The Secret Power, Marie Corelli [good romance books to read .TXT] 📗

And he looked at her, smiling. Her passionate eyes, full of glowing ardour, met his,—a flashing fire seemed to leap from them into his own soul, and for the moment he almost lost his self-possession.

“Wise Manella!” he repeated, his voice shaking a little, while he fought with the insidious temptation which beset him,—the temptation to draw her into his arms and take his fill of the love she was so ready to give—“They always marry? No dear, they do NOT! Many of them avoid marriage—” he paused, then continued—“and do you know why?”

She shook her head.

“Because it is the end of romance! Because it rings down the curtain on a beautiful Play! The music ceases—the lights are put out—the audience goes home,—and the actors take off their fascinating costumes, wash away their paint and powder and sit down to supper— possibly fried steak and onions and a pot of beer. The fried steak and onions—also the beer—make a very good ordinary ‘marriage.’”

In this flippant talk he gained the mastery over himself he had feared to lose—and laughed heartily as he saw Manella’s expression of utter bewilderment.

“I do not understand!” she said, plaintively—“What is steak and onions?—how do they make a marriage? You say such strange things!”

He laughed again, thoroughly amused.

“Yes, don’t I!” he rejoined—“But not half such strange things as I could say if I were so inclined! I’m a queer fellow!”

He touched her hair gently, putting back a stray curl that had fallen across her forehead.

“Now, dear,” he continued, “It’s time you went. You’ll be wanted at the Plaza—and they mustn’t think I’m keeping you up here, making love to you!”

She tossed her head back, and her eyes flashed almost angrily.

“There’s no danger of that!” she said, with a little suppressed tremor in her throat like the sob of a nightingale at the close of its song.

“Isn’t there?” and putting his arm round her, he drew her close to himself and looked full in her eyes—“Manella—there WAS!—a moment ago!”

She remained still and passive in his arms—hardly daring to breathe, so rapt was she in a sudden ecstasy, but he could feel the wild beating of her heart against his own.

“A moment ago!” he repeated, in a half whisper. “A moment ago I could have made such desperate love to you as would have astonished myself!—and YOU! And I should have regretted it ever afterwards— and so would you!”

The struggling emotion in her found utterance.

“No, no—not I!” she said, in quick little passionate murmurs—“I could not regret it!—If you loved me for an hour it would be the joy of my life-time!—You might leave me,—you might forget!—but that would not take away my pride and gladness! You might kill me—I would die gladly if it saved YOUR life!—ah, you do not understand love—not the love of Manella!”

And she lifted her face to his—a face so lovely, so young, so warm with her soul’s inward rapture that its glowing beauty might have made a lover of an anchorite. But with Roger Seaton the impulses of passion were brief—the momentary flame had gone out in vapour, and the spirit of the anchorite prevailed. He looked at the dewy red lips, delicately parted like rose petals—but he did not kiss them, and the clasp of his arms round her gradually relaxed.

“Hush, hush Manella!” he said, with a mild kindness, which in her overwrought state was more distracting than angry words would have been—“Hush! You talk foolishness—beautiful foolishness—all women do when they set their fancies on men. It is nature, of course,—YOU think it is love, but, my dear girl, there is no such thing as love! There!—now you are cross!” for she drew herself quickly away from his hold and stood apart, her eyes sparkling, her breast heaving, with the air of a goddess enraged,—“You are cross because I tell you the truth---”

“It is not the truth,” she said, in a low voice quivering with intense feeling—“you tell me lies to disguise yourself. But I can see! You yourself love a woman—but you have not my courage!—you are afraid to own it! You would give the world to hold her in your arms as you just now held ME—but you will not admit it—not even to yourself—and you pretend to hate when you are mad for love!—just as you pretend to be ill when you are well! You should be ashamed to say there is no such thing as love! What mean you then by playing so false with yourself?—with me?—and with HER?”

She looked lovelier than ever in her anger, and he was taken by surprise at the impetuous and instinctive guess she had made at the complexity of his moods, which he himself scarcely understood. For a moment he stood inert, embarrassed by her straight, half-scornful glance—then he regained his usual mental poise and smiled with provoking good humour and tolerance.

“Temper, Manella!—temper again! A pity, a pity! Your Spanish blood is too fiery, Manella!—it is indeed! You have been very rude—do you know how rude you have been? But there! I forgive you! You are only a naughty child! As for love---”

He paused, and going to the door of the hut looked out.

“Manella, there is a big cloud in the west just over the ocean. It is shaped like a great white eagle and its wings are edged with gold,—it is the beginning of a fine sunset. Come and look at it,— and while we watch it floating along I will talk to you about love!”

