V.
POLYMNIA’S STORY: AN HOUR OF DEATH.
CLIO was toying with the delicate little glass from which she had been drinking. “Before we have the next story, one of you might sing something,” she said. “I shall be glad to play the accompaniment on the sackbut, which is a historical instrument. We first hear of it as being in use about the latter end of the——”
“Let’s see,” said Erato, shamelessly interrupting, “I was to tell the next story, I think.”
“Well, let’s have the song first.”
“I like music at night,” said Erato. “At night it has a speaking voice, and one understands it better. And it would be a good introduction to my story; but it must not be a drawing-room song. They are called drawing-room songs because they are whistled in the street. No, my song must be good. There mustn’t be any—
That sort of thing couldn’t possibly make anybody love anybody, you know. It’s rather queer,” she continued meditatively, “but one goes out at night all alone, and it’s quiet, and a lot of little stars show you how big the darkness is. You’re thinking just about ordinary things; and without any reason there comes into your head a bit of one of the Nocturnes—Chopin’s, the eleventh, I think—and straightway you feel as if you’ll die unless you kiss somebody you’re awfully fond of. And, of course, being alone, you can’t. And so you get sorrowful. It’s queer, because there’s nothing about love in all that—the music, and quiet, and darkness—to make one think about it; but one always does—at least I do.”
“My dear Erato!” remonstrated Clio.
“Well, I do. Euterpe shall sing to us now. I don’t mind a song that can be sung in a drawing-room—it’s the drawing-room song that I hate. But Euterpe knows all about it, and she sings beautifully, and she’s very pretty—and yet she’s shy.”
Erato was quite shameless in her favouritism. But she had chosen well. Euterpe was shy and quiet, but she loved singing. She smiled at Erato, and seated herself at a cottage piano in one corner of the cloud-room. I had not noticed before that there was a piano. She refused Clio’s offer to accompany her on the sackbut, and another offer from Terpsichore to accompany her on the banjo. She was quiet, but when it came to music she was firm. The music of her song was beautiful, but owing to the expense of printing music it is cheaper to give the words:—
“Dear Euterpe,” said Erato, “you must have been thinking of Sicily. It brings it all back to my mind, how he and I——” Erato paused. “Clio,” she said at last, “I don’t want to tell the next story. Let one of the others tell it. Perhaps I sha’n’t listen very much, but you must forgive me. I want to lie here, and think, and think, with music in my head.”
“Perhaps Polymnia has a story to tell us,” suggested Clio.
Polymnia wore a long robe of pearly-grey; her face was pale, and her eyes were deep and thoughtful.
“Yes,” she said, in a low musical voice, “I remember a story.”
And this is the story which she remembered:—
It happened one day that Zeus was in a bad temper—a thoroughly bad temper. When this took place the whole of Olympus knew it. John Ganymede knew it. He had grown respectable and middle-aged. He was inclined to be portly, and still more inclined to give his views on anything to anybody. Just at present he was standing in his pantry, polishing glasses, and talking to the Deputy Cloud-controller.
“There’s no pleasin’ of him, when he’s like that,” said Ganymede, shaking his bald respectable head. “Last night he was suthin’ awful. ‘Ganymede,’ he says to me, when I brings him his whisky last thing afore he goes to bed, ‘you can pour it out for me.’ So I does. ‘And you can put hot water in it.’ So I does again. ‘I think a couple of lumps of sugar would improve it—and a little bit of lemon peel—don’t you, Ganymede?’ ‘Yessir, suttinly sir,’ I says, and puts ’em in. ‘Grate a little nutmeg on the top.’ I were surprised, o’ course, but I did it. ‘Stick a couple of spoonfuls of Maraschino into it.’ All this time he’s lookin’ as quiet and gentle as a hangel. There wasn’t no Maraschino, and I had to go down to the cellar and fetch it. I measures it out careful, and says nothing. ‘I’ll have a large lump of ice in it, and two straws.’ I thought his poor ’ead must be going, but it wasn’t my place to make no remarks. I just carries out the horder. ‘Have you done all that, Ganymede?’ he asks, drowsy-like. ‘Yessir, suttinly sir,’ says I. ‘Well, there,’ says he, ‘you—several blanks—now you can run round, and see if you can find a dog that’s such a Zeus-forsaken fool as to drink it—because I ain’t going to.’ And with that he goes off into his bedroom, screamin’ an’ laughin’ an’ swearin’ like a maniac. Now that ain’t no way to be’ave.”
The Deputy Cloud-controller could sympathise. That very morning Zeus had sent for him, and demanded:
“How’s the wind?”
“Due East,” said the Deputy.
“Then make it due West.”
