Arctic regions -- Discovery and exploration -- Fiction; Man-woman relationships -- Fiction
Adler's words were the words of the world. She alone of the thousands
whose eyes were turned toward Bennett was blinded. She was wrong. She
belonged to him, but he did not belong to her. The world demanded him;
the world called him from her side to do the terrible work that God had
made him for. Was she, because she loved him, because of her own single
anguish, to stand between him and the clamour of the world, between him
and his work, between him and God?
A work there was for him to do. He must play the man's part. The battle
must be fought again. That horrible, grisly Enemy far up there to the
north, upon the high curve of the globe, the shoulder of the world,
huge, remorseless, terrible in its vast, Titanic strength, guarding its
secret through all the centuries in the innermost of a thousand gleaming
coils, must be defied again. The monster that defended the great prize,
the object of so many fruitless quests must be once more attacked.
His was the work, for him the shock of battle, the rigour of the fight,
the fierce assault, the ceaseless onset, the unfailing and unflinching
courage.
Hers was the woman's part. Already she had assumed it; steadfast
unselfishness, renunciation, patience, the heroism greater than all
others, that sits with folded hands, quiet, unshaken, and under fearful
stress, endures, and endures, and endures. To be the inspiration of
great deeds, high hopes, and firm resolves, and then, while the fight
was dared, to wait in calmness for its issue--that was her duty, that,
the woman's part in the world's great work.
Lloyd was dimly conscious of a certain sweet and subtle element in her
love for Bennett that only of late she had begun to recognise and be
aware of. This was a certain vague protective, almost maternal,
instinct. Perhaps it was because of his present weakness both of body
and character, or perhaps it was an element always to be found in the
deep and earnest love of any noble-hearted woman. She felt that she, not
as herself individually, but as a woman, was not only stronger than
Bennett, but in a manner older, more mature. She was conscious of depths
in her nature far greater than in his, and also that she was capable of
attaining heights of heroism, devotion, and sacrifice which he, for all
his masculine force, could not only never reach, but could not even
conceive of. It was this consciousness of her larger, better nature that
made her feel for Bennett somewhat as a mother feels for a son, a sister
for her younger brother. A great tenderness mingled with her affection,
a vast and almost divine magnanimity, a broad, womanly pity for his
shortcomings, his errors, his faults. It was to her he must look for
encouragement. It was for her to bind up and reshape the great energy
that had been so rudely checked, and not only to call back his strength,
but to guide it and direct into its appointed channels.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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