She hesitated,—her whole spirit was up in arms against this man whom she loved, and who, so she argued with herself, had allowed her to love HIM, while having no love for HER; and yet,—since Gwent had told her that his mysterious occupation might result in disaster and danger to his life, her devotion had received a new impetus which was wholly unselfish,—that of watchful guardianship such as inspires a faithful dog to defend its master. And, moved by this thought, she obeyed his beckoning hand, and stood with him on the sward outside the hut, looking at the cloud he described. It was singularly white,—new-fallen snow could be no whiter,—and, shaped like a huge bird, its great wings spread out to north and south were edged with a red-gold fire. Seaton pushed an old tree stump into position and sat down upon it, making Manella sit beside him.

“Now for this talk!” he said—“Love is the subject,—Love the theme! We are taught that we must love God and love our neighbor—but we don’t, because we can’t! In the case of God we cannot love what we don’t know and don’t see,—and we cannot love our neighbor because he is often a person whom we DO know and CAN see, and who is extremely offensive. Now let us consider what IS love? You, Manella, are angry because I say there is no such thing—and you accuse me of indulging in love for a woman myself. Yet—I still declare, in spite of you, there is no such thing as love! I ought to be ashamed of myself for saying this—so YOU think!—but I’m not ashamed. I know I’m right! Love is a divine idea, never realised. It is like a ninth new note in the musical scale—not to be attained. It is suggested in the highest forms of poetry and art, but the suggestion can never be carried out. What men and women call ‘love’ is the ordinary attraction of sex,—the same attraction that pulls all male and female living things together and makes them mate. It is very unromantic! And to a man of my mind, very useless.”

She looked at him in a kind of sorrowful perplexity.

“You have much talk”—she said—“and no doubt you are clever. But I think you are all wrong!”

“You do? Wise child! Now listen to my much talk a little longer! Have you ever watched silkworms? No? They are typical examples of humanity. A silkworm, while it is a worm, feeds to repletion,—you can never get it as many mulberry leaves as it would like to eat— then when it is gorged, it builds itself a beautiful house of silk (which is taken away from it in due course) and comes out at the door in wings!—wings it hardly uses and seems not to understand— then, if it is a female moth, it looks about for ‘love’ from the male. If the male ‘loves’ it, the female produces a considerable number of eggs like pin-heads—and then?—what then? Why she promptly dies, and there’s an end of her! Her sole aim and end of being was to produce eggs, which in their turn become worms and repeat the same dull routine of business. Now—think me as brutal as you like—I say a woman is very like a female silkworm,—she comes out of her beautiful silken cocoon of maidenhood with wings which she doesn’t know how to use—she merely flutters about waiting to be ‘loved’—and when this dream she calls ‘love’ comes to her, she doesn’t dream any longer—she wakes—to find her life finished!— finished, Manella!—dry as a gourd with all the juice run out!”

Manella rose from her seat beside him. The warm light in her eyes had gone—her face was pale, and as she drew herself up to her stately height she made a picture of noble scorn.

“I am sorry for you!” she said. “If you think these things your thoughts are quite dreadful! You are a cruel man after all! I am sorry I spoke of the beautiful little lady who came here to see you- you do not love her-you cannot!—I felt sure you did—but I am wrong!—there is no love in you except for yourself and your own will!”

She spoke, breathing quickly, and trembling with suppressed emotion. He smiled,—and, rising, saluted her with a profound bow.

“Thank you, Manella! You give me a true character!—Myself and my own will are certainly the chief factors in my life—and they may work wonders yet!—who knows! And there is no love in me—no!—not what YOU call love!—but—as concerns the ‘beautiful little lady,’ you may know this much of me—THAT I WANT HER!”

He threw out his hands with a gesture that was almost tragic, and such an expression came into his face of savagery and tenderness commingled that Manella retreated from him in vague terror.

“I want her!” he repeated—“And why? Not to ‘love’ her,—but to break her wings,—for she, unlike a silkworm moth, knows how to use them! I want her, to make her proud mind bend to MY will and way!—I want her to show her how a man can, shall, and MUST be master of a woman’s brain and soul!”

A sudden heat of pent-up feeling broke out in this impulsive rush of words;—he checked himself,—and seeing Manella’s pale, scared face he went up to her and took her hand.

“You see, Manella?” he said, in quiet tones—“There is no such thing as ‘love,’ but there is such a thing as ‘wanting.’ And—for the most selfish reasons man ever had—I want HER—not you!”

The colour rushed back to her cheeks in a warm glow—her great dark eyes were ablaze with indignation. She drew her hand quickly from his hold.

“And I hope you will never get her!” she said, passionately—“I will pray the Holy Virgin to save her from you! For you are wicked! She is like an angel—and you are a devil!—yes, surely you must be, or you could not say such horrible things! You do not want me, you say? I know that! I am a fool to have shown you my heart—you have broken it, but you do not care—you could have been master of