I had won my heart's
desire; but before I could enjoy it a god, ironical but just, intuitive
and swift to punish, had sent me down to my place in life. I would go to
Reverdy, and stand before him in my familiar guise. He would not see
Rome in my eyes; he would not know that I had been in Paradise; that in
my heart shone a face that I had put by and should never look on again.
Every man is a temple of forsaken shrines, of altars where candles
burned replenished by spirits that need open no doors--a temple whose
portals are barred.
I went through Chicago, which had grown and changed in my absence so
marvelously, straight to Jacksonville, regarding nothing on my way,
reading nothing. Like a supernatural being which has girdled the earth
in a second, it seemed that I stood before Reverdy and Sarah and their
children. I stood before them, but I could hear the bells of Rome; and I
saw Isabel as she handed the candle to me and walked from the room.
I supplemented what I had written to them of Dorothy's death; then I
told them brokenly of Rome. Where could I begin, what words could I
select to express briefly my experiences? But besides, Isabel was all my
thought, and of her I could not speak. Then we had the meal. The house,
the town, the surrounding country, began to assemble themselves together
familiarly.
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