273

THE FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH

A ROMANCE OF THE SUPERNATURAL.

By Mrs. Elia W. Peattie

It may have been a week later, or a month- I have no means of knowing- when I again came to a "consciousness of life. I listened for the groans, the cries of the fighting and dying men, and the tumult of the waters. But no such sound came to my ears. There was no sound, in fact, except the dull buzzing of bees, languorously inviting me to slumber.

The room in which I lay was the one I had been accustomed to since I lived in the house of De Vega, but the twilight and the sound of those buzzing wings in the sun told me that it had been darkened by artificial means.

The dull hours passed and no one came to disturb me. I had no wants, I suffered no pain. Now and then I took a draught from the pitcher which stood near me, swathed in wet cloths, to keep the water cool. I felt no impatience, for it took me a long time to remember all that had happened and all that I had feared. It was even some time before I remembered what I feared for my love. When at last that stinging though did come I leaped from the bed and called aloud. My head felt strange and light, but I had no pain, and I managed to reach the press where my clothes were kept. A minute later the doorway were pushed back and Bryan entered.

For a moment I did not know him. His face presented to me a baffling paradox. It was younger and handsome than I had ever seen it before, and yet it wore a look of profound melancholy-and something more-perhaps it was despair. For a moment I could not think where I had seen anything like it. Then I recollected that marble runner which stood within the door of Opaka's house, with his beautiful young face turned toward the sun, yet clouded with an unquenchable distress.

"Bryan," I cried, and I put force enough into my words to make them a shout, though they seemed to come from my lips with faintness. "Tell me how it ended. Tell me what has become of-of-" For some reason, the name which was so familiar and dear could not be spoken. I chocked over it, and felt my throat fill up. Bryan moved toward me with that elastic step, and putting his strong arm around me, led me back to the couch. I sunk on it and gazed up at him, my eyes I am sure, pleading for the information for which I dared not ask again.

My friend straightened himself and looked down at me. That fine body of his seemed to protest some way against its strength. Those powerful shoulders stoped under the weight of a sorrow. All the sick soul [word] him cried out palpably against the detested physical vigor which kept that soul in the encasement it had grown to loathe. I realized this as fully then, before he spoke a word, as I did afterward when I knew all.

"We were defeated," he said,
"Bridges is dead, and he made me go back to the Girl and take her word of how it happened. Our cause was lost and that black priest sits grinning in the statehouse this moment, planning a punishment for us."

He knew he was not telling me what I most wanted to know. He saw my helpless, suffering anger in my eyes. And yet he went on:

"Our friends died by the score, Shadwin-those splendid fellows-and the sour followers of the priest met with victory everywhere. There seemed to be a fatality in it." I could stand no more. A wave of terror swept over me and turned me into a mad man.

"Bryan," I shrieked hoarsely, "I can wait no longer, I can stand no more! Tell me"-

"I will tell you," shrieked back Bryan, hardly more sane than myself. "She is dead. They dragged her from her home. I followed with the rest. She was taken to that hideous plane, and struggled up the words of that fowl flower with her sweet hands, and put her lips-her dear lips, Shadiwn-to that deadly syrup, and then the leaves writhed up, and her white body was within. She did not cry out. I saw nothing more. But believe me, Shadwin, if I suffered for myself, I suffered more for you"

That was all he said. And I had the courage to ask no more. We sat together for hours in silence, brooding. At night he gave me a book, a strange and antique palimpsest of parchment, originally the monkish record of uncouth miracles, but written over in ancient Spanish by the hand of my dead love. The faded brown ink of the original was barely visible beneath the fresh markings of the purple mangrove stains in which Opaka had written her fancies.

I dare not say what madness might have followed for me, but it turned out; fortunately enough, under the circumstances, that as soon as my recovery from my winds was learned of, we were summoned to the state house. We knew very well what that meant.

"There is only one thing for it." I said to Shadwin, "and that is escape. I care little enough for life now. God knows, but I will not die at the hands of these savages."

"Escape is impossible," Bryan protested. "Do you imagine for a moment that we would be able to find our way back through that interminable slough. And now, how hard would we die! Fancy, if you can, with these staunch bodies what the torments of starvation would be! Health rioting in us, and we starving! No man living was ever subjected to torture such as that. No fable of sufferings, not even that of Prometheus, can equal it. I dare not try to return. Neither of us knows where lies that mysterious path by which we entered this accursed island."

