VIII.
URANIA’S STORY: NUMBER ONE HUNDRED AND THREE.
“YES,” said Clio, “it will soon be morning. There will be time only for one more story. Urania shall tell it to us. Do you not think that you had better go and rest now, Erato? You look so tired.”
“I am tired,” answered Erato, “but it is not the tiredness that wants sleep. And I should like to hear Urania’s story.” She was very pale; dark shadows lay under her burning eyes; her face seemed spiritualised. Her ways and her voice were subdued and gentle now. The brightness and vivacity were gone. Sometimes she would look lovingly up into Euterpe’s eyes, or touch caressingly Cupid’s curly hair. For the most part she lay motionless, and seemed to be looking fixedly at something—some vision unseen by her sisters.
But Cupid never ceased to look earnestly at her, with trouble on his pretty, boyish face. And all of them felt the strange nervous tension of those who have watched far into the night; an excited tremor came over them, bringing with it flashing, vivid imaginings. There was a pause, a silence that was like a prayer to the dawning light. Then Terpsichore arose, with no merriment, as of old, upon her face, but a look of eager penitence. And she knelt down by Erato’s side, and whispered—so softly that only Erato might hear it—“Forgive me, Erato, forgive me! I did not love you once as well as I love you now. I was half jealous because you seemed to like Euterpe better than you liked me, and because you were so beautiful. But I do love you now—I love you more than I can say. Oh, forgive me, Erato!”
Erato kissed her on the lips, and Terpsichore went back to her place, crying a little, for no particular reason, and hoping that no one noticed it, after the manner of maidens.
Suddenly Urania spoke, with a deep thrill in her voice. This was her story:—
There was once a man who was very careful. He saluted the sun, spoiled a good floor by making libations, sacrificed freely, and learned by heart what enabled him to remember the distinction between the dies fastus and the dies nefastus. In fact, he did all that could be done. And his number in the books was number one hundred and three.
Now, at the end of the quarter, Zeus & Co. were going through their books. It was wearying work and dry work. Ganymede was in and out of the office all day with liquors, and Mercury had been run off his legs with messages to the different departments. The clerk was reading out the items in a dreary monotone.
“Number one hundred and one. Dead. Cholera.”
“That was a capital cholera,” murmured Co., “and did its work well. Go on, clerk.”
“Used to live in Eubœa. Killed to spite his sister, because she——”
“That’ll do,” said Zeus hurriedly; “I remember that case—a stupid woman, a very stupid woman—but pretty. Next, please.”
“Number one hundred and two. Philosopher still living because he wants to die.”
“Say ‘usual formula’ when we come to that. It’s no good wasting time. Has number one hundred and two got anything unpleasant the matter with him?”
“No, sir.”
“Ah, then—let me see—we’ll give him a couple of ulcers. Mercury, just look in at the Punishment Department, and order a couple of large ulcers to be sent to number one hundred and two, and look sharp back. Next, please.”
“Number one hundred and three. Living and prosperous. Regular in his righteousness. Further details at the Virtue Record Department.”
“We ought to give that man some other reward,” said Zeus, who sometimes suffered from a slight twinge of justice in damp weather.
“I’m not so sure of that,” said Co., who was very healthy, and never got a touch of justice in any weather. “I hate a man who does everything right. It’s so infernally hypocritical. Besides, it shows a commercial mind. He only does it in order to get something by it. I hate a commercial mind. I’ll guarantee he doesn’t do it out of affection for us.”
Zeus sniggered. “Well, well,” he said, “affection, you know, affection——” But here he was interrupted by the arrival of Mercury.
“Just look in at the Virtue Record,” said Co., “and bring the detailed list for number one hundred and three.”
Mercury was back again in a minute. “The Virtue Record office is shut, sir, nobody ever virtuous after lunch, sir—shuts at one, sir. The clerk’s gone home and taken the keys.”
“Well,” said Co., “it doesn’t matter. The man is obviously a hypocrite, and he’s got no business to try and make bargains with us. I don’t mind it so much myself, Zeus, but it is such an insult to your dignity.”
“Do you think so?” said Zeus quickly. “Then he shall repent it. I’ll teach him to call ME a pettifogging huckster. I’ll teach him to try to bribe ME. I’ll give him a lesson. Pass me those thunderbolts. I’ll scorch, and blight, and blast——”
“Gently, gently,” said Co. “We may just as well try and get a little fun out of it. We’ll see who can torture best—killing barred. You shall go first.”
