Once Gud sat all aloneHigh on his shining throne.The Devil had been drivenFlaming out of heaven;And this was eons afterGud suddenly burst with laughter,Remembering with a shoutA story the Devil toldBefore they drove him out—(Though even then 'twas old)
Once Gud sat all aloneHigh on his shining throne.The Devil had been drivenFlaming out of heaven;And this was eons afterGud suddenly burst with laughter,Remembering with a shoutA story the Devil toldBefore they drove him out—(Though even then 'twas old)
I. B. Devil paced restlessly about in his brand new Hell. Everything was running in apple pie order, but not a soul in torment. That fact worried him, for it had been nearly two generations since Gud had planted the souls. He had done it well, had plunged the busy sphere into a day of thick darkness. There had been a mad howling and babble among the conceited rationals until the whole race of them had tumbled in their tracks and fallen into a profound slumber. It was then that the souls were planted.
One of Gud's newly employed assistants had made the count of the mortals, and the Devil had marvelled at his accuracy, for there were only six souls left over. These Gud had laughingly handed to the Devil, who had given them to six of his firemen—appreciative chaps they were, and it hadn't spoiled them, this thing of having two souls.
After the soul planting was finished, the Devil and Gud had parted cordially enough. They had agreed it was best not to be seen together after that. By the agreement Gud was first to visit the sphere alone and give out his revelation, and the Devil was then to make one visit to sow doubts and temptations.
The Devil had glanced at Gud's revelation most casually; it seemed quite ordinary—old stuff, and he had been rather careless in planting his doubts and temptations. The competition had looked easy. But now two generations had passed on the sphere and not a soul had arrived for torment.
The Devil was profoundly puzzled. He wondered if Gud had been unethical and double-crossed him with a spurious revelation, getting out another one later with utterly different beliefs and morals, so that the doubts and temptations were thus all obsoleted. This possibility made the Devil furious, for it was plausible enough—yet that Gud chap had seemed such a fair and simple sort!
Half a dozen times the Devil started to go up and see about it—yet, had he not pledged his own incombustibility on his keeping away from the sphere after the first visit? He had been a simple fool, and here he was with a fully equipped hell on his hands and a big payroll to meet and the best of his helpers deserting right and left, because they were bored with idleness. As good a hell as ever burned brimstone and not a soul to roast!
Drearily enough, the Devil began his rounds again. He had to keep the boys cheered up. How he wished that he had not been so democratic and told them just when things had been started on the sphere. The best he could do now, was to lie out of that and claim that this was just a trial run. But he could see that many of his once loyal helpers had utterly lost faith in his leadership. He had been proud of those helpers, some of the brightest demons in the game. He had bid them off good jobs in older hells by promises of greater freedom to try out their own ideas. In that way he had obtained a superior set of tortures for special sins. But now no souls—and half his demons deserted and the cleverest of his torture machines rusting from lack of use.
At last he could stand it no longer, and he went back to his private chambers. Telling his valet that he was not to be disturbed, he locked the door and took a sleeping potion gauged for a century.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
I. B. Devil awoke and tried to stretch himself, but he was so stiff he could hardly move. Cold, icy cold penetrated his very bones. He managed at last to sit up on the edge of his couch, and then the chamber door fell in before the battering ram of the last of his faithful followers. Six shivering demons piled into the chamber—the six grateful firemen to whom he had given the extra souls.
"The last of the fires are out, Your Majesty, and all the others have deserted."
"But why," demanded the Devil, "did you not keep my private furnace fired? We shall all freeze to death."
"But, Your Majesty, there is no one to work the mines. Do you not remember that you arranged for them to be worked by the souls of scabs who were to be killed by strikers?"
"Another blunder," sighed the Devil. "Well, there is a grate and in that case yonder is my private stock of smoking brimstone. Light it, for I must get thawed out so I can think."
The two-souled firemen hastened to obey and the seven of them were soon sitting around the spluttering blue flames and inhaling the delicious vapors.
The Devil got out a set of heavy, asbestos furs, smiling as he recalled for whom he had ordered them. He had intended to keep her in his private chamber to light his pipe and brew his tea—and he had chuckled many a time at the thought of her in summer furs.
