Finding it,
beneath it with one deep breath of surrender she takes her place--the
virgin's tryst with the tree--there to be tested.
Such is the command of the Arch Druid: it is obedience--submission to
that test--or death for her as a sacrifice to the oak which she has
rejected.
Again the shrubbery is parted, rudely pushed aside, and a man
enters--a tried and seasoned man--a human oak--counterpart of the
Forest Lover--to officiate at the test.
* * * * *
He was standing there in the parlor of his house and in the presence
of his wife. But in fealty he was gone: he was in the summer woods of
ancestral wandering, the fatherland of Old Desire.
_He_ was the man treading down the shrubbery; it was _his_
feet that started toward the oak; _his_ eye that searched for the
figure half fainting under the bough; for _him_ the bed of moss
and violets--the hair falling over the eyes--the loosened girdle--the
breasts of hawthorn white and pink--the listening song of the
nightingale--the silence of the summer woods--the seclusion--the full
surrender of the two under that bough of the divine command, to escape
the penalty of their own death.
The blaze of uncontrollable desire was all over him; the fire of his
own story had treacherously licked him like a wind-bent flame.
Pages:
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109