The sky was a melting blue. It seemed to hang over the mountain and valley caressingly. The air was luscious with the scent of orange blossoms. Birds, silent, but of exquisite plumage, swept down slowly on the flowering trees. The scene was fair as paradise. It might have been a deathless paradise if death had not been introduced by the barbarity of man. But because death came in that way, because it represented revenge and hate and unholy love, the paradise became accursed.

Bryan was right in calling it so, and yet I knew that was not what Opaka would have thought.

"The uses of sin," Opaka used to say, "are apparent only to the wise. It is sin which makes innocence. It is sin which makes heaven possible."

We were sitting together in the garden, in one of those melancholy bowers that cypresses can make when the moss and the vines droop from them.

"There is something creeping under that bush," I said to Bryan, "and I think it is a serpent. Move cautiously. Rise, but not suddenly."

The sounds which had attracted my attention ceased but I felt there was something breathing near me, and arming myself with a stick, I pried into the thicket. And I found something. It was Sin, thinner than I had seen him before, and with a mournful look in his pretty animal eyes. I dragged him out with some roughness, and setting him on his feet, shook him till his tough little test clattered in his head.

"Are you a serpent that you crawl on your belly?" cried I angrily, speaking in his tongue. "Men of the Tiger tribe walk erect before other men. If you are a Tiger and not a snake, speak out! Where have you been for these long days? What do you know listening and creeping like a coward?"

The sharply bronze head drooped on his breast, but pride made the slight body rigid. A negro of this age would not have twisted and fawned and sulked. But a young hawk could not have been fiercer and more haughty than Sin. When he did raise his head his eyes met mine with a stare that would have done credit to an English prince.

"I know where lies the road through the swamp. I will lead you to the hammock land of the Tigers. I will be the guide of my white brothers to the Big Cypress swamp." He grew in height as he spoke. I could not tell whether my admiration or my amusement predominated.

"Do you mean what you say, little brother?" cried Bryan. "Can you really take us through the swamp? Remember it is many suns' journey."

"A Tiger," replied Sin, "never forgets the way over which he has once walked. I can guide you in safety. Will you come?"

"We will come, replied Bryan, mournfully, "this very night."

I could say nothing. Now, that the opportunity offered I hesitated to leave the spot where I had found the joy of life. That joy seemed still to encompass me. The intoxication of Opaka's love lingered with me. Yet my reason told me it was but death to stay. And I was no morbid creature. I did not desire death, even though the sweetest part of my life was gone.

Bryan and I went together, at dusk, through quiet ways, to Opaka's house. The beautiful court, where the marble runner lifted his longing face, stood silent. The fountain was not playing. The pool lay in the shadow. I went for a moment to the room where I had spent those hours of poignant suffering and exquisite delight with Opaka. The couch with its purple coverlet was disturbed, and it bore the imprint of my dear love's form. On the chair lay a long white mantle which she wore often on the street. A pair of quill-trimmed moccasins rested near. I picked them up and kissed them. No servants were to be found, though I wandered over the house and through the garden; but I did find, weeping by a magnolia bush, one of the little maiden's who used to follow in Opaka's train.

"For whom do you weep?" I asked.

"For the Lady Opaka, who was my friend," she answered sobbing.

"Let me kiss your hands," I said. "For I also weep for her."

She put up her hands, and I kissed them on the palms, I saw they were red as if they had been stained with blood. For a moment I drew back from them. Then cried:

"Are you not called the Oriole?"

"It is my name."

"You know that my companion is dead-he whom we called Bridges? I do not know what name you called him by."

She lifted up a pair of mournful and beautiful eyes.

"I know that he is dead. He died for the Lady Opaka. I weep also for him."

I made no answer. Bryan and I walked away together.

"He was a merry fellow--was Bridges. It was hard to think that he should have had to become so terribly serious at last."

"But he never was serious," interposed Bryan. "When he found that death faced him, he looked quite as merry as we have seen him many a time since we met him first, 'I want to do the proper thing' he said, 'I want to send my love to somebody, It ought to be to the Oriole. She was my last love. But somehow, my heart goes back to the Girl. I get in such a habit of loving the Girl, that it was hard to break it off. You know where she lives and who she is. If ever you get out of this land of mysteries to place where men die when they get through

TEA GOWN, BALL DRESS AND HOME COSTUME. At the right is a lilac crepon tea gown with pointed yoke of white velvet embroidered in gold. At the left is a home dress of old rose costume. Down the front there is a fold of the material with chocolate-colored buttons. In the center is a mauve silk crepon evening gown with a line of mink fur and prune bows.

