A MIDSUMMER NIGHTMAJKE

Otago Witness, Issue 2860, 6 January 1909, Page 88

A MIDSUMMER NIGHTMAJKE

| By H. F. Wellmet. It was a brilliant, starlit night — the last night of that year. One could see distinctly the outline of those extraordinary mountains, whose serrated summite cut the horizon into notches like the teeth of a saw. There was no wind, but a strong breeze had been blowing until sunset, and the murmur of the lake came to our ears as the thunder of surf on a distant coast. On the lawn the young people were dancing gaily in the starlight to the music of the "first set," the schottische and other elaborate and mysterious terpsichorean rites — the strains filtering somewhat feebly through the window of the sitting-room. Tired at last, the dancers dispersed, the music ceased, and to me it seemed that a strange spell of silence fell upon the place, . . . Have I been sleeping? The air is hot and heavy. lam oppressed with a- melancholy foreboding — a feeling that something urgently unpleasant is about to happen. It is a nightmare of vague dread, and I uuavailingly strive to awaken myself. I am oppressed by an uncomfortable sense of guilt, but cannot remember the commission of any crime — the power of concrete thought seems to be inhibited. I can only wait. Presently I become aware that unfamiliar {strains of music are trembling in the air, yet without breaking the spell of that unearthly stillness in which I am steeped. It must be that piano again? I make a desperate effort to rise, but a dead weight of numb inertia lies heavily on every limb, and I abandon myself to the inevitable. No, the music does not come from the- piano, and it seems to be a stringed instrument that is sounding so clearily now. The light iB becoming brighter, but is diffused through the atmosphere. I notice that it oasts no shadow. There is a flicker of white, as of vapour in rapid motion. It grows, takes shape and apparent density, and becomes — a young girl, clothed in white garments, dancing in time to the music. A strange dance that, in which convulsive movements as of repulsion alternate with gestures at once coy and alluring. This m interesting, at anyrate — though I am still suffering from the feeling of helpless tetror that had swooped down upon my mind as a black shadow over a samling landscape, when this numbing shadow threw its coil about me. Perforce I Abandon myself to the illusion gjfijat is violently thrust upon my senses, and, as a prisoner at a play, watch that which I cannot escape seeing. For a sudden intensity of sight and hearing comes to me — rather, some strange, new sense in which present and past mingle and become one. The sudden impulse of curiosity which stirred in me as the form of the dancing girl took shape from t>he whirling vapours dies out. I become an impersonal spectator. I note on and record from some tablet of memory, but in an automatic, uninterested way. Or is it that I merely read from that tablet, and am not stirred because the story is so intimately known? I look upon a, large hall, with high, roof and stone floor. Pillars supporting pointed arches enclose the central space, leaving dark alleyways, like the aisles of a church, at the end and sides. It is from this covered way that the music proceeds. Here, at the upper end of the hall, is a dais raised some three feet above the level of the floor. Five steps lead up from the main floor, and the raised space runs to the walls on three sides. At the back is a- door, the only one visible. The girl dances in front of the stone platform, and thereon sits, cross-legged upon a heap of rugs, a man apparently about thirty years of age. His white robe and elaborately twisted turban show in relief a dark, sombre face, not ill-looking, but marred by pride and evil passions. He gazes with sensual satisfaction at the graceful form posing and swaying on the stone iloor — yet looks to right and left now and again with quick, .apprehensive glances. The performance is evidently illicit and informal, or perhaps carries an element of personal risk. There is a manifest incongruity about the scene. The great apartment ha^ a lonely, deserted look. The light, proceeding, like tho music, from an unseen source, suffices to show the theatre and the performer ; but always there is a suggestion of mist about the pictuie. The dance becomes more animated, the agile figure throws itself into attitudes of abandon. The eye? of the dancer glance towards the back of the platform, her face assumes an expression of triumph and gratified malice. A door is partially open, and a face, on whose expressive features may be read pride and pain and disgust, looks out. By the .'elf -moving activity of my newlyacquired f.en«e, I become instantly aware of the whole tragedy. I see the dissolute successor of a warlike king sitting crosslegged there, and read the selfish fears that piompted his loveless marriage to this daughter of a powerful neighbour who is staring — her features distorted by painful emotion — through that carved and decorated door set on silver hinges in the thick stone wall. The music cea&es, and the scene slowly dissolves into white, palpitating mist. I return to a state of painful semi-conscious-ness and make a futile effort to awake. It is evidently useless to struggle against the power that thus holds me an unwilling spectator of a well-known play. I have a feeling, too, that the end of the evil dream is at hand. Again the white mist begins to palpitate and circle about in spiral shapes, gradually forming another scene in this unappreciated rehearsal of an old drama. The music

J sounds again. Not quite the same, yefc I there is a resemblance. Presently I ccc and hear clearly. There is a wide arch, cut as a "windo-w in the wall of an upper room. The walls and pillars are of stone, as before. Outside is a balcony set on a projecting buttress, and two of tho characters of this play of mine are sitting there. It is my play, I suppose. At anyrate I am the only spectator. The man with the white turban is on the balcony, so also is the owner of that agonised face which I had: seen thrust through the door jn the stone hall. But the face is calini j now, though with a pathetic eadness i stamped upon it. It is the face of a lady. She is young and simply dressed in a long white robe, with sleeves. She has heavy gold bracelets on her wrists, and now and again tiny points of light flash from her head, as though diamonds were hidden in her hair. She is pleading -witih the man, reminding him of promises made to her and to her father. Without effort. I comprehend what is eaid. He looks ashamed and uncomfortable, but says ' nothing. Presently aihe lifts a long stringed instrument, like a banjo, with an exaggerated handle, and begins to sing. I recognise the sounds. I heard when the scene was shaping itself from the mist. Certainly I recognise the sounds. I recognise the voice, too. The heavy oppression that sits upon my soul quickens to an agony. A thousand events are tora from their roots in the past and stamped upon my quivering mind. I cannot escape from the record. With horror I recognise that each happening is recorded, each thought or word registered indelibly on the screen of time. And what a tale of lust and selfishness and greed is being thrust upon my unwilling senses ! The voice still sings, its tones vibrate in my heart. I must awake. I cannot bear any more. But I have tried to 'awaken myself before. What if I never wake again? What if this dreadful present consciousness of past evil is hell, and is an eternal state? I make a desperate effort. The accusing voice changes its note. A silly old verse comes incongruously to my mind : " Oh, it is love, it is love that makes the world go round !" lam throwing off the lethal influence that numbs my faculties. Presently I shall return from the abyss. "Yes, yes," sings the voice, "by love you can make amends, by love you dm repair the evil -wrought, by love all wrongs may be righted, all woes assuaged, all tears dried." Light comes to me. I perceive that it is verily love that is at the heart of Nature — sustaining all things, destroying but to recreate in fairer form. Then I awoke/ I was in a room brilliantly lit and filled with people. But the voice still sang, though the dreadful import had gone out of its words. The lady who sang had her back towards me. I could not see her face. Quickly I got up and left the room and the house. Then I breathed more freely. That face might have turned towards me with some memory of the past upon it — some message for me. I did not dare to risk- it. Outside .the air was cool, the night brilliant with stars. I could see the shafts of the pinnacled mountains thrusting into the void.