He laid the furs on a chair and went to his desk and wrote busily for a few minutes.
"Now, boys," he said, "here are your passes for mortality, and remember you have two souls."
The firemen vanished and the Devil was alone in Hell.
He drew on the furs and wrapped his own travelling cape about them. Then he went into the outer chamber. Across the room the windows, into which usually shone the cheery redness of roaring flames, were now frosted with weird designs, and the fireproof platinum fittings on the great door were hoary white.
Slowly the Devil trudged across the chill chamber and, with a fur-clad hand, grasped the frosted handle, swung open the great door, and stepped out on the balcony.
For a moment he was blinded by the dazzling, sparkling white. He stumbled over some object and bent down to find the huddled form of a demon frozen stiff as an ice idol. It was poor little Beezel, who had come all the way from the hell of the three-ringed planet to try out his new scheme of torture for trigamists.
I. B. Devil stepped lightly over his frozen disciple and went to the balcony rail. Shading his eyes until they became accustomed to the white glare, he now looked far up and down the wide stretches of his domain, puzzled, dumbfounded and subdued. The water mains that supplied the steam baths had burst and flooded the place, and all hell was frozen over!
I. B. Devil leaped from the balustrade and straight as an arrow shot upward to Gud's Paradise.
He paused for a moment only outside the portals to discard the furs he wore, then he pushed open the great unguarded gate and stepped inside.
It was a goodly heaven, vast and beautiful and shining in its new-made emptiness.
I. B. Devil did not pause for admiration, but went straightway to Gud's private office and kicked open the door. There was no one there. Beside the larger desk was a lesser one, and on this lay a powder puff and a small mirror. The Devil stepped to the file cabinet, flung it open; and with uncanny accuracy reached in, pulled out the carbon copy of the order for souls, and read:
"In accordance with your quotation, you may ship us at once three billion mortal souls."
"Poor old chap," mused the Devil, "I should never have trusted one."
Then he stepped outside and mounted to the throne of Gud. There he found a note pinned to the upholstery. It read: "We have gone to Hell."
The Devil went back to the portal of Gud's heaven and picked up the furs: "I guess," he said, "I had better take them down to her."
But Gud let her go to Hell alone, for in the course of their headlong flight, he heard the faint sound of far off barking. Wheeling in the ether Gud made straight for the campfire, where he had left Fidu watching the beans.
"Did the beans boil over?" asked Gud.
"No, indeed," said Fidu, in his best dog language, "but you were gone so long that I caught a nice wild boar so that there is pork in the beans."
"Don't you know, Fidu," admonished Gud, "that I disapprove of eating pork?"
"But," said Fidu, "this was a vegetarian pig, for he was rooting for peanuts when I caught him."
There are figures in the shadow but the shadow hides the faces,And their silence is a subject that must flagellate the flesh.There are hands and arms that touch you with their lingering embracesLike the petals of clipped flowers still miraculously fresh.There are voices through the darkness 'round which darkness swiftlycloses;Remembered words and phrases that are only lost in death,Heard within some misted twilight in a garden filled with rosesAs though our own youth whispered with its awed and hollow breath.There is nothing in the shadow that will satisfy our quest,For each shore that's undiscovered has been lined with molding wrecks,And if we should burst on Beauty with her healing hands of restLife would bind us down in duty to some slavery of sex.There is something quite sardonic in the race's old ideals,And the struggle for their gaining is derisive as a jest....He who prays unto his Godhead will be wiped out as he kneels,While the wonders of decay will destroy all the rest.We are grinding in the shadow for the glory of the ages,Though no hope of immortality has ever come to stay;Yet each human soul is fretting at the bars of separate cagesHearing rhythms of tomorrow in the discords of today.All the ones who started seeking when the game was strange and new,See the beauty of believing lost in wonders of deceitThere is truth in every vision, but the day is hardly through,Ere the night is all around us with her silence and defeat.There is dogma, there is duty in the urge of dead emotionThrough the worshipped gods of yesterday the present gods existHid away among our temples for the dreams of our devotionThe alters of the ages in their ruins still persist.Let the mothers bear their children for the centuries to comeThere is truth in adoration for the thing that is adoredAnd if all the many answers on the lips of life are dumbAt least the coming children may be murdered for the Lord.