THE FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH

A ROMANCE OF THE SUPERNATURAL.

By Mrs. Elia W. Peattie

It may have been a week later, or a month- I have no means of knowing- when I again came to a "consciousness of life. I listened for the groans, the cries of the fighting and dying men, and the tumult of the waters. But no such sound came to my ears. There was no sound, in fact, except the dull buzzing of bees, languorously inviting me to slumber.

The room in which I lay was the one I had been accustomed to since I lived in the house of De Vega, but the twilight and the sound of those buzzing wings in the sun told me that it had been darkened by artificial means.

The dull hours passed and no one came to disturb me. I had no wants, I suffered no pain. Now and then I took a draught from the pitcher which stood near me, swathed in wet cloths, to keep the water cool. I felt no impatience, for it took me a long time to remember all that had happened and all that I had feared. It was even some time before I remembered what I feared for my love. When at last that stinging though did come I leaped from the bed and called aloud. My head felt strange and light, but I had no pain, and I managed to reach the press where my clothes were kept. A minute later the doorway were pushed back and Bryan entered.

For a moment I did not know him. His face presented to me a baffling paradox. It was younger and handsome than I had ever seen it before, and yet it wore a look of profound melancholy-and something more-perhaps it was despair. For a moment I could not think where I had seen anything like it. Then I recollected that marble runner which stood within the door of Opaka's house, with his beautiful young face turned toward the sun, yet clouded with an unquenchable distress.

"Bryan," I cried, and I put force enough into my words to make them a shout, though they seemed to come from my lips with faintness. "Tell me how it ended. Tell me what has become of-of-" For some reason, the name which was so familiar and dear could not be spoken. I chocked over it, and felt my throat fill up. Bryan moved toward me with that elastic step, and putting his strong arm around me, led me back to the couch. I sunk on it and gazed up at him, my eyes I am sure, pleading for the information for which I dared not ask again.

My friend straightened himself and looked down at me. That fine body of his seemed to protest some way against its strength. Those powerful shoulders stoped under the weight of a sorrow. All the sick soul [word] him cried out palpably against the detested physical vigor which kept that soul in the encasement it had grown to loathe. I realized this as fully then, before he spoke a word, as I did afterward when I knew all.

"We were defeated," he said,
"Bridges is dead, and he made me go back to the Girl and take her word of how it happened. Our cause was lost and that black priest sits grinning in the statehouse this moment, planning a punishment for us."

He knew he was not telling me what I most wanted to know. He saw my helpless, suffering anger in my eyes. And yet he went on:

"Our friends died by the score, Shadwin-those splendid fellows-and the sour followers of the priest met with victory everywhere. There seemed to be a fatality in it." I could stand no more. A wave of terror swept over me and turned me into a mad man.

"Bryan," I shrieked hoarsely, "I can wait no longer, I can stand no more! Tell me"-

"I will tell you," shrieked back Bryan, hardly more sane than myself. "She is dead. They dragged her from her home. I followed with the rest. She was taken to that hideous plane, and struggled up the words of that fowl flower with her sweet hands, and put her lips-her dear lips, Shadiwn-to that deadly syrup, and then the leaves writhed up, and her white body was within. She did not cry out. I saw nothing more. But believe me, Shadwin, if I suffered for myself, I suffered more for you"

That was all he said. And I had the courage to ask no more. We sat together for hours in silence, brooding. At night he gave me a book, a strange and antique palimpsest of parchment, originally the monkish record of uncouth miracles, but written over in ancient Spanish by the hand of my dead love. The faded brown ink of the original was barely visible beneath the fresh markings of the purple mangrove stains in which Opaka had written her fancies.

I dare not say what madness might have followed for me, but it turned out; fortunately enough, under the circumstances, that as soon as my recovery from my winds was learned of, we were summoned to the state house. We knew very well what that meant.

"There is only one thing for it." I said to Shadwin "and that is escape I care little enough for life now, God knows but I will not die at the hands of these savages."

"Escape is impossible" Bryan protested. "Do you imagine for a moment that we would be able to find our way back through that interminable slough and now, how hard would we die! Fancy, if you can, with these stauch bodies what the torments of starvation would be! Health rioting in us, and we starving! No man living was ever subjected to torture such as that. No fable of sufferings, not even that of Prometheus, can equal it. I dare not try to return. Neither of us knows where lies that mysterious path by which we entered this accursed island."

