Complete Works of George Moore

by George Moore

  CHAPTER 40.

  BUT BEFORE GOING on further with the story, Alec, I think I would like to give my legs a stretch. If your honour has a match about you I’d be glad to have a shaugh at the pipe. I’d like a smoke, too, I answered, a cigarette! A cigar will take too long; and to keep Alec in good humour I spoke of Liadin and Curithir and the throbbing love night they had passed together, and Alec promised to give me his opinion of my story when I had finished it. I like the stipulation; and, Alec, you’re a good listener. A story-teller must know how to listen, he answered, for ’tis out of stories a story comes. A maxim that deserves all my congratulations, I said, and as soon as we had finished smoking, I reminded him that Lilith, after exchanging shapes with Lucifer, coiled herself into a tree within hearing distance of the flowering bank on which Adam and Eve were sitting, Adam looking into the depths of the wood disconsolate, making up a story about a little bird that might come hopping along the branches and let out the secret to him. A welcome bird he would be, by my faith, cherished by the two of us, and allowed to eat his fill of the fruit trees. But neither bird nor beast will come to our aid, and Adam continued to sit with his eyes averted from Eve, who, having pity for him, was thinking what she could say to console him, but everything that came into her head she threw out as likely to wound his feelings; till at last the silence seemed to her to be worse than anything she could say, and convinced that she could not leave him thinking any more she began talking to him about Lilith. And as soon as the name passed her lips she began saying to herself that Adam would not like to speak of Lilith, who might have left him for the reason that he did not know what the birds knew and all the beasts.

  But she was wrong in this, for Adam liked talking about Lilith, and Eve was glad to see his face brighten, although it was hard to keep her jealousy from gathering in her face. She talked about Lilith soothingly, saying that she believed her to be a woman tall and thin as far as one could see through the mist that was about her always. ’Tis as if thou hadst seen her, Adam chimed in, for she would steal upon me like a mist in which I could see only a beautiful line of chin and ear; like those hills far away in the blue distance, he said. It was never in waking but in dreams that thou knewest her, Eve said. In dreams and between dreaming and waking.... Yet we walked in the garden together. You spoke together? Eve queried, and Adam told Eve that he remembered Lilith’s voice and her silences. I do not know how she came, or whether it was out of the sky or out of the trees, but she came to me. And thou wast happy with her? I was happy and I was unhappy, Adam answered. Dost think, Adam, Eve asked sadly, that I was made to make thee unhappy? Ah, Eve, thou art blaming me now as Lilith used to do, Adam answered, and I’m thinking that all women are alike. I will try to tell thee everything, but it is hard to tell Lilith, for she is only clear to a man when he is not thinking about her at all. As soon as he tries to see or hear her she has gone. I would tell all I know lest thou shouldst think that I am keeping something back. Adam, I understand. But I haven’t told thee that my love for thee is different from my love for her. I only loved her as we love the clouds; thou’rt here and kind and good, but Lilith was cruel and wicked, and when she was here she was yonder too. I could not lay hold on her, but thou I canst hold and see and hear. She was only a beam of moonlight. I read in thine eyes that a gleam from the moon is better than the shining of midday to a man. Why wouldst thou put thoughts into my head that were never there? she said.

  If I am satisfied, why shouldst thou be dissatisfied? I will try to be satisfied, he replied, and if anybody canst help me it is thou, with thy sweet, gentle eyes and kindly hands. Lay thy hand upon my forehead for my head is hot, I wouldst sleep a little, but before I sleep, tell me, Eve, that knowledge is not always better than ignorance and that if we knew what the birds and beasts know and the knowledge gave us offspring our happiness would not be greater than it has been. And he gazed into her eyes as if he would read her answer therein. I love thee well enough to live with thee, though my life go by without offspring, her eyes said.

  At that moment two doves came down from the branches, love being easier on the ground than at perch. If he turn his head, she said, and sees those birds, the sight of them will recall Iahveh’s commandment. Would that they were not so noisy in their love, she continued to herself, the wood resounds with their kisses; if he turn his head he will deem the birds were sent to make a mock of him. Alas, said Adam, turning at the moment when the cock was treading the hen, these birds are more knowledgeable than we are. Shall we take our knowledge from them, and kiss as they kiss? And Eve, nothing loth, took Adam in her arms, and having kissed as they had seen the doves kiss, and suffered thereby many great and terrible piercings, she fell back in front of him like the hen. But Adam in this last moment remembered Iahveh’s commandment, and a gloom beset his face. It may be that we shall be guilty of some great transgression, he said. Of what transgression shall we be guilty? Eve asked. Adam could not answer her, and so they sat estranged from each other until, unable to bear the estrangement any longer, Adam ran away through the trees up the steep path to the praying stone, leaving Eve absorbed in the thought that it might fall out that the end of all this would be that they would live on different sides of the garden, seeing each other in glimpses only, she said, and she asked herself if the meaning behind it all was that Iahveh created her so that he might punish Adam because he had not joined him against Lucifer.

