The Rosary
Chapter XXIX
Jane Looks Into Love's Mirror
Behind the yellow screen, Jane found a great confusion of canvases, and
unmistakable evidence of the blind hands which had groped about in a vain
search, and then made fruitless endeavours to sort and rearrange. Very tenderly,
Jane picked up each canvas from the fallen heap; turning it the right way up,
and standing it with its face to the wall. Beautiful work, was there; some of it
finished; some, incomplete. One or two faces she knew, looked out at her in
their pictured loveliness. But the canvases she sought were not there.
She straightened herself, and looked around. In a further corner, partly
concealed by a Cairo screen, stood another pile. Jane went to them.
Almost immediately she found the two she wanted; larger than the rest, and
distinguishable at a glance by the soft black gown of the central figure.
Without giving them more than a passing look, she carried them over to the
western window, and placed them in a good light. Then she drew up the chair in
which she had been sitting; took the little brass bear in her left hand, as a
talisman to help her through what lay before her; turned the second picture with
its face to the easel; and sat down to the quiet contemplation of the first.
The noble figure of a woman, nobly painted, was the first impression which
leapt from eye to brain. Yes, nobility came first, in stately pose, in uplifted
brow, in breadth of dignity. Then — as you marked the grandly massive figure,
too well-proportioned to be cumbersome, but large and full, and amply developed;
the length of limb; the firmly planted feet; the large capable hands, — you
realised the second impression conveyed by the picture, to be strength; —
strength to do; strength to be; strength to continue. Then you looked into the
face. And there you were confronted with a great surprise. The third thought
expressed by the picture was Love — love, of the highest, holiest, most ideal,
kind; yet, withal, of the most tenderly human order; and you found it in that
face.
It was a large face, well proportioned to the figure. It had no pretensions
whatever to ordinary beauty. The features were good; there was not an ugly line
about them; and yet, each one just missed the beautiful; and the general effect
was of a good-looking plainness; unadorned, unconcealed, and unashamed. But the
longer you looked, the more desirable grew the face; the less you noticed its
negations; the more you admired its honesty, its purity, its immense strength of
purpose; its noble simplicity. You took in all these outward details; you looked
away for a moment, to consider them; you looked back to verify them; and then
the miracle happened. Into the face had stolen the "light that never was on sea
or land." It shone from the quiet grey eyes, — as, over the head of the man who
knelt before her, they looked out of the picture — with an expression of the
sublime surrender of a woman's whole soul to an emotion which, though it sways
and masters her, yet gives her the power to be more truly herself than ever
before. The startled joy in them; the marvel at a mystery not yet understood;
the passionate tenderness; and yet the almost divine compassion for the
unrestrained violence of feeling, which had flung the man to his knees, and
driven him to the haven of her breast; the yearning to soothe, and give, and
content;- -all these were blended into a look of such exquisite sweetness, that
it brought tears to the eyes of the beholder.
The woman was seated on a broad marble parapet. She looked straight before
her. Her knees came well forward, and the long curve of the train of her black
gown filled the foreground on the right. On the left, slightly to one side of
her, knelt a man, a tall slight figure in evening dress, his arms thrown forward
around her waist; his face completely hidden in the soft lace at her bosom; only
the back of his sleek dark head, visible. And yet the whole figure denoted a
passion of tense emotion. She had gathered him to her with what you knew must
have been an exquisite gesture, combining the utter self- surrender of the
woman, with the tender throb of maternal solicitude; and now her hands were
clasped behind his head, holding him closely to her. Not a word was being
spoken. The hidden face was obviously silent; and her firm lips above his dark
head were folded in a line of calm self-control; though about them hovered the
dawning of a smile of bliss ineffable.
A crimson rambler rose climbing some woodwork faintly indicated on the left,
and hanging in a glowing mass from the top left-hand corner, supplied the only
vivid colour in the picture.
But, from taking in these minor details, the eye returned to that calm tender
face, alight with love; to those strong capable hands, now learning for the
first time to put forth the protective passion of a woman's tenderness; and the
mind whispered the only possible name for that picture: The Wife.
Jane gazed at it long, in silence. Had Garth's little bear been anything less
solid than Early Victorian brass; it must have bent and broken under the strong
pressure of those clenched hands.
She could not doubt, for a moment, that she looked upon herself; but, oh,
merciful heavens! how unlike the reflected self of her own mirror! Once or twice
as she looked, her mind refused to work, and she simply gazed blankly at the
minor details of the picture. But then again, the expression of the grey eyes
drew her, recalling so vividly every feeling she had experienced when that dear
head had come so unexpectedly to its resting-place upon her bosom. "It is true,"
she whispered; and again: "Yes; it is true. I cannot deny it. It is as I felt;
it must be as I looked."
And then, suddenly; she fell upon her knees before the picture. "Oh, my God!