The sky was a melting blue. It seemed to hang over the mountain and valley caressingly. The air was luscious with the scent of orange blossoms. Birds, silent, but of exquisite plumage, swept down slowly on the flowering trees. The scene was fair as paradise. It might have been a deathless paradise if death had not been introduced by the barbarity of man. But because death came in that way, because it represented revenge and hate and unholy love, the paradise became accursed.

Bryan was right in calling it so, and yet I knew that was not what Opaka would have thought.

"The uses of sin." Opaka used to say "are apparent only to the wise. It is sin which makes innocence. It is sin which makes heaven possible."

We were sitting together in the garden, in one of those melancholy bowers that cypresses can make when the moss and the vines droop from them.

"There is something creeping under that bush." I said to Bryan; "and I think it is a serpent. Move cautiously, Rise, but not suddenly."

The sounds which had attracted my attention ceased but I felt there was something breathing near me, and arming myself with a stick, I pried into the thicket. And I found something. It was Sin, thinner than I had seen him before, and with a mournful look in his pretty animal eyes. I dragged him out with some roughness, and setting him on his feet, shook him till his tough little test clattered in his head.

"Are you a serpent that you crawl on your belly?" cried I angrily, speaking in his tongue. "Men of the Tiger tribe walk erect before other men. If you are a Tiger and not a snake, speak out! Where have you been for these long days? What do you know listening and creeping like a coward?"

The sharply bronze head drooped on his breast, but pride made the slight body rigid. A negro of this age would not have twisted and fawned and sulked. But a young hawk could not have been fiercer and more haughty than Sin. When he did raise his head his eyes met mine with a stare that would have done credit to an English prince.

"I know where lies the road through the swamp. I will lead you to the hammock land of the Tigers. I will be the guide of my white brothers to the Big Cypress swamp." He grew in height as he spoke. I could not tell whether my admiration or my amusement predominated.

"Do you mean what you say, little brother?" cried Bryan. "Can you really take us through the swamp? Remember it is many suns' journey."

"A Tiger," replied Sin, 'never forgets the way over which he has once walked. I can guide you in safety. Will you come?"

"We will come, replied Bryan, mournfully, "this very night."

I could say nothing. Now, that the opportunity offered I hesitated to leave the spot where I had found the joy of life. That joy seemed still to encompass me. The intoxication of Opaka's love lingered with me. Yet my reason told me it was but death to stay. And I was no morbid creature. I did not desire death, even though the sweetest part of my life was gone.

Bryan and I went together, at dusk through quiet ways, to Opaka's house. The beautiful court, where the marble runner lifted his longing face, stood silent. The fountain was not playing. The pool lay in the shadow. I went for a moment to the room where I had spent those hours of poignant suffering and exquisite delight with Opaka. The couch with its purple coverlet was disturbed, and it bore the imprint of my dear love's form. On the chair lay a long white mantle which she wore often on the street. A pair of quill-trimmed moccasins rested near. I picked them up and kissed them. No servants were to be found, though I wandered over the house and through the garden but I did find, weeping by a magnolia bush, one of the little maiden's who used to follow in Opaka's train.

"For whom do you weep?" I asked.

"For the Lady Opaka, who was my friend." she answered sobbing.

"Let me kiss your hands," I said "For I also weep for her."

She put up her hands, and I kissed them on the palms, I saw they were red as if they had been stained with blood. For a moment I drew back from them. Then cried:

"Are you not called the Oriole?"

"It is my name."

"You know that my companion is dead-he whom we called Bridges?" I do not know what name you called him by."

She lifted up a pair of mournful and beautiful-eyes.

"I know that he is dead. He died for the Lady Opaka. I weep also for him" I made no answer. Bryan and I walked away together.

"He was a merry fellow-was Bridges. It was hard to think that he should have had to become so terribly serious at last."

"But he never 'was serious" Interposed Bryan. "When he found that death faced him, he looked quite as merry as we have seen him many a time since we met him first, 'I want to do the proper thing' he said, 'I want to send my love to somebody, It ought to be to the Oriole. She was my last love. But somehow, my heart goes back to the Girl. I get in such of habit of loving the Girl, that it was hard to break it off. Yor know where she lives and who she is. If ever you get out of this land of mysteries to place where men die when they get through

TEA GOWN, BALL DRESS AND HOME COSTUME. At the right is a lilac crepon tea gown with pointed yoke of white velvet embroidered in gold. At the left is a home dress of old rose costume. Down the front there is a fold of the material with chocolate-colored buttons. In the center is a mauve silk crepon evening gown with a line of mink fur and prune bows.