Delphi Collected Works of Marie Corelli (Illustrated) (Delphi Series Eight Book 22)

by Marie Corelli

  And the monk Anselmus, proffering spiritual consolation, trembled within himself, knowing the guilt of his own conscience which branded him as the murderer of the dead girl. But he kept his secret and betrayed no sign of his inward torment. And so, like all things sad or pleasant, humorous or pathetic, the little tragedy of a lost life was soon forgotten. No one ever knew that the poor drowned child had had a lover, and certainly no one in their wildest conjectures would have suspected that a monk could be that lover — a monk of austere reputation, who was sometimes called by his brethren “our heavenly sculptor, Anselmus.” Years passed — and his sin had never found him out, save in secret hours when the remembrance of his little dead love’s last look haunted him with a kind of ghostly terror, and he could feel her last kiss upon his hand like a scorching coal of fire. Just in these latter days the thought of her had been so prominent in his brain as to leave him no peace. There was no especial reason why he should perpetually dwell upon the recollection of her sea-blue eyes and child’s smile, yet somehow he could not shut her memory from his mind. And it was because of this constant, remorseful impression and the knowledge of the irreparable wrong he had wrought upon her that he had almost involuntarily told the Abbot that he was unworthy to perform the task for which he was commissioned, namely, to fill the last remaining empty niche in the chancel with the statue of an Angel. Burdened with the hidden weight of his sin, and feeling that even in his most rigorous fastings and penances he was nothing more than a hypocrite in the sight of the All-Knowing God, he wrestled with himself in prayer, and with tears, but all in vain. And even now, abased in supplication before the crucifix, he felt no answering thrill of hope or consolation, so that when he rose from his knees it was with a kind of desperate resignation to the inevitable — a resolve to do the work he was set to do, not with pride or gladness, but by way of punishment. In this spirit — so far removed from the joyous elation of an artist who knows that his hand can accomplish what his brain conceives — he began his labours. Carefully taking the exact measurement of the niche to be filled, he made a similarly sized one of rough wood and set it up in his own workshop or studio, so that he might study its height and breadth and try to realize within his mind the attitude and appearance the “Angel” should assume. Sitting opposite to it, and looking attentively at its interior vacancy, he saw that the figure would have to be life-size, and he presently began to draw on paper in charcoal the suggestion of a form and face, but without success or satisfaction in any actual conception.

  “It is not for me to see divine things!” he said, bitterly. “Such inspiration as I once had is killed at its very source by sin! Shame on my weak soul that it should be trapped by a woman’s eyes! If she had not looked at me? — if her smile had not been so sweet! — if she had resisted my passion she might have saved herself and me!” —

  So he argued — as Adam argued before him— “The woman tempted me.” So will men, in their pitiless egotism, argue in their own defence till time shall be no more.

  All that first afternoon of attempted “work” he sat, weary and puzzled, alternately gazing at the empty niche and at the paper on his drawing-board, where as yet he had only traced a few unmeaning lines. The sun began to sink, and through the broad mullioned windows of his monastic studio he saw the western sky glowing like melted rubies in a belt of sapphire blue. The bright glow flared dazzlingly upon his eyes and made them ache — he covered them with one hand for a minute’s space. Then, uncovering them again, he looked away from the sunset light toward the niche he had been studying all day, and — looking — uttered a smothered cry of mingled terror and rapture and fell on his knees! For the niche was no longer empty — an Angel stood within it! — a Figure delicate, brilliant, and surpassingly beautiful, with folded wings like rays of light on either side, and a Face fair, radiant, and full of an exquisite tenderness such as is never seen on any features of mere mortality. Awed and overwhelmed beyond all power of speech, Anselmus, kneeling, gazed upward at the ravishing Vision which bent its star-like eyes upon him with a look of divine and affectionate compassion. The red glow of the sunset deepened, and within the studio all the lights of heaven seemed transfused, circling gloriously around the one white uplifted Wonder that shone forth from the niche like a lily illumined with some pale hidden fire — then, almost mechanically, Anselmus groped for his pencil and his drawing-board, and trembling with fear, essayed to make a hasty similitude of the gracious Loveliness which, like a beautiful dream, confronted him. But, gradually as the sunset light faded into gray shadow, the vision faded also, and by the time darkness began to steal slowly over all visible things, it had vanished! In a kind of mingled ecstasy and anguish, Anselmus rose slowly from his kneeling attitude — the Angelus was ringing — it was time for him to leave his work for the day and betake himself to prayer and vigil. Like a man too suddenly awakened from deep sleep he walked slowly, absorbed in thought, and the brethren who watched him enter his choir-stall to join them in the singing of the vespers glanced at each other with meaning in their looks, one or two murmuring to each other, “Our Anselmus is at work! He has the air of one inspired by Heaven!”

