CHAPTER TWELVE

They spent the next few days wandering about on foot, driving to this place and that, taking a boat and sailing upon the waters of the Ægean Sea. Hitherto they had known each other only from afar; now they studied one another close at hand. How contrasted were their temperaments! Their lives had run along such different paths of experience, and yet their intellectual and instinctive sympathies bridged the gulf that might otherwise have yawned between them. Scherer had escaped from the northern winter and from his professional duties. Now the companionship of this young woman was to confirm his first impression of her. She interested him, she was prolific of ideas, she was productive in her work; and yet it seemed to him that the woman in her was again slipping through his fingers, and that all he had beside him was a trusty friend. Diana, whose doubts of him had been laid to rest as soon as he had resumed his ordinary poise, was eager to discover all she could of this man whose brain was a match for hers, and whose knowledge of the world was far superior.

When, four days later, they met by appointment in the museum to look at the Mycenean relics, he seemed pleasurably excited. Drawing a telegram from his pocket, he handed it to Diana, saying:

"Something to cheer you up!"

She read: "Winterthur to succeed Münsterberg. Linnartz to go. Foreign secretary probably retiring."

"A voice from the tomb," murmured Diana, as she gave the slip of paper back to him. "Maybe this is the modern equivalent of the old-fashioned ghost, the way to make your influence felt after death! These people of an age long past took gold with them into the grave, and we of a later generation stand looking at them as they lie in their glass cases. This cup with the running lions carved upon it speaks to us of the spirit of Agamemnon. And look at this one, and this, are they not perfect?"

They examined the treasures in the glass cases for a while; a dagger, a pot, a ring. Then, quite suddenly, Diana exclaimed:

"Linnartz to go!? They should have strung him up to the first lamp-post that came handy!"

Scherer smiled as he answered, mimicking Linnartz's voice and manner:

"Throughout he assumed an absolutely unprejudiced attitude, and deserves a good mark against his name in the State archives."

Diana resumed her study of the contents of the glass cases in silence. After a while they passed out of that room and into the one where the coffins are preserved. She had become very quiet, as if she were no longer aware of Scherer's presence. Then she noticed that his attention was concentrated upon one tomb in particular. He stood contemplating it for many minutes. A naked youth, life size, was depicted on it, in very low relief. Leaping towards him was a greyhound. Beneath, was carved the Greek word: Χαϊρε!--Scherer knew what was in Diana's thoughts.

That evening as they were dining at his hotel, the tumult from the streets came to them through the open windows. Carnival frolics were in full swing. The sound of flutes, rattles, mandolins, and drums, mixed with the patter of many feet, filled the wide square. There were calls and screams, snatches of music and laughter. Like fireflies on a summer evening in the north, little Japanese lanterns flickered and fluttered by in the gloaming. But away there beyond the noise and the bustle, rose the flat-topped hill crowned with the silent, stately pile of the Acropolis, still glowing faintly in the light of the western sky. The scent of the orange blossom was wafted to them from the royal gardens, to mingle with all the other springtime perfumes within the room and without.

Scherer's fancy endowed his companion with magic arts, and he felt as if bewitched with a circle of her making. She had a long Venetian shawl wrapped round her shoulders, a garment she dearly loved. The lamp shone softly down upon her bare head, and Scherer was struck with the difference in her looks tonight from what he remembered of her as she had sat that evening nine months ago on the terrace of his home in her pale lilac silk frock. He was amazed at her faculty for changing her appearance, of becoming, as it were, a different woman, adapted to different moods and circumstances. The barriers he had so carefully set up around him were being broken down one by one as his interest and curiosity were aroused. A tone of subdued excitement was in his voice as he spoke.

"On the way here, I kept on thinking that in this land at least you should adopt the Greek form of your name, and call yourself Artemis. Yet now it seems to me that Cassandra would be a more fitting appellation, and that I should be awaiting your oracle."

"Just listen to the way that merry throng is responding to your rhetoric," laughed Diana. "Little drum-taps such as the god will call for when he is in a good humour, and before he has lost his head. Lanterns swaying joyously over the heads of the merrymakers, who are laughing and singing as if Death were dead and everlasting life were the key to happiness!"

"Do you want to die?" asked Scherer, calmly.

She raised her arms slightly, so that the black folds of the shawl fell apart, disclosing the delicate tint of her bare neck.

"Why do you ask?" she said reservedly but without any coldness in her voice. "Had I wished to do so, should I not already have gone from this life, now, when a part of my very self has slipped from my hands and vanished into the night of darkness? Yes, I loved Count Münsterberg, and the baron's lies are in essence truths far greater than he can have any idea of, for it was on my account that Gregor died. I felt all along that the affair must come to a violent end. Only I did not know who the victim would be. In any case our friendship would have had to cease as soon as the poet or the countess decided to go away. It might very well have turned out that I was to be the victim. But fate struck him...."

She sighed, caught in the toils of pain renewed, her eyes lowered on to the table. Then she turned towards the square and looked at the medley of masqueraders below. Her voice was steady when she resumed:

"And we three go on living, all three of us, who mourn his death. I, who was the greatest loser, do I not sit here at dinner with you, feel the scent of flowers around me, wear a nosegay of violets at my breast, listen to the joyous calls of the Athenian youth, just as if nothing unusual had happened? We are enmeshed in the web of life; don't you feel it too? And since I am thus enmeshed I do not choose to die before I have experienced all there is to experience. To taste of everything just once--in order to be able to despise everything."