So Zeus, who had plenty of force but very little skill, went to work in the old-fashioned way. He killed the man’s relations, burned down his house, destroyed his crops, wrecked his ships, reduced him to poverty, and afflicted him with the most distressing disease that the Punishment Department had in stock. And yet the man continued cheerful, saying that the gods were just and would yet send him prosperity.
“Oh, this is sickening,” said Zeus; “I can’t do anything with him. Now, Co., you try.”
“You’ve not left me much to work on,” said Co.; “you’ve taken away all the man has, except his baby son and his belief in us. I will give him something—a little accident—fever—cerebral disorder. See? Then he kills his child—you observe?—the child whom he loves more than himself. Then I restore him to his senses again. Pretty, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” said Zeus, a little sulkily, “you’ve won, Co. What made you think of that?”
“I don’t know,” said Co. modestly. “It was just an idea. He could not be tortured any worse than that?”
“Oh, I don’t think so,” objected Zeus. “You let me try again.” Number one hundred and three still lay moaning on the floor of the room.
“You can try, of course,” said Co.
Zeus still stuck to the old-fashioned plan of punishing by deprivation. There was only one thing left to take away—the man’s belief in the gods. So he took that.
Suddenly number one hundred and three arose. There was a chill smile on his face, and he walked out into the courtyard, and looked at the rising sun. “I was mistaken,” he said. “There are no gods. All is as it chances. Good is chance and bad is chance. Nothing matters any more. I would die if I thought anything mattered. There are no more values. It is the same thing whether I murder my son, who is dearer than life to me, or whether I give alms, or whether I eat my breakfast. I shall never be sorry or happy any more. Sorrow and happiness are vain and foolish.”
So he went back to his house again, and washed his hands calmly, and broke his fast.
“Well, I never!” said Zeus.
“Ah!” said Co., “you must learn the new ways. You’re behind the times.”
“Very well,” retorted Zeus snappishly; “you needn’t say it so loudly. I don’t want all Olympus to know that.”
“The dawn is here!”
It was Terpsichore who spoke. She had drawn back the curtain that formed the front of the cloud. Below them lay the flat fen country, with dykes, and waste places, and gaunt lonely trees. The sunrise was beautiful as a fair dream, sprigs of light snapping on the surface of the marshy pools and slow streams, where the cool dawn-wind shook the water’s surface.
“And now I will go to my rest,” said Clio.
“And I,” said the others. “And I too.” Only Erato strove to rise and could not, and fell back, breathing quickly.
“I have grown weak,” she said, and her voice was low, so that it could hardly be heard. “I will stay here, and rest here, in the warm light of the sun: I am cold, strangely cold.”
Euterpe and Cupid stayed with Erato. The rest all went into an inner room, far within the cloud. Each as she passed Erato had some gentle word to say to her. They had bidden Cupid come with them; he had replied with an angry look and a shake of the head, not trusting himself to words.
So these three were left alone in the cloud-chamber. Erato stretched out her little hands to the sun, and watched the light come flickering over them. Cupid had drawn a little apart, still watching her. At last her eyes closed. “Euterpe,” she whispered, “sing to me—sing the last song. I am drowsy, and would sleep now.” So Euterpe went to the piano. She did not sing very well, for something seemed to be wrong with her voice—a kind of huskiness:
Suddenly Euterpe stopped, and for a moment there was an awful silence in the room. Then putting restraint aside, she burst into sobs, weeping as if her heart were broken, and flung herself down by Erato’s side.
“Dead? Erato, my darling!”
And Erato did not move or speak; her face was very beautiful as the sunlight fell upon it. There was no sound in the room but the passionate sobbing of Euterpe.
Cupid had risen. His face, for all its boyishness, was firm, unmoved; only a little drop of blood was on his lip where he had bitten it through. He looked once at his dead Erato; then walked to the front of the cloud-chamber, and stared vacantly outwards. It seemed to him that rings of iron were growing tighter round his chest, and stopping his breath. A humming sound was in his ears. He did not quite know what was happening. Flecks of light seemed to dart before his hot, dry eyes.
He had stood there a long time—he knew not how long—when he heard a voice behind him.
“Cupid! Cupid! you loved her too.”
It was Euterpe, standing there pale and sweet, looking at him, stretching her hands towards him, the tears trembling still in her eyes.
And then, at last, flinging himself into her arms and clinging to her, he wept. “Loved her! loved her!” he cried.
So Erato lay there dead, and beautiful in death, and the sun shone fiercely, because it was now day, and men were going forth to their work.