I stood up and looked. The sun was near the horizon now, and partially concealed by low clouds, which were beginning to form--gray, and tinged with purple and red; but their misty edges burned with an intense yellow flame. Above, the sky was clear as blue gla.s.s, barred with pale-yellow rays, shot forth by the sinking sun, and resembling the spokes of an immense celestial wheel reaching to the zenith. The billowy earth, with its forests in deep green and many-colored, autumnal foliage, stretched far before us, here in shadow, and there flushed with rich light; while the mountain range, looming near and stupendous on our right, had changed its color from dark blue to violet.

The doubts and fears agitating my heart made me indifferent to the surpa.s.sing beauty of the scene: I turned impatiently from it to gaze again on her graceful figure, girlish still in its slim proportions; but her face, flushed with sunlight, and crowned with its dark, shining hair, seemed to me like the face of one of the immortals. The expression of rapt devotion on it made me silent, for it seemed as if she too had been touched by nature's magic, like earth and sky, and been transfigured; and waiting for the mood to pa.s.s, I stood by her side, resting my hand on her knee. By-and-by she looked down and smiled, and then I returned to the subject of her age.

"Surely, Yoletta," said I, "you were only poking fun at me--I mean, amusing yourself at my expense. You can't possibly be more than about fifteen, or sixteen at the very outside."

She smiled again and shook her head.

"Oh, I know, I can solve the riddle now. Your years are different, of course, like everything else in this lat.i.tude. A month is called a year with you, and that would make you, let me see--how much is twelve times thirty-one? Oh, hang it, nearly five hundred, I should think. Why am I such a duffer at mental arithmetic! It is just the contrary--how many twelves in thirty-one? About two and a half in round numbers, and that's absurd, as you are not a baby. Oh, I have it: your seasons are called years, of course--why didn't I see it before! No, that would make you only seven and a half. Ah, yes, I see it now: a year means two years, or two of your years--summer and winter--mean a year; and that just makes you sixteen, exactly what I had imagined. Is it not so, Yoletta?"

"I do not know what you are talking about, Smith; and I am not listening."

"Well, listen for one moment, and tell me how long does a year last?"

"It lasts from the time the leaves fall in the autumn until they fall again; and it lasts from the time the swallows come in spring until they come again."

"And seriously, honestly, you are thirty-one years old?"

"Did I not tell you so? Yes, I am thirty-one years old."

"Well, I never heard anything to equal this! Good heavens, what does it mean? I know it is awfully rude to inquire a lady's age, but what am I to do? Will you kindly tell me Edra's age?"

"Edra? I forget. Oh yes; she is sixty-three."

"Sixty-three! I'll be shot if she's a day more than twenty-eight! Idiot that I am, why can't I keep calm! But, Yoletta, how you distress me! It almost frightens me to ask another question, but do tell me how old your father is?"

"He is nearly two hundred years old--a hundred and ninety-eight, I think," she replied.

"Heavens on earth--I shall go stark, staring mad!" But I could say no more; leaving her side I sat down on a low stone at some distance, with a stunned feeling in my brain, and something like despair in my heart.

That she had told me the truth I could no longer doubt for one moment: it was impossible for her crystal nature to be anything but truthful.

The number of her years mattered nothing to me; the virgin sweetness of girlhood was on her lips, the freshness and glory of early youth on her forehead; the misery was that she had lived thirty-one years in the world and did not understand the words I had spoken to her--did not know what love, or pa.s.sion, was! Would it always be so--would my heart consume itself to ashes, and kindle no fire in hers?

Then, as I sat there, filled with these despairing thoughts, she came down from her perch, and, dropping on her knees before me, put her arms about my neck and gazed steadily into my face. "Why are you troubled, Smith-have I said anything to hurt you?" said she. "And do you not know that you have offended me?"

"Have I? Tell me how, dearest Yoletta."

"By asking questions, and saying wild, meaningless things while I sat there watching the setting sun. It troubled me and spoiled my pleasure; but I will forgive you, Smith, because I love you. Do you not think I love you enough? You are very dear to me--dearer every day." And drawing down my face she kissed my lips.

"Darling, you make me happy again," I returned, "for if your love increases every day, the time will perhaps come when you will understand me, and be all I wish to me."

"What is it that you wish?" she questioned.

"That you should be mine--mine alone, wholly mine--and give yourself to me, body and soul."

She continued gazing up into my eyes. "In a sense we do, I suppose, give ourselves, body and soul, to those we love," she said. "And if you are not yet satisfied that I have given myself to you in that way, you must wait patiently, saying and doing nothing willfully to alienate my heart, until the time arrives when my love will be equal to your desire. Come,"

she added, and, rising, pulled me up by the hand.

Silently, and somewhat pensively, we started hand in hand on our walk down the hill. Presently she dropped on her knees, and opening the gra.s.s with her hands, displayed a small, slender bud, on a round, smooth stem, springing without leaves from the soil. "Do you see!" she said, looking up at me with a bright smile.