The Deputy bowed, retired, and made it due West. In ten minutes’ time he was summoned before Zeus again.
“Make it East and West and South and North all at once,” said Zeus.
“I can’t,” said the Deputy.
“Then consider yourself discharged,” roared Zeus.
“Then consider yourself a blighted idiot,” replied the Deputy indiscreetly, getting ready to dodge a thunderbolt.
“So I do,” said Zeus, who never was very expected. “Go away, and send me some one else to be angry with. You’re stale.”
The Deputy Cloud-controller had found some difficulty in getting any one to go.
“What am I to do, Mr. Ganymede?” said the Deputy despairingly. “They all say that it’s more than their lives are worth. And the females won’t stand his language. I must send some one, or I shall get discharged in real earnest.”
“Well, pussonally,” said Ganymede, “I should be very glad to oblige you, but leave this ’ere glass and plate I can’t. Now, there’s the Clerk of the Curses. He’s pretty tough. Why don’t you send him?”
“So I would,” said the Deputy, “but he’s away on his holiday.”
“Then there’s the Earth-child,” suggested Ganymede, looking a little ashamed of himself.
No one quite knew how the Earth-child had come among the gods. There must have been a mistake somewhere; it was pretty generally known that she was to have been born in Arcadia. There was something of a scandal about it, too. But there she was, generally petted and liked, and happy enough among the gods.
“Yes, there’s the Earth-child,” said the Deputy, and he too looked a little ashamed of himself. They talked together a little while longer, and then the Deputy went away, suffering badly from conscience.
A few minutes afterwards the Earth-child walked fearlessly into the hall where Zeus was seated. She had red hair, and an intelligent face. She was bright, and affectionate, and twelve years old, and not afraid of anything.
“I heard you wanted to be angry with me, Zeus,” said the child.
Zeus looked at her grimly. “I should prefer something rather bigger.”
“Why do you want to be angry?” the child asked.
“Because I’ve done everything, and know almost everything, and I’m quite sick of everything.”
“Music?” suggested the child.
“Sick of it!”
“Love?”
“Everything—everything, I tell you,” said Zeus hastily. “I’m tired of eating, drinking, loving, hating, sleeping, walking, talking, killing—everything.”
“I’m sorry for you, Zeus,” said the child, with a sigh. “Couldn’t you die?” she suggested afterwards, seriously.
Zeus frowned. “No, no—not that,” he said. There was a moment’s pause. Zeus was thinking; and, as he thought, his face grew very ugly. He was immortal, but to a certain extent his immortality was conditioned. He might die at any moment he chose, and remain dead for an hour. If at the end of that hour any one would put his lips on the lips of Zeus, and draw in his breath, then Zeus would come back to life, and he that so drew in his breath would die. But if no one did that, then Zeus himself would be dead for ever. Zeus had never ventured on the experiment; he knew that no one loved him enough. But he might play on the simplicity of the child. And take her life? No, he could not do that. But he would ask her.
“Earth-child,” he said, “will you do something for me?”
“Yes, Zeus—anything that will make you happy again.”
It was horribly tempting. Should he try this one thing of which he knew nothing, of which he was not tired? Yes, he must.
“I am going to sleep,” he said rapidly. “I will turn this hour-glass here, and when the last grain of sand is running out, you must put your lips to mine and draw in your breath. Then I shall wake up again, and be happy.”
The child stared at him with wondering eyes. “I will do it,” she said.
A minute afterwards Zeus was lying dead, and the child was watching him, and in the hour-glass the sand was running out slowly. Time passed, and the child, as she watched, saw that his face was changing queerly. It was not quite like the face of one who slept. Suddenly she crept to his side, and put one hand over his heart. It was motionless. “Zeus!” she called, in a loud whisper. He did not answer, and she knew then that he was dead.
“But shall I wake him?” she said, watching the running sand.
As the last grains ran out, she bent over him, and did what he had said. He sat up with a gasp, and a look of horror died slowly out of his face. And the child lay prone on the floor, face downwards.
Zeus hardly thought of her. “Take that away,” he said to Ganymede, who entered the hall just then. Ganymede went pale to the lips, but he lifted the white burden in his arms, and carried her out. “I wish we hadn’t sent her,” he sighed to the Deputy Cloud-controller; “I would have gone myself, if I’d known.”
“I wish you had,” said the Deputy. “Both of us together are not worth her.”
Zeus had forgotten her. He could think only of the things he had known in that horrible hour. “I will never die again,” he said to himself; and for many nights he could not sleep.
“The weather’s rainy,” said the Muse of Astronomy, who had drawn a curtain back and was looking out.
“Yes, but Urania,” murmured Terpsichore, knowing it was wrong, but quite unable to help it.