There are figures in the shadow but the shadow hides the faces,And their silence is a subject that must flagellate the flesh.There are hands and arms that touch you with their lingering embracesLike the petals of clipped flowers still miraculously fresh.
There are voices through the darkness 'round which darkness swiftlycloses;Remembered words and phrases that are only lost in death,Heard within some misted twilight in a garden filled with rosesAs though our own youth whispered with its awed and hollow breath.
There is nothing in the shadow that will satisfy our quest,For each shore that's undiscovered has been lined with molding wrecks,And if we should burst on Beauty with her healing hands of restLife would bind us down in duty to some slavery of sex.
There is something quite sardonic in the race's old ideals,And the struggle for their gaining is derisive as a jest....He who prays unto his Godhead will be wiped out as he kneels,While the wonders of decay will destroy all the rest.
We are grinding in the shadow for the glory of the ages,Though no hope of immortality has ever come to stay;Yet each human soul is fretting at the bars of separate cagesHearing rhythms of tomorrow in the discords of today.
All the ones who started seeking when the game was strange and new,See the beauty of believing lost in wonders of deceitThere is truth in every vision, but the day is hardly through,Ere the night is all around us with her silence and defeat.
There is dogma, there is duty in the urge of dead emotionThrough the worshipped gods of yesterday the present gods existHid away among our temples for the dreams of our devotionThe alters of the ages in their ruins still persist.
Let the mothers bear their children for the centuries to comeThere is truth in adoration for the thing that is adoredAnd if all the many answers on the lips of life are dumbAt least the coming children may be murdered for the Lord.
After Gud had regaled himself on pork and beans he laid down under a deadly nightshade tree and fell asleep. As he slept a worm happened along and stepped on Gud, and Gud turned.
"Pardon," said the worm, "but I did not notice you until you turned. You see I was very preoccupied, for I have just returned from the Diet of Worms, which was called by the Conqueror Worm to suppress a book. As soon as I heard that a book had been suppressed I went in search of a copy. I found one in the Master's chamber of a deserted mansion of the newly cultured. I carefully chewed it up and removed the fragments to my nest, where I pieced them together again."
"What kind of book is it?" asked Gud. "I am rather fond of forbidden books."
"It is a book of etiquette," replied the worm, "and if you will promise me not to mark it up or tear out any choice passages, I will lend you my copy."
So Gud sat down upon a gravel and the worm climbed a stalk of timothy and handed Gud the book; but it was so badly patched up that he could not read it.
"Perhaps," suggested the worm, "I should read it to you. See, this is the table of contents. It says:
"'How to shake hands with gloves on.
"'How to introduce people who already know each other.
"'How to steal postage stamps without having a guilty conscience.
"'How to dance without knowing how.
"'How to pretend to understand relativity.
"'What to wear if you don't like spats.
"'How to tell a risque story in the presence of a minister.
"'How to get rich without making your friends envious.
"'How to catch large fish with little worms.'
"Ah," cried the worm, "that is the very line that caused the Diet of Worms to suppress the book, for that is an allusion to the bitter truth that worms are put on hooks to catch fish. We worms, who know that in the end we shall conquer man himself, do not like to be reminded that in the meanwhile man may use us for fish bait."
Gud smiled at the thought that the worms could only suppress the truth, whereas he could change it. So he made it to be that men should no longer put worms on hooks to catch fish, but should henceforth put fish on hooks to catch worms. That is how came the great sport of worming; and some of the worm tales men tell do not need to be suppressed, for there is no truth in them.
And now Gud came to a place where the ether was as thick as coal tar. It was so dark that Fidu could not even imagine a moon, and Gud could not see any reason for existence.
Just as he had about decided that there would never be any more light, Gud saw a wee small flicker shining in the inky void, as might an invisible star if there never had been brighter stars to pale its flame.
Hastening on Gud and Fidu came upon the source of light and found it to be a man with a torch in his hand who was very much occupied in searching for something.
"Have you lost anything?" asked Gud.
"No," replied the man, "but I am looking for something."
"I shall be glad to assist you," offered Gud, "and my dog here is very good in locating lost articles; so if you will kindly tell us what you are looking for we will help you find it."