She flung the last words across the table to him, a note of challenge in her voice. But he had long since known that she despised possessions and wealth. Nevertheless he picked up the gauntlet she had thus thrown down, for he was resolved to make his request, now, fearlessly and without ambiguity. Yet when the moment came to put the question in cold blood, his heart failed him; his intellect took command, and all he was able to say was:

"So much striving after harmony and yet so great disquietude! Need one really experience everything in actual reality? You, who are a student of Plato, is it possible that you should not have recognized what I fully recognized when I decided to confine my activities in life to the narrow circle of my present occupations--narrow, for all the outer world may think to the contrary? You who have gained in a few years a knowledge of the world which others take many decades to acquire, can afford to break away from your present way of living. And I urge you: give it up now. Concentrate your activities, instead of scattering them to the four winds. Try to possess yourself of yourself. Make your life secure and safe; do this hand in hand with me, as mistress of my house, which you once were kind enough to praise. I came to Athens for no other purpose than to ask you to be my wife."

With a sudden inspiration, he took up the orange he had peeled, divided it in half, and handed one portion over the table to Diana. Moved by his impassioned speech, she reached towards the fruit, and as she did so she met his eyes fixed on her with an expression of infinite longing, most unusual in a man accustomed to command.

"I accept the half," she said, unflinchingly, as she kept her eyes on his, "for I feel that you are my friend.--You said well. Harmony. It might be thought a rather venturesome word to utter in this place and at this time. Yet over there, on the hill of the gods, which the night has now swallowed up so that I can no longer see it as background to your silhouette; over there, harmony watches over the present, harmony in its everlasting embodiment. But I am not a column, or a structure of stone, or, even, a tree. You have created for yourself a world of security wherein you may dwell in peace and harmony; I love life precisely because of its insecurity, and, because of this love of mine, I have no fear of death. You with your clear vision, have you not noticed that I have no roots? Did I not hear you say--I am so fond of your voice, it rings true--did I not hear you say my name that evening on the terrace of your home as if you understood all its implications? And again, when you were coming down here to see me, you thought of me as Artemis. I am for the chase, for a lifelong chase through the world. Even if I do strive after harmony, I must have freedom all around me. Would you ever grant freedom to your wife? Every freedom, even to the ultimate, the freest of freedoms?--Have I lost you now by my refusal? Please, please, do not deprive me of your confidence, you who came to recognize what I was, and what my worth. Please--shake hands...."

He set the half of the orange on the table and took her outstretched hand. He held it for a moment, but did not kiss it.

Towards midnight she prepared to go back to her hotel. He begged to be allowed to drive to Phaleron with her. The carriage could only move along at a foot's pace, so densely packed were the streets with revellers. Even now, the air was full of confetti, and flowers long since withered were thrown aloft with jubilant cries. As they neared the outskirts of the town, the crowd gradually thinned, and the going was better. The sweet air was blowing from the sea. They had both lapsed into a mood of quiet contemplation, and it was with a faraway smile that Scherer shook some confetti out of her shawl. He, as a northerner unused to southern exuberance, had been more bewildered by the noise and commotion than she, and the heavy southern wine flowed sluggishly through his veins. His mind was clouded, and in vain did he try to fill the great black void which her answer had dug in his very heart. The little act of flicking the confetti from the folds of her wrap was no more than a pretext; he wanted to be nearer to her, and yet was fearful lest by some rash move he might spoil his chances for ever.

With the knowledge of an experienced woman, Diana knew the struggle that was going on within him, and was cogitating as to the best way to meet him. Since Gregor's death her senses were benumbed. Never in her life had she been so free from all sensual desire, especially in the springtime of the year. Scherer took her hand in his, slowly unbuttoned her glove, and suddenly bowed his dark head over the back of the hand he held, covering it with kisses.

"I am lonely," he said disjointedly. "Won't you--join me--?"

Looking down at him, she murmured:

"You want a faithful and devoted wife, and children in your home. I need freedom."

His passionate desire grew as the conviction was forced upon him that he pleaded in vain. Instinct took possession, while intellect went to sleep in the warm and fragrant night. He seized her hand, her arm, and said:

"Diana! I would have given my life..."

She felt him pressing against her shoulder, and realized how shaken he was, how his whole spirit bent beneath the emotional stresses of this hour. Even more, she knew that now he was asking her to accept no more than what a hundred other women would have accepted on the terms, and she recalled the honourable proposals with which he had at first pressed his suit, in spite of the facts he knew about her previous life. Again she felt, as in days gone by, that there inevitably comes a moment when the platonic affection between man and woman breaks down before the onslaught of human instincts.

They had passed the sea-front, had driven along the quay, and were now coming to the lighted streets again, to houses, and at any minute might be crossing the path of other vehicles. She made him sit up and begged him to compose himself. As they drew near her hotel, she took him kindly by the hand.

"Try to--pull yourself together--go back and have a good sleep...."

They drew up. He sprang out and helped her to alight, hardly touching her in the process. Then he asked in as matter-of-fact tones as he could muster:

"And tomorrow?"

She stood pensive for a second, then said gaily:

"Tomorrow? Weren't we going to Salamis tomorrow?"