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Page 66
As he went on, Gnulemah grew every moment nearer. At length he caught
the flutter of her mantle amidst the foliage, and presently saw her
on the brink of the precipice, looking out across the broad blue
river. Thus had he, through his glass, darkly, seen her stand the day
before. Were the crossing a river and the flight of a day all that
divided his past life from what he thought awaited him now!
While yet at a distance, he called to her,--not from impatience, but
because he stood in awe of the meeting, and wanted the first moments
over. His voice touched Gnulemah like a beloved hand, and turned her
towards him. Her face, which had not learned to be the mask of
emotion, but was instead the full and immediate index thereof,
brightened with joy; and as he came near, the joy increased. Yet a
seriousness deep down in her eyes, marked the shadow of a night and
the dawn of another day. A spiritual chemistry had been working in
her.
She did not move forward to meet him but stood delighting in the sense
of his ever-growing nearness. When at length he stood close before
her, she drew a long, pleasant breath and said,--
"A beautiful morning!"
This was no commonplace greeting, for it was not made in a commonplace
manner. It said that his coming had consummated the else imperfect
beauty of nature, and won its expression from Gnulemah's lips. The
commonplace wondered to find itself transmuted into a compliment of
fine gold!
Gnulemah's attire to-day was more Diana-like than yesterday's, and
looked as appropriate to her as leaves to trees or clouds to the sky.
Her dress, indeed, was not so much a conventional appendage as a
living, sensitive part of her, which might be supposed to change its
color and style in sympathy with her shifting moods and surroundings,
yet never losing certain distinctive traits which had their foundation
in her individual nature.
"A beautiful morning!" returned Balder, taking her hand. "Were you
expecting me?"
"I feared you might not show yourself to me again," she answered, with
sudden tears twinkling on her eyelashes. She seemed more tenderly
human and approachable to-day than heretofore. Had she found her
mountain-height of unmated solitude untenable?--found in herself a
yielding woman, and in Balder the strength that is a man? This
descent, which was a sweet ascent, made her endlessly more lovable.
"I come here always when I feel lonely," continued she. "If it had not
been for this place, with its great outlook, I should often have been
too lonely to stay in the world."
"We all need an outlook to a larger, world, Gnulemah."
"Besides, you came to me from the other side!" said she glancing in
his face.
"Did you see me there?" Balder was on the point of asking; but he was
wise enough to refrain. If he could believe it true, let him not tempt
his happiness; if faith were weak, why build a barrier against it? So
he kept silence.
"You found my violets!" whispered Gnulemah, with a shy smile. "You
understand all I do and am; it is happiness to be with you."
They sat down by mutual consent beneath a crooked old apple-tree,
which yet blossomed as pure and fresh as did the youngest in the
orchard. From beneath this white and perfumed tent was a view of the
distant city.
Gnulemah could not be called talkative, yet in giving her thoughts
expression she outdid vocabularies. Many fine muscles there were
around her eyes, at the corners of her mouth, and especially in the
upper lip,--whose subtile curvings and contractions spoke volumes of
question, appeal, observation. Her form by its endless shiftings
uttered delicate phrases of pleasure, surprise, or love; her hands and
fingers were orators, and eloquent were the curlings and tappings of
her Arab feet.
This kind of language would be blank to one used rather to hear words
than to feel them; but Balder, in, his present exalted mood, delighted
in it. Was there any enjoyment more refined than to see his thought,
before he had given it breath, lighten in the eyes of this daughter
of fire? and with his own eyes to catch the first pure glimmer of her
yet unborn fancies? A language genial of intimacy, for the talkers
must feel in order to utterance,--must meet each other, from the heart
outward, at every point. The human form is made of meanings. It is the
full thought of its Creator, comprising all other thoughts. Is it
blind chance or lifeless expediency that moulds the curves of woman's
bosom, builds up man's forehead like a citadel, and sets his head on
his shoulders? Is beauty beautiful, or are we cozened by congenial
ugliness? But Balder's philosophic scepticism should never have braved
a test like Gnulemah!
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