"I am looking," replied the man, "for creation's dawn and the end of all things. I also wish to find the unknowable first cause and the eternal varieties and the limits of space. I am searching for the cause of hope, the reason for despair, the explanation of love and the excuse for crime. I am seeking a reason for all that is, and a cause for all that ever was and an accurate prophesy of all that ever will be. I am also hunting for the fundamental principles, the absolute truth, the laws of nature, the theories of science, the hypotheses of metaphysics, the interpretations of creeds, the aims of arts and the melodies of songs that have never been sung. And I do wish so to locate all the unknown stars, and trace all the lost comets, and determine what kept the heavens in order before the law of gravitation was enacted. But most of all I want to find out why my wife thinks I am a fool to be out here looking for these things."
"If you do not object to a little operation," said Gud, "I can find all these things for you and show you where they all are."
Then without waiting for the man to reply, Gud caused a deep sleep to fall upon him, and straightway Gud opened up the man's skull and took out his brains and laid them upon a platter.
When the man awoke he looked upon his own brains and saw that they were very much like calf's brains, except that they were more convoluted and sutured.
"And why is this platter set before me?" demanded the man as he stood there gazing upon his own brains.
"Because," replied Gud, "therein lies what you were looking for, and you need search no further, for it is all there and much more besides."
"So, so," said the man, "I see it all, and now I shall go home to my wife and find if a child has been born unto her while I have been away."
"Then," said Gud, "would you give me your torch, since you will not be needing it longer?"
The man did so; and after he had gone, Gud took the torch and set the darkness on fire.
Once more Gud walked along the Impossible Curve, which had now become more impossible than ever.
Gud was lonely, for he missed his faithful companion, the Underdog, whom he had sold into slavery. His heart was filled with grief, and remorse preyed upon his soul, and Gud resolved never again to be ungrateful and never to be unkind, and to grant to all creatures their wishes and to help them to realize their hearts' desires and make their dreams come true.
In his sorrow and loneliness Gud walked on until his feet were sore and he was athirst. Then he came to a flowing fountain of pure water. He paused and kneeled at the fountain. When he had quenched his thirst, he removed his sandals and bathed his feet in the stream that flowed from the fountain.
Then Gud laid himself down by the fountain and fell asleep, and dreamed that a beautiful bubble appeared on the surface of the fountain.
The bubble which Gud saw in his dream was iridescent with a great iridescence; for the colors of the bubble were many and they were ever changing, so that it was never twice alike.
In the iridescence of the bubble Gud saw the essence of transcendent beauty, for its beauty was as the beauty of youth, and as the beauty of faith, and as the beauty of love, and as the beauty of a woman, when she is young and has faith and a longing for more love than she has found.
As Gud looked upon the beauty of the bubble, he saw that it was no longer a bubble, for it had become a woman of flesh and blood, and hope and love and beauty. And he saw that she looked upon him with faith and trust. This pleased Gud, so he spoke in his dream to the woman of his dream and said: "Who art thou and what wouldst thou of me?"
And the woman replied, "Oh, Gud, I am a searcher after mysteries that have not been revealed and things which can not be understood. And I am sore distressed because I have looked and have found them not."
Gud asked, "Have you looked into the mind of man?"
"I have looked into the mind of man," replied the woman, "and it is very simple."
Again Gud asked: "Have you looked into the heart of woman?"
She replied to Gud and said: "Into the heart of woman have I also looked, and though it is not so simple, yet do I understand it, for am I not a woman?"
"Of a truth you are a woman, and you are very beautiful."
And she smiled upon Gud, and when she smiled, he vowed that he would grant her all her wishes and the fulfillment of all her dreams.
But first he would know who she was, and so he spoke to her again and said: "Of a truth, and who art thou?"
And she of the iridescent beauty, which is the beauty that is ever changing, made answer to Gud: "Of a truth, great Gud, I am no other than the reader of this book which two men are writing about you."
"What's this?" asked Gud, for he was much amazed, albeit not displeased, to hear that Hersey and I were writing this book about him.
And the iridescent woman said again, "I am the reader of 'The Book of Gud,' which Dan Spain and Harold Hersey are writing about you."
"How do you know they are writing it?"