Is that as I looked? And the next thing that happened was my boy lifting his
shining eyes and gazing at me in the moonlight. Is THIS what he saw? Did I look
SO? And did the woman who looked so; and who, looking so, pressed his head down
again upon her breast, refuse next day to marry him, on the grounds of his
youth, and her superiority? . . . Oh, Garth, Garth! . . . O God, help him to
understand! . . . help him to forgive me!"
In the work-room just below, Maggie the housemaid was singing as she sewed.
The sound floated through the open window, each syllable distinct in the clear
Scotch voice, and reached Jane where she knelt. Her mind, stunned to blankness
by its pain, took eager hold upon the words of Maggie's hymn. And they were
these.
"O Love, that will not let me go,
I rest my weary soul in Thee;
I give Thee back the life I owe,
That in Thine ocean depths its flow
May richer, fuller be."
"O Light, that followest all my way,
I yield my flick'ring torch to Thee;
My heart restores its borrowed ray,
That in Thy sunshine's blaze its day
May brighter, fairer be."
Jane took the second picture, and placed it in front of the first.
The same woman, seated as before; but the man was not there; and in her arms,
its tiny dark head pillowed against the fulness of her breast, lay a little
child. The woman did not look over that small head, but bent above it, and gazed
into the baby face.
The crimson rambler had grown right across the picture, and formed a glowing
arch above mother and child. A majesty of tenderness was in the large figure of
the mother. The face, as regarded contour and features, was no less plain; but
again it was transfigured, by the mother-love thereon depicted. You knew "The
Wife" had more than fulfilled her abundant promise. The wife was there in
fullest realisation; and, added to wifehood, the wonder of motherhood. All
mysteries were explained; all joys experienced; and the smile on her calm lips,
bespoke ineffable content.
A rambler rose had burst above them, and fallen in a shower of crimson petals
upon mother and child. The baby-fingers clasped tightly the soft lace at her
bosom. A petal had fallen upon the tiny wrist. She had lifted her hand to remove
it; and, catching the baby- eyes, so dark and shining, paused for a moment, and
smiled.
Jane, watching them, fell to desperate weeping. The "mere boy" had understood
her potential possibilities of motherhood far better than she understood them
herself. Having had one glimpse of her as "The Wife," his mind had leaped on,
and seen her as "The Mother." And again she was forced to say: "It is true —
yes; it is true."
And then she recalled the old line of cruel reasoning:
"It was not the sort of face one would have wanted to see always in front of
one at table." Was this the sort of face — this, as Garth had painted it, after
a supposed year of marriage? Would any man weary of it, or wish to turn away his
eyes?
Jane took one more long look. Then she dropped the little bear, and buried
her face in her hands; while a hot blush crept up to the very roots of her hair,
and tingled to her finger-tips.
Below, the fresh young voice was singing again.
"O Joy, that seekest me through pain,
I cannot close my heart to Thee;
I trace the rainbow through the rain,
And feel the promise is not vain
That morn shall tearless be."
After a while Jane whispered: "Oh, my darling, forgive me. I was altogether
wrong. I will confess; and, God helping me, I will explain; and, oh, my darling,
you will forgive me?"
Once more she lifted her head and looked at the picture. A few stray petals
of the crimson rambler lay upon the ground; reminding her of those crushed
roses, which, falling from her breast, lay scattered on the terrace at
Shenstone, emblem of the joyous hopes and glory of love which her decision of
that night had laid in the dust of disillusion. But crowning this picture, in
rich clusters of abundant bloom, grew the rambler rose. And through the open
window came the final verse of Maggie's hymn.
"O Cross, that liftest up my head,
I dare not ask to fly from Thee;
I lay in dust life's glory dead,
And from the ground there blossoms red
Life that shall endless be."
Jane went to the western window, and stood, with her arms stretched above
her, looking out upon the radiance of the sunset. The sky blazed into gold and
crimson at the horizon; gradually as the eye lifted, paling to primrose, flecked
with rosy clouds; and, overhead, deep blue — fathomless, boundless, blue.
Jane gazed at the golden battlements above the purple hills, and repeated,
half aloud: "And the city was of pure gold; — and had no need of the sun,
neither of the moon to shine in it: for the glory of God did lighten it. And
there shall be no more death; neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be
any more pain: for the former things are passed away."
Ah, how much had passed away since she stood at that western window, not an
hour before. All life seemed readjusted; its outlook altered; its perspective
changed. Truly Garth had "gone behind his blindness."
Jane raised her eyes to the blue; and a smile of unspeakable anticipation
parted her lips. "Life, that shall endless be," she murmured. Then, turning,
found the little bear, and restored him to his place upon the mantelpiece; put
back the chair; closed the western window; and, picking up the two canvases,
left the studio, and made her way carefully downstairs.