A WOMAN'S HANDS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2325, 22 September 1898, Page 55

A WOMAN'S HANDS.

What' They Portrayed. I first saw them in the month of October ]as f . It had been intensely hot all day. Night fell, and the moon rose in brilliant splendour, flooding my room, the house opposite, and the adjoining streets. My windows gaze into a court some 15ft apart from my neighbours. Lowering my gaze from the Tour St. Jacques's shimmering spire, I saw lyin^ on the parapet within a few feet of me the most marvellous pair of hands I had ev:r seen. I ran from one window to the next hoping to catch a glimpse of the happy possessor of so much beauty. But impossible! — there they lay, so temptingly near, so exasperatingly close, but an angle in the eaves, casting its shadow, prevented me from distinguishing the lineaments of my charming but invisible neighbour. She was evidently like myself, enjoying the little air one breathes in crowded Paris. Her hands lay listlessly before her, giving to the grim stono a touch of colour, warmth, and life. They were softly white, marvellously chiselled, and delicately tapering — dimpled, yet strcng ; languid, but intense ; flesh and blood hands finished off by oval pinkish nails with the gloss of satin. Like some dazzling creation in purest marble they lay in the clear moonlight, each exquisite line and curve being thrown out against the rough coping with the distinctness of an etching. I gazed at them almoat spellbound. Those incomparable hands, shining like alabaster, enchained ixif attention, and riveted me to the spot. As I looked she slowly rose, and passing to the opposite side of the window seated herself at the piano, now visible in the advancing moon rays. Her face was still concealed by the jutting angles of the low-roofed attic, b.i; her figure, as much of it as I saw, was slorder and elegant, its supple roundness but enl anced by her close-fitting gown. Her sensitive fingers rested on the keys a moment, then into the silence of the night poured forth a flood of divinest harmony. It was the magnificent opening chords of Beethoven's greatest sonata. Her playing was nothing short of genius. Such power and passion, such depth, and such despair! The imprisoned cries seemed to reach the very hea^ensy By a charming modulation, she glided into the fantastic witchery of Gnomcnreigen. The elfin band of fairies dancing in their dewy glades floated before me. Those light, mocking notes were but the impish tinkle of the bells. Music, to those who love and understand, is the universal interpreter, and in these sounds of sweetness, strength, and passion T felt this woman's so il laid bare. The lingering notes of Schumann's " Warum." to mo. always the essence of exouisite melody, followed. The strains niblted so softly, so tenderly, into the upper silerres that it might have been the golden music of the spheres. Her beautiful hands, now lying on the instrument, portrayed a nature ideal and emotional, given to impulse and guided by the heart That she could feel and suffer I knew from her mastery of the art; that she had lived and loved was as faithfully depicted by those lovely, mute interpreters of hidden feeling. Truly a lovable woman's hands, and in their suggestive tender curves I fancied I cr-ull read a woman's history. The night was now far advanced. A sudden desire came over me to behold the fare tj which these gifted hands belonged. Yielding to this impulse, I leaned far out of the open window, but in vain, and only regained my former position in time to see her figure disappear among the background shadows. She returred, however, almost immediately, and I sa T v that in one hand she held a letter, p-vi-

dently just received. With marked agitatio j, evinced by the spasmodic twitching of hdf nervous fingers, she tore it open, glanced swiftly down tTie page, and as swiftly I beliiid those eloquent hands, dumb yet speaking, changing horribly before my fascioated gaze. Clenched convulsively on the open letter, their faultless moulding turned into a gnarled angularity frightful to witness; the skin lay loose and flaccid, showing a network of irregular ageing wrinkles. The rounded outJines seemed to shrink and collapse." The very nails became of a thick whiteness, colourless and dull. The n«rm lints of ths flesn gave way to a peculiar bluish case, as of pearl seen under a black gauae. Each tense ti.ie in its pallid rigidity, e<;eh bloi<d-e»s and quivering linger, betrayed the overpowering force of emotion too great for repression. 1 couiu scarcely trust the evidence of my sens?s. Intensely interested in this exrrac-rdi-naiy manifestation, my eves glued to the narrow casement, [ hardly breathed. Somewhere in! the room a door jarred roughly. The man who entered came straight towards the agonised creature facing him. From her nerveless hand the letter dropped unheeded to the floor. The sounds of his rapid questioning and her faltering replies thrilled vibrantly across the lattice wires. She came 'nearer, a world of womanly love and tenderness in the beautiful gesture which nn_tely asked for its return. He stood seeming irresolute. She came nenrer still. One slowly - relaxing hand, instinct with aroused feeling, stole caressingly into his ; the other, a blue-veined pearl, lay tightly on his arm. He raised the soft hand to his lijs with what seemed sincerest admiration for its matchless beauty. Then his strong hands unclasped, and put the pathetic clinging fingers away. They fell hopelessly, desolation and loneliness, the stamp of humanity, plainly imprinted on their exhausted whiteness. Once again I saw them outstretched in a last piteous appeal. He turned to leave the room. As he did so, I glanced quickly at the drooping figure leaning heavily on the table near. Those restless hands behind her were twisting and writhing in a heroic effort for self-control. Clutched together, the once pliant fingers, like crooked , claws, the distended knuckles beneath the pinched skin, shone like glistening marble. Suddenly her feigned calmness gave way. Crouching low before the table, back and foi ther back crept that eager seeking hand, back 6 and farther back, till the groping fingers found and closed on that they desperately sought. Like a wild thing she leapt forward. High in air, clenched savagely on the murderous steel, flashed that murderous hand, distorted by wild, maniacal fury in that sweeping downward lunge which sheathed the blade in a beating human heart. I staggered back. A woman's laugh shrilled out. I looked again. She was dabbling ecstatic hands in a welling crimson tide! — Lucy Baker Jerome in the San Francisco News Letter.