CHAPTER XII

WHEN LOVE WAS BORN

The streets of St. Petersburg, the city itself, nihilism, Russia, the czar had ceased to exist for me, however. Whatever she may have seen upon the street that had brought that startled cry to her lips, and had made her turn about and grasp my arm, had also brought into her countenance an expression of such overwhelming and overpowering concern for me, that I knew with a perfect knowledge in that instant, that Zara loved me.

Have you ever been swayed by an impulse that is utterly beyond your control, and before which all other considerations degenerate to such utter insignificance as not to exist at all?

It was such an one that controlled me then.

As she drew me toward the window, and would have directed my gaze through it, her own eyes held unflinchingly to mine, and mine held hers with a compelling power which she did not seek to resist, and could not have controlled, even if she had made the effort.

Whatever it may have been, out there in the street, that had alarmed her, she forgot it, and my arms were around her, her lithe, sinuous, pulsing body was crushed madly against my own, and our lips had met before either of us realized it. We had mutually recognized the strange and overwhelming instinct of love, that had a.s.serted its control over both at the self-same instant. I forgot the world, the flesh and the devil, the czar, Russia, and nihilism, and she forgot even that uppermost terror that was tearing at her heart, in that supreme moment of the rapturous recognition of love.

We were unconscious of the fact that we were standing directly before the window, where we must have been for the moment in full view of persons pa.s.sing in the street; we had forgotten everything, save each other.

We were both silent; there was no occasion for words; our souls were speaking to each other in a language of their own, G.o.d-given and complete, which leaves nothing to be understood, which comprehends all things.

In such supreme moments as that one was, heart speaks to heart with a complete understanding which pa.s.seth all human knowledge, and which can be understood only by the two who are most concerned, and by G.o.d, who created such impulses.

Presently we were back again beside the low divan. She was seated upon the edge of it, and I was beside her, with one knee on the floor, clasping both her hands in one of mine, while the other still encircled her body, holding her tightly against me in that rhapsody of love which overawes all sense of understanding.

Her head rested lightly upon my shoulder; stray tresses of her hair brushed against my temple and my cheek; her half-parted lips, glowing like newly opened rose-buds, never attained a distance of more than an inch from mine, and for the most part they were together, as lightning conductors of every thrill that pulsed through her being and mine.

When our lips were not in contact, our eyes were; they were gazing into the utmost depths of each other's soul, reading and understanding all that was mutually expressed, charmed and fascinated by the beauteous panoramic scenes which flittered in love-phantoms past our prophetic vision.

"My love! my love!" she murmured over and over again, as if it were all she could utter, and as if with the use of that expression all things were said and done; and I replied as inevitably and comprehensively.

It sounds inane enough in the telling of it, but meaningless phrases and abrupt expressions may, at certain moments in our lives, express everything.

Time became a blank; the world was blotted out; existence was only an incident; we, ourselves, with our bodies, our energies, our capabilities, had become mere atoms in the immensity of that greatest of all G.o.d's creations, Love.

There were murderers waiting in the street to do me to death; I thanked G.o.d for their presence, since because of it, Zara had been brought to the confession and expression of her love for me. She was a nihilist queen and she had played with the affections of men in order to stupefy them to her purposes, as demanded by the cause she served; but I also thanked G.o.d for that, because its consideration and my deep resentment had made plain to me the real power and pa.s.sion of this abundantly glorious woman, now swayed by only one impulse, love for me.

But, however enthralling they may be, all impulses must have an end.

However complete may be love's expression, there is a limit to its continuance; I mean that silent form of expression which proclaims itself only in soul communion.

It was a period of almost utter unconsciousness, since we were both conscious of only one thing while it lasted; but the reaction came at last while she was still relaxed in my embrace, and while yet the mystifying magic induced by contact with her, enveloped me, body and soul.

"Zara," I said, half whispering the word now so unutterably sweet to me, "you will leave Russia now--with me?"

The question brought us both to our senses, with a start, and my princess drew away from me a little, and said, with a whimsical smile:

"A little while ago, my love, you ordered me to leave Russia, alone; now you order me away again, but under guard. I think I will obey you in this last order you have given me. Whenever you will it, I will go."