  The next morning dawned fair and bright, and as soon as the light had fully come Anselmus hastened to his studio. Full of an almost feverish haste and eagerness he caught up the drawing he had attempted — the picture of the visionary Angel — but alas! there was nothing suggestive enough for any attempt at further elaboration or completion, and he flung it aside with a sigh of bitter disappointment. The sun peeped sparkling through the windows, shooting rays of light along the stone floor — and Anselmus, seating himself in his accustomed working place, slowly and half-fearfully raised his eyes toward the niche which on the previous night had held, as he now thought, a dream of his own brain. Then he caught his breath and remained still, not daring to move — for there again — there stood the Angel! In full daylight, and whiter than the whitest cloud tipped by the sun — there, with folded wings and divine, inscrutable smile it waited, as though it sought to be commanded, its delicate hands outstretched in an attitude of mingled protection and blessing! And now Anselmus did not kneel, for, more than ever convinced that this miraculous sight was the chimera of his own mind, he resolved to turn it to use.

  “It is my own creation!” he said. “A vision evoked from my own thoughts, and from my desire to fulfil the task our father Abbot has set upon me. Let me, therefore, work while it is day—” And he did not finish the sentence, “For the night cometh when no man can work.”

  He began to draw, and everything came to him easily as in the former days of his early skill and power — with light and facile touch he soon completed a rough outline of the form and luminous drapery of his heavenly visitant, and then — then, when he attempted to get some idea of the divinely fair face and features his hand trembled — he looked again and again and his heart suddenly failed him! For surely he had seen those eyes before! — that wistful child’s smile! Shuddering as with icy cold he murmured:

  “God have mercy upon me! Spare me my brain, O Lord! Let me not go mad until my work is done! Is this Thy punishment? — and can the dead arise before Thy Judgment Day? It is not yet the time! — not yet!”

  His eyes smarted with the pain of unshed tears as he lifted them to the Angel in the niche — a Vision silent as the light itself, but expressive of all sweetness, all patience. Seeing that it did not move, but remained quite still as though it were in very truth a model, posed for his study and treatment, he fell to work again with a sort of passion that consumed his energies as though with a devouring fire.

  Day after day he toiled unceasingly, giving himself scarcely any leisure for food or sleep, and for the first time in his life almost grudging the hours he was compelled to pass in the duties of his religious Order. Day after day, with miraculous fidelity, the Angel stood in the niche confronting him, and never stirred! Treating the vision as a delusion or imaginary creation of his own brain, he worked from it steadily, knowing th
at it was a perfect presentment of the ideal “Angel” he sought to create — and very soon after his drawings were made he began to mould the figure in clay. Slowly, but surely, it grew up in his hands toward a beautiful completeness, and still the Angel stayed with him, apparently watching with steadfast, sweet eyes the modelling of its own likeness.

  More than a month passed in this way, and the Angel in the niche became so much a part of the life and work of Anselmus that he could not imagine himself able to accomplish any good thing without the influence of its shining presence. The autumn deepened into winter — the withered leaves fell in rustling heaps on the gravel-paths and disfigured the smooth green grass-walks round the monastery, and bitter winds blew from the northeast, bringing sudden gusts of sleet and snow. The bare room or studio where Anselm us worked became very cold — sometimes he felt a chill as of death upon him while modelling the figure of his “Angel” in the damp clay. Yet from the niche, where the heavenly Vision faithfully remained, streamed an unearthly light that was almost warmth, and Anselmus would have died rather than have left the spot for a better room in the monastery, which the Abbot had offered him in kindly solicitude for his health.

