"I know it," she answered gently."You have loved me from the first, have you not? Even when I lay asleep in the coffin you began to love me, but until you dreamed a certain dream you would not admit it.""Yva, what was the meaning of that dream?""I cannot say, Humphrey.But I tell you this.As you will learn in time, one spirit may be clothed in different garments of the flesh."I did not understand her, but, in some strange way, her words brought to my mind those that Natalie spoke at the last, and Ianswered:
"Yva, when my wife lay dying she bade me seek her elsewhere, for certainly I should find her.Doubtless she meant beyond the shores of death--or perhaps she also dreamed."She bent her head, looking at me very strangely.
"Your wife, too, may have had the gift of dreams, Humphrey.As you dream and I dream, so mayhap she dreamed.Of dreams, then, let us say no more, since I think that they have served their purpose, and all three of us understand."Then I stretched out my arms, and next instant my head lay upon her perfumed breast.She lifted it and kissed me on the lips, saying:
"With this kiss again I give myself to you.But oh! Humphrey, do not ask too much of the god of my people, Fate," and she looked me in the eyes and sighed.
"What do you mean?" I asked, trembling.
"Many, many things.Among them, that happiness is not for mortals, and remember that though my life began long ago, I am mortal as you are, and that in eternity time makes no difference.""And if so, Yva, what then? Do we meet but to part?""Who said it? Not I.Humphrey, I tell you this.Nor earth, nor heaven, nor hell have any bars through which love cannot burst its way towards reunion and completeness.Only there must be love, manifested in many shapes and at many times, but ever striving to its end, which is not of the flesh.Aye, love that has lost itself, love scorned, love defeated, love that seems false, love betrayed, love gone astray, love wandering through the worlds, love asleep and living in its sleep, love awake and yet sleeping; all love that has in it the germ of life.It matters not what form love takes.If it be true I tell you that it will win its way, and in the many that it has seemed to worship, still find the one, though perchance not here.
At her words a numb fear gripped my heart.
"Not here? Then where?" I said.
"Ask your dead wife, Humphrey.Ask the dumb stars.Ask the God you worship, for I cannot answer, save in one word--Somewhere!
Man, be not afraid.Do you think that such as you and I can be lost in the aching abysms of space? I know but little, yet I tell you that we are its rulers.I tell you that we, too, are gods, if only we can aspire and believe.For the doubting and timid there is naught.For those who see with the eyes of the soul and stretch out their hands to grasp there is all.Even Bastin will tell you this.""But," I said, "life is short.Those worlds are far away, and you are near."She became wonderful, mysterious.
"Near I am far," she said; "and far I am near, if only this love of yours is strong enough to follow and to clasp.And, Humphrey, it needs strength, for here I am afraid that it will bear little of such fruit as men desire to pluck."Again terror took hold of me, and I looked at her, for I did not know what to say or ask.
"Listen," she went on."Already my father has offered me to you in marriage, has he not, but at a price which you do not understand? Believe me, it is one that you should never pay, since the rule of the world can be too dearly bought by the slaughter of half the world.And if you would pay it, I cannot.""But this is madness!" I exclaimed."Your father has no powers over our earth.""I would that I could think so, Humphrey.I tell you that he has powers and that it is his purpose to use them as he has done before.You, too, he would use, and me.""And, if so, Yva, we are lords of ourselves.Let us take each other while we may.Bastin is a priest.""Lords of ourselves! Why, for ought I know, at this very moment Oro watches us in his thought and laughs.Only in death, Humphrey, shall we pass beyond his reach and become lords of ourselves.""It is monstrous!" I cried."There is the boat, let us fly away.""What boat can bear us out of stretch of the arm of the old god of my people, Fate, whereof Oro is the high priest? Nay, here we must wait our doom.""Doom," I said--"doom? What then is about to happen?""A terrible thing, as I think, Humphrey.Or, rather, it will not happen.""Why not, if it must?"
"Beloved," she whispered, "Bastin has expounded to me a new faith whereof the master-word is Sacrifice.The terrible thing will not happen because of sacrifice! Ask me no more."She mused a while, seated there in the moonlight upon the ancient altar of sacrifice, the veil she wore falling about her face and making her mysterious.Then she threw it back, showing her lovely eyes and glittering hair, and laughed.
"We have still an earthly hour," she said; "therefore let us forget the far, dead past and the eternities to come and be joyful in that hour.Now throw your arms about me and I will tell you strange stories of lost days, and you shall look into my eyes and learn wisdom, and you shall kiss my lips and taste of bliss--you, who were and are and shall be--you, the beloved of Yva from the beginning to the end of Time."