"I know," said the woman, "because it is common gossip in the Village, for every one there gossips about anything Hersey has a hand in."
"Where is this village?" asked Gud, "and who is this Hersey creature?"
"The Village," she replied, "where Hersey burns his wee small flame, is South of Fourteenth Street and West of University Place, in the City of New York, which is the Gateway to the Melting Pot of the Planet Earth in the Solar System of the Universe."
"Which universe?" asked Gud.
"My universe," said the woman.
"It must be a nice one, but what do you wish that I should do for you?"
"What I wish," said she (who is none other than the reader of this book) "is to find some great mystery in art or literature or in some psychic science; and I wish that you would inspire these men to put something into 'The Book of Gud' that no one can understand."
"I will look into the matter," said Gud. And he did.... Then he looked again into the iridescent eyes of the ever-changing woman and said to her: "It is useless, for I have searched the soul of that fellow Spain and he is not an inspired writer but only a disgruntled hack who could not possibly write anything that you could not understand."
Whereupon the woman was vexed with disappointment so that she began to weep, and in the small compass of each tear she shed was the iridescence of a tiny rainbow. As Gud saw her tears, that they were beautiful, his heart overflowed with tenderness, and he said with a gentle voice: "I will try again."
And now Gud searched the soul of Hersey. His search was not without reward and when he returned again to the beautiful woman she ceased to weep, for in his hand she saw that Gud held a poem. Seating himself beside her, he read her this poem that Hersey had written in the white heat of inspiration:
She stood there carelessly arrayedAll in jewelled dress,And leaning on the balustradeShe wept with bitterness,For facing her there stood a maidOf rival loveliness.Once she had been indifferentTo languishment or guile,But when I argued with intentTo hold her by a smile,Upon my eyes her own were bentFor quite a little while.The lady raised her fluttering hands."The night is cold," she said,"For tropic men in northern lands,For old maids still unwed,And for the evil one who standsIn heaven when he's dead."She turned and gazed upon that faceAs lovely as her own,The poise of beauty and of graceThat matched her grace alone....And in that close and silent placeI heard the lady moan.I held the lady to my breastAnd kissed her mouth and eyes.She sighed and snuggled down to restWithout the least surprise,While I told tales of sweet unrestThat sounded very wise."They say I'm mad," she whispered then,"I weep for dear despair,No matter where I go, dark menFollow me everywhere...."To quiet her I kissed againHer locks of golden hair."Great God!" she cried with finished grace,"That woman whom I hate."I looked and in a mirror's faceI saw the lady's mate.Then quiet men of that strange placeCame down the halls of state.They took the lady tenderlyAway from sound and sight.I answered not. It seemed to meAs though they must be right.So I smashed the mirror utterlyAnd fled into the night.
She stood there carelessly arrayedAll in jewelled dress,And leaning on the balustradeShe wept with bitterness,For facing her there stood a maidOf rival loveliness.
Once she had been indifferentTo languishment or guile,But when I argued with intentTo hold her by a smile,Upon my eyes her own were bentFor quite a little while.
The lady raised her fluttering hands."The night is cold," she said,"For tropic men in northern lands,For old maids still unwed,And for the evil one who standsIn heaven when he's dead."
She turned and gazed upon that faceAs lovely as her own,The poise of beauty and of graceThat matched her grace alone....And in that close and silent placeI heard the lady moan.
I held the lady to my breastAnd kissed her mouth and eyes.She sighed and snuggled down to restWithout the least surprise,While I told tales of sweet unrestThat sounded very wise.
"They say I'm mad," she whispered then,"I weep for dear despair,No matter where I go, dark menFollow me everywhere...."To quiet her I kissed againHer locks of golden hair.
"Great God!" she cried with finished grace,"That woman whom I hate."I looked and in a mirror's faceI saw the lady's mate.Then quiet men of that strange placeCame down the halls of state.
They took the lady tenderlyAway from sound and sight.I answered not. It seemed to meAs though they must be right.So I smashed the mirror utterlyAnd fled into the night.
And when Gud had finished reading the woman asked: "Is that all?"
And Gud looked at the poem in his hand and said sorrowfully, "That is all."