"And leave behind you all that you have hitherto thought so much about, Zara?" I asked, brought back by her statement to a realization of the conditions by which we were surrounded. She replied without hesitation, and with a finality that was complete:

"Yes."

Ah, what maps of the world have been changed by that word yes. What histories have been written because of its utterance, even in a whispered tone, as hers was then.

"And your nihilists?" I asked her, still intent upon an even more complete capitulation on her part.

"Yes," she repeated.

"And your brother? The cause you have served so intently? The purpose of your life? Everything, Zara?"

"Yes," she said a third time, and still with that same emphasis of finality which could not be misunderstood, and for which there was no qualification.

I was silent and so was she; but after a little I heard her murmuring in a tone so low that it seemed as if I scarcely heard it, notwithstanding the fact that every word was quite distinct.

"I will leave everything for you, my love, for you are all the world to me. There is nothing else now, but you. Nihilism and the cause it upholds, has sunk into utter insignificance, and has become a mere point in the history of my life, like a punctuating period that is placed at the end of a written sentence. Nihilists, great and small, have become mere atoms in the mystery of creation, and they can have no further influence upon my life. The czar of all the Russias is no more a personage to me now, than the merest black dwarf of central Africa, and Russia itself has diminuated to a mere island in the sea of eternity, a speck on the map of the infinite creation. You, Dubravnik----" She paused there and smiled into my eyes with an inimitable gesture of tenderness as she reached upward with her right hand and brushed back the hair from my temples--"I think I shall always call you Dubravnik. The name is yours, as I have known you, and as Dubravnik you are mine, as I am yours."

My reply to this was not a spoken word, and it needs no explanation.

"You, Dubravnik," she continued from the point where she so sweetly interrupted herself, "have become the universe to me, now. You are the infinite s.p.a.ce which comprehends all."

It was sweet to hear her express herself so; sweeter still to know, that comprehensive as it was, it went but a little way toward explaining all that she would have liked to say; and sweetest of all to realize that she also exactly expressed my thought toward her, and that she knew she did so.

There was a long silence after that, broken only by her breathing, by a murmured word of caress, by a gesture of endearment or an occasional sigh; but I brought it to an end presently by asking a question which brought her out of her reverie with a start of affright.

"What was it, Zara, that you saw through the window when----" I did not complete the sentence. It was not necessary. She understood me instantly and with the understanding there returned to her a realization of all the terrors by which we were at that moment surrounded. We could love each other with a rhapsodical completeness, in perfect security, so long as we remained together inside that room; but beyond the walls of Zara's palatial home death stalked grimly, waiting, waiting, waiting, for the moment to strike.

She withdrew from my embrace, slowly and tentatively, but surely, until we no longer touched each other, and she gazed appealingly into my eyes while the flush of love forsook her cheeks and brow, giving place to a pallor of uncertainty and dread for me.

"I had forgotten," she murmured.

"Then continue to forget, my Zara," I whispered.

"No, we must not forget; we must remember." She raised her hand and pointed toward the window. "Out there, Dubravnik, death waits for you.

I had forgotten. I had forgotten."

With a start she gained her feet and stood for a moment palpitatingly uncertain, clasping and unclasping her hands, while her bosom rose and fell in this stress of an utterly new emotion.

One whom she loved was threatened, now. The maternal instinct of womankind is never more prominent than when it is exercised in the protection of the man she loves, and who is destined to be the father of her offspring. It is a grand and a n.o.ble sentiment, and no man lives who will ever comprehend it; but when a man loves as I loved then, he can appreciate its fullness, even though he may not understand it; he can recognize its existence and presence, even though it would be impossible for him to define it.

And it was the maternal instinct that governed her in that moment of terrorized realization of the dangers which threatened me.

I had suddenly become her charge and care. She saw herself as responsible for the conditions that menaced me, and she was like a wild partridge sheltering its brood, and which will not hesitate to face any peril for their protection.

I was always more or less indifferent, if not insensible, to danger. It may not necessarily be bravery that refuses to recognize perils; it may be an instinctive quality of dominance, and self-confidence which is convinced of its power to overcome them.

I rose and stood beside her, putting my arm around her as we faced the window from the opposite side of the room.

"Out there lies danger, Zara," I said smiling, "but here, in this room, dwells happiness."

"There can be no happiness with death waiting for you outside," she said, with sharp decision.