CHAPTER XLII

Briareus reddening angrily over the sea—­what is that vaporous Titan?  And Hesper set in his rosy garland—­why looks he so implacably sweet?  It is that one has left that bright home to go forth and do cloudy work, and he has got a stain with which he dare not return.  Far in the West fair Lucy beckons him to come.  Ah, heaven! if he might!  How strong and fierce the temptation is! how subtle the sleepless desire! it drugs his reason, his honour.  For he loves her; she is still the first and only woman to him.  Otherwise would this black spot be hell to him? otherwise would his limbs be chained while her arms are spread open to him.  And if he loves her, why then what is one fall in the pit, or a thousand?  Is not love the password to that beckoning bliss?  So may we say; but here is one whose body has been made a temple to him, and it is desecrated.

A temple, and desecrated!  For what is it fit for but for a dance of devils?  His education has thus wrought him to think.

He can blame nothing but his own baseness.  But to feel base and accept the bliss that beckons—­he has not fallen so low as that.

Ah, happy English home! sweet wife! what mad miserable Wisp of the Fancy led him away from you, high in his conceit?  Poor wretch! that thought to be he of the hundred hands, and war against the absolute Gods.  Jove whispered a light commission to the Laughing Dame; she met him; and how did he shake Olympus? with laughter?

Sure it were better to be Orestes, the Furies howling in his ears, than one called to by a heavenly soul from whom he is for ever outcast.  He has not the oblivion of madness.  Clothed in the lights of his first passion, robed in the splendour of old skies, she meets him everywhere; morning, evening, night, she shines above him; waylays him suddenly in forest depths; drops palpably on his heart.  At moments he forgets; he rushes to embrace her; calls her his beloved, and lo, her innocent kiss brings agony of shame to his face.

Daily the struggle endured.  His father wrote to him, begging him by the love he had for him to return.  From that hour Richard burnt unread all the letters he received.  He knew too well how easily he could persuade himself:  words from without might tempt him and quite extinguish the spark of honourable feeling that tortured him, and that he clung to in desperate self-vindication.

To arrest young gentlemen on the downward slope is both a dangerous and thankless office.  It is, nevertheless, one that fair women greatly prize, and certain of them professionally follow.  Lady Judith, as far as her sex would permit, was also of the Titans in their battle against the absolute Gods; for which purpose, mark you, she had married a lord incapable in all save his acres.  Her achievements she kept to her own mind:  she did not look happy over them.  She met Richard accidentally in Paris; she