"But that is quite comprehensible," said the woman, "for it is merely one of Hersey's usual plagiarisms—a twittering parody of Rossetti's 'THE BLESSED DAMOSEL', and it is so simple."
"Do you understand it?" asked Gud.
"Of course, it merely means that the love of man is insufficient to satisfy the yearning of woman, and so she must look into the mirror of her own soul in search of greater spiritual joys. But alas, she is shadowed by her sex consciousness as reflected in her beauty of the flesh, and she can not escape that haunting shadow which finally drives her mad. Is that not simple?"
To D. S.: I protest. This interpretation is entirely erroneous.—H. H.To H. H.: Good God, I know it! but if you had seen what I first wrote about it you would keep still.—D. S.
To D. S.: I protest. This interpretation is entirely erroneous.—H. H.
To H. H.: Good God, I know it! but if you had seen what I first wrote about it you would keep still.—D. S.
"I should say," said Gud, "that it is beautiful simplicity."
"That is just the trouble with all that these chaps are writing. They are so keen on the obvious. You see, I can understand all that these men have written, for it is all explainable by psychoanalysis. It is merely the symbolism of a suppressed wish to be famous. And, oh Gud, how I do crave true mystery!"
"Then," said Gud, "you shall have it, for am I not Gud the Great?"
"If you are, why do you not inspire these men who are writing this book about you to put something into the book that no one can understand? Indeed, if you cannot do that I shall be tempted to believe that you are not Gud, but only a mere figment of fancy conceived in the brains of two conceited young egotists who are seeking a cheap notoriety by shocking decent people with blasphemous literature."
"I fear you are right."
"Oh," cried the woman, "then you admit that you are what I said?"
"Not at all. I merely admit that he is what you said."
"Really, Gud, you ought to have had some well-known writer do this book about you—some one who had already been suppressed, or, better yet, a Russian."
"Who are the Russians?" asked Gud.
"They are the supremists in dancing, the theorists in politics, the idealists in economics and the realists in literature. But you are romantic, aren't you, Gud?"
"I think so. At least I feel so—did you always wear your hair that way?"
"Oh, no, indeed. You see, I used to wear it shorn like that of a boy, for that fashion was once the insignia of the female intelligence. But all the fat bankers' wives aped us, so now our only chance for distinction is to ape our mothers, and I wear my mother's hair. See, I will take it off and show it to you."
"It is very lovely," said Gud, as he fingered her mother's hair. "I think I should have loved your mother, and it is very sweet of you to wear this hair in remembrance of her. Most women who have risen to your intellectual heights forget their mothers."
"It is very kind of you to say that, but distinction is in being different, and so we ultra-intelligent women are again showing respect for our mothers to distinguish us from the mob of the commonplace intellectuals who came flopping into the pool of progress and muddied the water.... It is a great race, dear Gud, this struggle to keep ahead of the apings of the stupid."
"Yes, yes, so I find it. Little up-start muddling gods have quite fogged up the milky way with their nebulous creations—but pardon me if I suggest that I would rather that you put your mother's hair back on."
She had some difficulty in putting her mother's hair on straight; so Gud reached over, and with a few deft touches, arranged it for her. Then, plucking a button from his robe, he burnished it on his sleeve until it shone silvery bright, and then he held it before her. She looked into the mirroring silver and gave a little rapturous cry of joy, for the hair of her mother, on which they had both wasted so much henna, had been turned into a brilliant shade of fluorescent opalescence—a color that no artist of the Latin Quarter had ever painted and that no artist of the Village had ever imagined.
"Oh, Gud," she cried, "now I know that I love you, for they will go mad about it and I shall be the queen of the studios."
"I would rather that you remain just a woman as you have so sweetly shown yourself to be."
"Never!" cried she who wanted something that no one could understand, "never, never, will I be content to be just a woman! I must be, oh so much more. I must have super-personality, and hyper-yearnings, and ultra-strivings and transcendent seekings after ultimate mysteries—really I don't think you understand me at all!"
"Has any one ever understood you?" asked Gud.
"No," she breathed in soft expectancy.
"Only a little while ago you were searching for something that no one could understand—have we not found it in yourself?"
"Perhaps," she spoke dubiously.
"And if you were in my book, would it not then contain something that no one could understand?"
"Do you mean it?" she faltered.