"Yes, dear, I see a bud; but I do not know anything more about it."

"Oh, Smith, do you not know that it is a rainbow lily!" And rising, she took my hand and walked on again.

"What is the rainbow lily?"

"By-and-by, in a few days, it will be in fullest bloom, and the earth will be covered with its glory."

"It is so late in the season, Yoletta! Spring is the time to see the earth covered with the glory of flowers."

"There is nothing to equal the rainbow lily, which comes when most flowers are dead, or have their bright colors tarnished. Have you lived in the moon, Smith, that I have to tell you these things?"

"No, dear, but in that island where all things, including flowers, were different."

"Ah, yes; tell me about the island."

Now "that island" was an unfortunate subject, and I was not prepared to break the resolution I had made of prudently holding my tongue about its peculiar inst.i.tutions. "How can I tell you?--how could you imagine it if I were to tell you?" I said, evading the question. "You have seen the heavens black with tempests, and have felt the lightnings blinding your eyes, and have heard the crash of the thunder: could you imagine all that if you had never witnessed it, and I described it to you?"

"No."

"Then it would be useless to tell you. And now tell me about the rainbow lilies, for I am a great lover of flowers."

"Are you? Is it strange you should have a taste common to all human beings?" she returned with a pretty smile. "But it is easier to ask questions than to answer them. If you had never seen the sun setting in glory, or the midnight sky shining with myriads of stars, could you imagine these things if I described them to you?"

"No."

"That word is an echo, Smith. You must wait for the earth to bring forth her rainbow lilies, and the heart its love."

"With or without flowers, the world is a paradise to me, with you at my side, Yoletta. Ah, if you will be my Eve! How sweet it is to walk hand in hand with you in the twilight; but it was not so nice when you were scuttling from me like a wild rabbit. I'm glad to find that you do walk sometimes."

"Yes, sometimes--on solemn occasions."

"Yes? Tell me about these solemn occasions."

"This is not one of them," she replied, suddenly withdrawing her hand from mine; then with a ringing laugh, she sped from me, bounding down the hill-side with the speed and grace of a gazelle.

I instantly gave chase; but it was a very vain chase, although I put forth all my powers. Occasionally she would drop on her knees to admire some wild flower, or search for a lily bud; and whenever she came to a large stone, she would spring on to it, and stand for some time motionless, gazing at the rich hues of the afterglow; but always at my approach she would spring lightly away, escaping from me as easily as a wild bird. Tired with running, I at last gave up the hunt, and walked soberly home by myself, wondering whether that conversation on the summit of the hill, and all the curious information I had gathered from it, should make me the most miserable or the most happy being upon earth.

Chapter 12

The question whether I had reason to feel happy or the reverse still occupied me after going to bed, and kept me awake far into the night. I put it to myself in a variety of ways, concentrating my faculties on it; but the result still remained doubtful. Mine was a curious position for a man to be in; for here was I, very much in love with Yoletta, who said that her age was thirty-one, and yet who knew of only one kind of love--that sisterly affection which she gave me so unstintingly. Of course I was surrounded with mysteries, being in the house but not of it, to the manner born; and I had already arrived at the conclusion that these mysteries could only be known to me through reading, once that accomplishment was mine. For it seemed rather a dangerous thing to ask questions, since the most innocent interrogatory might be taken as an offense, only to be expiated by solitary confinement and a bread-and-water diet; or, if not punishable in that way, it would probably be regarded as a result of the supposed collision of my head with a stone. To be reticent, observant, and studious was a safe plan; this had served to make me diligent and attentive with my lessons, and my gentle teacher had been much pleased with the progress I had made, even in a few days. Her words on the hill had now, however, filled me with anxiety, and I wanted to go a little below the surface of this strange system of life. Why was this large family--twenty-two members present, besides some absent pilgrims, as they are called--composed only of adults? Again, more curious still, why was the father of the house adorned with a majestic beard, while the other men, of various ages, had smooth faces, or, at any rate, nothing more than a slight down on the upper lip and cheeks? It was plain that they never shaved. And were these people all really brothers and sisters? So far, I had been unable, even with the most jealous watching, to detect anything like love-making or flirting; they all treated each other, as Yoletta treated me, with kindness and affection, and nothing more. And if the head of the house was in fact the father of them all--since in two centuries a man might have an indefinite number of children--who was the mother or mothers? I was never good at guessing, but the result of my cogitations was one happy idea--to ask Yoletta whether she had a living mother or not? She was my teacher, my friend and guardian in the house, and if it should turn out that the question was an unfortunate one, an offense, she would be readier to forgive than another.

Accordingly, next day, as soon as we were alone together I put the question to her, although not without a nervous qualm.

She looked at me with the greatest surprise. "Do you mean to say," she answered, "that you do not know I have a mother--that there is a mother of the house?"