  “We do not seek to know what you are doing,” he said, “nor would we look upon your work till you yourself summon us to see it finished. But you appear to suffer — you are worn to the merest shadow of a man! Let me entreat you, my son, to take more care and rest — or cease work for a while—”

  “No, no!” interrupted Anselmus, excitedly. “I cannot cease work, or I must cease to live! I am well — quite well! Have no trouble concerning me — let me finish my task, or else the Angel” — here he smiled a strange, bewildered smile— “Yes, the Angel may leave me!”

  The Abbot was puzzled by his manner, but forbore to press any further advice upon him, though both he and all the brethren of the Abbey noticed with deep and regretful concern that their “heavenly sculptor” seemed stricken with some strange mortal illness which, though he did not complain of any ailment, was visibly breaking him down.

  Things went better for him, and he appeared to suffer less, when, having finished his model in the clay, he began to hew out his “Angel” in stone. He was an adept at this kind of hard work, and the physical exertion needed for it did him good and restored to him something of his old vigour and elasticity. From dawn to dusk every day he worked steadily and ardently, and from dawn to dusk every day the radiant Vision filled the niche and adorned it with rays of light more brilliant than the sunbeams. From dawn to dusk the sweet, mysterious Angel-eyes watched him as he hammered and carved the rigid stone, forming it into an apparently pliable grace and beauty, till at last the day came when, having spent all his thought and energy on the last few fine perfecting touches — looking every moment at the delicate features, the eyes, and divine smile of his visionary model, and making sure that he had rendered them as faithfully as only a great artist can, he realized that his task was done. Throwing down his tools, he fell on his knees, stretching out his hands in an agony of appeal. For there was now no longer any need to try and deceive himself, or to feign to his own accusing conscience that he had not recognized the face he had sculptured, the sweet lips he had so tenderly chiselled, the dimple in the soft cheek, the drooping eyelids — he knew it well! — it was the face of an Angel truly or the face of a Vision — but more than all it was the face of the little dead girl who had loved him and given him all her life.

  “Angel of my soul!” he murmured. “Angel of my dreams! Spirit of my work! Speak to me! Oh, speak, and tell me why you are here! — why you have stayed so patiently and long! — you, who are the heavenly likeness of one whom I wronged! — why have you come to me?”

  There followed a moment’s silence — a silence so tense and deep as to be fraught with ineffable torment to the mind of the suffering man. Then the answer came — in a voice sweeter than the sound of a crystal bell:

  “Because I love you!”

  Thrilled by these words, and gazing upward, he met the sea-blue radiance of those angelic eyes in mingled fear and rapture.

  “Because I love you!” repeated the Voice. “Because I have always loved you!”

  He heard — incredulous.

  “I am mad! — or dreaming!” he whispered, tremulously. “This Miracle speaks as She would have spoken!”

  “Love is the only miracle!” went on the Voice.

  “It cannot die — it is immortal! Oh, my Beloved! Your sin before God was not the breaking of a religious vow but the breaking of a human heart — the ruin of a human life! — a heart that trusted you! — a life that gave itself to you!”

  The unhappy monk wrung his hands in despair.

  “Punish me!” he cried. “Wreak lightning vengeance now upon me, O Angel of the Most High! Slay me with one look of those sweet eyes, O spirit of my murdered love! Let me not live to lose the memory of this day!”

  The figure of the Angel stirred — its folded wings quivered and began to expand slowly like great fans of light on either side.

  “Love has no vengeance in its hands!” said the Voice, in accents surpassingly tender. “All is pardoned, my Beloved! — all is finished save the story of our joy which no mortal shall ever know! — a joy beginning but never ending! Out of my death I give you life, and for the wrong you wrought upon my soul, I bring you, in the Name of God, pardon and peace! Beloved, your work is done!”

