“Do you remember, when we had been home a week, you dreamed your dream?
Your old dream—you told me of it, one evening—but I knew already——”
“Knew?”
“No, don’t speak. I can’t go on if you speak. I knew because when you
dreamed your dream you came to me.”
She bent lower over her hands. Her breathing quickened. She scarcely
heard David’s startled exclamation. She must say it—and it was so hard.
Her heart beat so—it was so hard to steady her voice.
“You came into my room. It was late. The window was open, and the wind
was blowing in. The moon was going down. I was standing by the window in
my night-dress—and you spoke. You said, ‘Turn round, and let me see your
face.’ Then I turned round and you came to me and touched me. You
touched me and you spoke, and then you went away. And the next night you
came again. You were in your dream, and in your dream you loved me. We
talked. I said, ‘Who am I?’ and you said, ‘You are the Woman of my
Dream,’ and you kissed me, and then you went away. But the third
night—the third night—I woke up—in the dark—and you were there.”
After that first start, David sat rigid and watched her face. He saw her
lips quiver—the patience of her face break into pain. He knew the effort
with which she spoke.
“You came every night—for a fortnight. I used to think you would
wake—but you never did. You went away before the dawn—always. You never
waked—you never remembered. In your dream you loved me—you loved me very
much. In the daytime you didn’t love me at all. I got to feel I couldn’t
bear it. I went away to Agneta, and there I thought it all out. I knew
what I had to do. I think I had really known all along. But I was
shirking. That’s why it hurt so much. If you shirk, you always get
hurt.”
Elizabeth paused for a moment. She was looking at the blue of her ring.
It shone. There was a little star in the heart of it.
“It’s very difficult to explain,” she said. “I suppose you would say I
prayed. Do you remember asking me, if you had slept because I saw you in
the Divine Consciousness? That’s the nearest I can get to explaining. I
tried to see the whole thing—us—the Dream—in the Divine Consciousness,
and you stopped dreaming. I knew you would. You never came any more.
That’s all.”
Elizabeth stopped speaking. She moved as if to rise, but David’s hand
fell suddenly upon both of hers, and rested there with a hard, heavy
pressure.
He said her name, “Elizabeth!” and then again, “Elizabeth!” His voice
had a bewildered sound.
Elizabeth lifted her eyes and looked at him. His face was working,
twitching, his eyes strained as if to see something beyond the line of
vision. He looked past Elizabeth as he had done in his dream. All at
once he spoke in a whisper.
“I remembered, it’s gone again—but I remembered.”
“The dream?”
“No, not the dream. I don’t know—it’s gone. It was a name—your name—but
it’s gone again.”
“My name?”
“Yes—it’s gone.”
“It doesn’t matter, David.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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