulty in finding words; both their voices were changed in tone; both of them trembled, agitated by irresistible desire, feeling almost faint at the thought of the approaching ecstasies.

They heard someone knock at the door of the staircase. George went into the loggia. It was Helen, Candia's daughter; she came to say that luncheon was ready.

"What do you wish to do?" said George, turning toward Hippolyte, irresolute, almost convulsed.

"Really, George, I have not the least appetite. I will eat this evening, if you'll let me."

In an agonized voice, George said:

"Come into your room. Everything is ready for your bath. Come!"

He led her into a room which he had covered all over with large rustic mats.

"You see, your trunks and your boxes are already here. Now, I'll leave you--alone. Be quick. Remember, I'm waiting. Every minute's delay will be one torture more. Remember----"

He left her alone. A few moments later he heard the splashing of the water which ran from the enormous sponge and fell back again into the bath-tub. He knew the icy coldness of this spring water well, and he imagined the little starts of Hippolyte's body, that long and flexible body, beneath the refreshing shower.

Then there remained nothing in his mind than thoughts of fire. Everything about him disappeared. And, when the splashing stopped, he was seized by a trembling so strong that his teeth began to chatter, as if shivering from a mortal fever. With the terrible eyes of desire, he saw the woman disengage herself from her dressing-gown, already dried, pure, delicate as an alabaster with golden tones.

*