  The thought that it might be so brought tears to her eyelids and she retired into the grove and wept unrestrainedly; and when there were no more tears for her to weep, her heart was moved to a great pity for the man who could not live enjoying things as they went by, but must needs pray. He will not come to me, said her failing heart, but she waited for him till the moonlight vanished. He will not come to me; he fears Iahveh more than he loves me. Ah! now he has fallen back, overcome with weariness, but as soon as he awakes he will pray again. If I do not leave some fruit for him he will not eat to-morrow.

  CHAPTER 41.

  HE HAS PUT the river between us, and we shall not see each other again but in glimpses, Eve said, as she walked absorbed in the mystery of God and man, asking herself why Iahveh should trouble himself as to their conduct on earth; for having exiled Adam, it would seem that he should be content to allow them to live according to the ways of the earth. She repeated the sacred name, and her unconcern in it reminded her of Adam’s alarm when she had repeated it casually after hearing it from him for the first time.

  Iahveh is always the centre of Adam’s thoughts, she muttered, and the stone altar came into her thoughts, and the day he had been propelled thither by fear of Iahveh; but there had been no fear in her mind; she had prayed because she had to live with Adam, and having to live with him, she must make herself according to his likeness as far as possible. But if Iahveh comes between us always, there is no life for me; and the task of winning him from Iahveh seemed beyond her strength. But if I can discover the secret he withholds from us, his power over Adam will be lessened, she said; and she roamed the garden, continuing her search, sure at noon that love was stronger than hate, but at night, lying where they had so often lain together on the bank under the fig-trees, she cried: Iahveh is over all, and missing Adam by her when she awoke, tears flowed over her eyelids again; she often thought that her heart would break, and it might have broken if her courage had been less than her love. My task is to save him, she said, from Iahveh, and if I am borne away and dashed against the rocks, and whirled on and on till darkness falls over me, our troubles will be ended.

  It was with these very words, Alec, that she turned down the hill-side towards the river, and finding a place that seemed shallow she waded into the stream, but did not reach the middle of it, when she slipped into a deep swirl of waters against which she strove but was sucked under and came up again and sank again, all the while sore afraid that she would never look upon Adam again, which she would not have done if he had not come to her and put his hand under her chin, in that way upholding
her.

  Neither to that bank must I take thee, Adam said, nor to the bank on which I left thee. But there are rocks in the middle of the stream, and upon them thou and I can talk if thou wishest to talk to me. If I wish to talk to thee? she repeated, and her look smote him to the heart. Why didst thou venture into the river and it in flood? he asked, when they were seated on the rocks. I was looking for thee, she said. The fruits I left for thee by the praying stone were untouched, so it cannot be else, I said to myself, than that he has put the river between us. And was not that well done? Adam replied. Should we not be thankful to Iahveh that he set a river flowing through Eden: for it is his will that we must live asunder like a pair of trees lest we break his commandment.

  Everything must be as thou wouldst wish it to be, Adam. But how are we to live apart?

  We shall have to make two hoards of fruit, Adam replied, on which we shall live through the winter when there is little fruit, or none at all, on the trees. But I know not how to make a hoard. I will teach thee. The grapes will be ripe in a month from now, and they must be gathered and dried in the sun; the figs the same. The apples too may be saved. We shall sit on these stones, for this is the meering; and thou’lt learn from me how these things may be done and to live without me. Thou’lt be lonely, no doubt, without me; the days will seem long and the nights too; but there is no other way. It shall be as thou sayest, she answered, and her arms went about him: it shall be as thou sayest. But do not make it harder for me, Adam said, and to disguise his great love of her he plunged into the pool. But after a little while he returned to her. We must try and bear our lives and live them as Iahveh seems to have willed that we should live them. Thou shalt live on the right bank of the river and I on the left bank, but we shall meet here on these rocks, he said, and I will instruct thee about the drying of fruits and thou canst make thyself comfortable in the hut that we built last autumn together. I shall build another hut on my side. But tell me, she said, how I may reach my bank. The current frightens me. I will swim with thee through the places where the river is deep and strong, and when thou’rt on the gravelly bank I will return unto the river, and remain on my side of it till thou comest out on to those rocks, which thou wilt do when thou hast need of me.

  It would have been better, Eve thought, as she returned to the grove in which they had spent so many happy hours, if he had left me to drown in that pool, for it would seem that man is made to make woman unhappy. But must we, she asked herself, be always unhappy? It cannot be that there is no way out of this trouble. It cannot be that we who are more intelligent than the birds and beasts should not find it, and she went about the garden watching all these, and when she was not watching the beasts and birds, she gathered such fruits as were ripe, and stored them as he had bidden her to do, and took pleasure in so doing, for she was doing his will. But the nights were long, and the calm dawns miserable to behold. At last remembrance came out of misery: he had told her that he would show her how the fruit should be stored!