"Yes, dear child, for whom all writers write, if it will bring me one more smile from those ever-changing eyes of beauty—I will see that you are in 'The Book of Gud'—if I have to catch these blasphemous scribes and pound their heads together!"
"For that promise," said the iridescent lady, "I could love you forever and a day. To think that we two should be in a book together! Just me and Gud!
"And now," she added, in a lower tone, "I'll confess to you why I want to be in the book. You see, I am supposed to be a literary character and one has to be in a book to be a literary character, you know."
"Yes, yes, I know. I suppose it will make me one also. But now I must hasten to seek out these mundane scribes, and see to it that they put you in my book—for they have it about finished."
"Which one of them do you propose to have write me into the book?"
"Which one would you prefer?"
"I hardly know," she said. "That fellow Spain is a woman hater, and I am afraid he will say something unkind about me. But that Hersey poet prostitutes his art to flatter women. He has an exaggerated idea of the importance of the sex consciousness in an intellectual woman's life. Really, it is a choice between two evils."
"If that is the way you feel about it," said Gud, "perhaps I had better write you into the book myself."
"Could you really? Oh, Gud! I would die of joy to be written by you; not even a movie actress ever had a celestial press agent!"
"I'll try," said Gud, "that is, if you will tarry with me as I write."
"Do you mean that I would inspire you?"
"Exactly."
"That is what they all say!"
"Then it must be true."
"But why do you not say something original, since you are Gud?"
"Because I am talking to you."
"You old brute!"
"Perhaps so, but a straight line is the shortest distance between two points."
"Oh, I like that," cried she who had sought for mystery. "It sounds so original, and I am sure that no one can understand it—what does it mean?"
"It means," said Gud, "that you and I have very much in common that quite transcends the reach and grasp of men."
"You flatter me."
"But really, that is true."
"Then quick, write it down before you lose the inspiration."
"But I have nothing on which to write," said Gud.
She blushed and turned away from him, and tore the whiteness from her bosom, and turned again toward Gud and handed him the whiteness that had covered up the secrets of her heart.
Gud took the whiteness of her bosom and thereupon he began to write, while she lay down upon the other side of the pool, and hid her bosom away from Gud, lest, now with its whiteness gone, he might see the color of her heart.
And so Gud, who is made in the image of man, became as a man. And as he wrote he forgot the woman, for when a pen is in the hand of man or god, the light that lies in woman's eyes burns dim as some brief candle.
And this indeed is the paradox of all who wield the treacherous weapon: that man sets out to write, some woman's heart to flutter; and having struck pen to paper, if there be anything in him that rises o'er the damp swamp of woman's kisses, then of a truth the instrument that she put into his hand becomes a knife to sever the cords with which she sought to bind him.
Such is the tragedy of her who flutters near while men make words on paper, that in their youth they write for her; and their youth gone, they still write on beyond the reaches of her soul.
And so, as Gud wrote upon the whiteness torn from a woman's bosom, he forgot quite utterly the woman herself, who lay by the pool trembling and suffering and trying to hide her heart from Gud.
And when she saw that he had forgotten her—even though he had told her he wanted her near him and needed her for inspiration—she suffered so that her heart died within her, and she shrank and withered and fell into the pool of the fountain, and, as a brown leaf, floated on the surface of the water.
When Gud had finished that which he was writing he arose and looked about him. He seemed to be searching for something, but could not recall what it was, and decided that it was of no importance.
He drew on his sandals and made ready to go upon his way. But the way was long and Gud recalled that he had been weary and had been athirst. So he knelt by the fountain and stooped over it to drink.
There was a brown leaf floating on the water, but he swished it away and drank his fill from the flowing fountain. Then Gud arose and girded up his loins and went on his way along the Impossible Curve.
I met an old man walking through the sky,A sort of startled twinkle in his eye."And who are you?" asked I."I am Gud," replied he, with a frown."Which one?" I asked, polite but terse,But without answer he went shrieking downThe shadowy spaces of the universe.
I met an old man walking through the sky,A sort of startled twinkle in his eye."And who are you?" asked I."I am Gud," replied he, with a frown."Which one?" I asked, polite but terse,But without answer he went shrieking downThe shadowy spaces of the universe.