  And now the radiant Form rose slowly, like a fine mist coloured through by the rays of the sun — it floated out of the niche where it had stood so long and patiently, and soaring upward, upward, melted away on a flashing stream of light into vaporous air.

  Late that evening, as Anselmus did not appear in his place at vespers, some of the brethren sought the Abbot’s permission to go to his studio and see if anything ailed him. The Abbot himself readily accompanied them, and by the light of a pale moon they found their “heavenly sculptor” lying unconscious before the empty niche, while standing on a rough pedestal was the completed statue of an angel, more angelic in form and feature than any they had ever yet seen. Full of wonder and compassion, they raised the sculptor’s senseless body and bore him to his cell, where after some hours he revived sufficiently to recognize his surroundings and to express with pathetic humility his gratitude for the Abbot’s fatherly solicitude and the brethren’s anxious care. He was too feeble and ill to suffer much converse, therefore they humoured him in his evident desire to be spared all praise for the noble work of art he had achieved. All he would say when the Abbot expressed his admiration and reverence for what he justly considered the most perfect statue of an angel that had ever adorned any church was:

  “God made it — not I!”

  And he lay quiet for many days, without the strength to move — till at last the hours wore peacefully on to the blessed time of Christ’s Nativity. Anselmus, brooding on this, began to rouse himself from his painful torpor and feebleness — nothing should prevent him, he said, with gentle, smiling earnestness, from standing in the choir with his “Angel” on Christmas Day!

  So when the glorious morning came he went to Mass, supported by two of the brethren, one on each side to guide his faltering steps, and took his own place, his stall being immediately opposite the niche where his sculptured Angel was now set up in all its glory — a beauteous figure so instinct with genius as to be almost living, stretching out its hands in Peace and Blessing. White, worn, and weary, Anselmus was the centre of sorrowful interest among all the brethren who looked upon him — his thin, intellectual face and great burning eyes suggested some haunting tragedy in his brain — and they watched him in a kind of fear, feeling that he had about him the sense of something supernatural and strange.

  The music surged around him, and the chanting voices of the monks made a deep, rhythmic wave of melody upon the air; the light through the stained-glass windows glittered and glowed, throwing long rays of purple and emerald, rose and blue across the steps of the altar, and Anselmus listened, lookin
g at all things vaguely as one far off may look from some great height at the little plots of land and houses spread below — wondering within himself at the curious impression he had of unreality in all these sights and sounds, and more conscious of the statue of his Angel opposite to him than of anything else. The stately ritual went on till it reached the supreme moment of the oblation of the Host, when all were seated with heads bent in profound meditation and prayer. The bell rang, and the resonant voices of the brethren chanted solemnly— “Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus! Dominus Deus Sabaoth ! Plein sunt coeli et terra gloria tuai” — when Anselmus, suddenly looking up, was struck across the eyes, as it were, by lightning. Thrilled by the shock, he sprang to his feet. There, on a shaft of dazzling luminance far brighter than the day, and poised on radiant wings between him and the statue he had wrought, was the Angel of his vision! — the Angel with the face of the little maiden he had wronged — the Angel of his inspiration — the Angel of his finished work! Ah, what tenderness now in the sea-blue eyes! — what sweetness in the divine smile! — what heavenly welcome in the outstretched arms and beckoning white hands!

  “Beloved! — Beloved!” he cried, then with a choking sound in his throat he staggered and fell forward. The chanting ceased — the Abbot at the altar paused, with the sacred chalice in his hand — the brethren gathered hastily round the prone figure in consternation and sorrow — but all was over. Anselmus was dead.

  A cloud swept across the sun, and for a moment the chancel was darkened, then, while two of the monks knelt by the fallen man and gently covered his face, the Abbot, with tears rising thickly in his eyes, again lifted the chalice. The sun came out anew, shining brilliantly through the chancel and lighting up the Angel-statue with a sudden whiteness as of snow, and with trembling voices the brethren resumed the interrupted service, making the arches of the noble Abbey resound and respond to a mystic Truth which the world is slow to recognize —