  Adam! Adam! she cried. And she had not to speak his name a third time before she saw his head above the water, and he rushing through it like a fish, so eager was he to be with her.

  As soon as he had climbed up beside her and shaken the water from his hair and beard they began to talk of the fruit she had gathered and the roof of the house in which she lived. At last he said: thou hast wandered much in the garden. Yes; and have seen much, she answered him; birds and squirrels and mice and rats, cockchafers, beetles and the ordinary fly. But we are not as these and have been commanded to abstain from imitating them in their swyvings, he said. Cats, she said, come over the wall screaming after each other. But we are commanded, he said, by the God, to abstain till he reveals the secret of love — And of offspring, she interjected. She had seen from a gap in the walls a herd of great animals with long hairy tails on their rumps and on their necks a yard of hair.

  Among these was one taller, handsomer, more powerful than the others, a sort of master among them and one day she said he came whinnying, his ears cocked to meet a female. I judged her to be one, she being smaller, smoother, daintier than he was, like unto him as I am to thee, Adam. A strange match they made as they stood nosing each other, she shy, diffident, he eager and valiant, yet gentle with her always, though she was rough and angry with him, squealing betimes and kicking at him till at last, like one that accepts another’s will, he drew away from her, regretfully, I thought, and then like one that had forgotten he began to graze a bit away. But he was only pretending to have forgotten her, for when she came forward, trying to entice him back to her, I could see that he was watching her, and every moment I expected him to leave off feeding, but it was a long time before she could get him to notice her. At last she succeeded in enticing him from his feed; and this time he was bolder with her, beginning at once to bite her in the chest, in play, of course; licking her sides and biting her again. She seemed to like his play; his cosening seemed to her taste; but when he came to her haunches she squealed and kicked, without striking him, however, misdirecting her kicks perhaps of set purpose. And this play was continued for several days, she always inviting his intentions and never resenting them till he tried to throw his fore-leg over her. The days went by, ripening her, and when her time was come he rose himself up and, gripping her by the neck, he went in unto her, hugging her the while. And then? said Adam. Then, Eve answered, he dropped exhausted on his hooves, and they sniffed at each other once or twice before beginning to graze, keeping together apart from the herd.

  But of what concern to us are the ways of beasts? Adam said, and hast thou forgotten Iahveh’s commandments? It may be, she answered, that the God put a wall round the garden, but when thou’rt not by me I forget these things. I knew of God only through thee, and am different from thee inasmuch as thou wast an angel once in heaven, but I’m a rib taken from thy side else a handful of dust. For thou knowest not exactly how God created me, only that when thine eyes opened I was sleeping by thee. Wouldst thou, Eve, have me return to the other bank and live with thee like a beast? It shall be as thou dost wish it, Adam. And it being my wish always that thou shouldst be happy, or at least as little unhappy as may be, I would have thee go to him with no desire in thy heart but obedience to his will only. Adam, leave me, Eve cried, but let me come to-morrow to these rocks, for though they are hard to sit upon it is better to see thee here than not to see thee at all.

  Thou mayest come here if thou wilt strive to make Iahveh’s will thine and — What else, Adam, is upon thy mind to tell me? Only this, Eve, that having looked over the wall, a thing that Iahveh has forbidden, it may fall out that in thy wanderings a voice may speak to thee out of a tree. Hast heard a voice, Adam, speaking out of you trees? And Adam answered that it had seemed to him that he had heard a voice speaking out of a tree, saying he had but to listen to hear the secret. And thou didst not listen? Eve said. Iahveh forbid, he answered. And then thou fleddest, she said, to the thither side, leaving the praying stone without offering. I had hoped to find another, he answered, and Eve, guessing that the desire of prayer was again upon him, said: why not cross the river for prayer? The evening skies are calm, and thy prayer will go up to Iahveh’s nostrils and refresh him.

  With words like these I’m telling she beguiled him over to her side of the river, and as soon as she saw him going up the hill-side with the fruits she had given him for offering her eyes turned to the trees out of which the voice had spoken to him. The voice that he heard can only be Lilith’s, she said, who would not have Adam withhold himself from me any longer, he having by now descended altogether out of angel kind into man kind. So she went to the tree that Adam had pointed out to her as the one out of which he had heard the voice speak: whosoever is in this tree, let her or him tell me how I may be Adam’s wife, and get offspring like the birds and the beasts, she cried, and as soon as the snake heard Eve, she stretched herself along the bough, and dropping a yard or two of herself said: I am Lilith, who was Adam’s first wife, but in his
mind rather than in his body. Lean thy ear closer, lest Iahveh should hear and send angels to hunt me into hell again. Eve gave her ear, and, having learnt from Lilith the way of man with a woman, she waited for Adam to return from the altar, all the while turning over in her mind the delightful modes of love she had learnt from Lilith.