Apocalyptic fantasies; End of the world -- Fiction; Natural disasters -- Fiction; Science fiction
The first time she was running with flushed face, intent upon striking
down a butterfly with a twig held in the left hand (for both hands she
uses with dexterity). It was at about nine in the morning, in her park,
near the bottom where there are high grass-growths and ferny luxuriance
between the close tree-trunks, and shadow, and the broken wall of an old
funeral-kiosk sunk aslant under moss, creepers, and wild flowers, behind
which I peeped hidden and wet with dew. She has had the assurance to
modify the dress I put upon her, and was herself a butterfly, for
instead of the shintiyan, she had on a zouave, hardly reaching to the
waist, of saffron satin, no feredjé, but a scarlet fez with violet
tassel, and baggy pantaloons of azure silk; down her back the long
auburn plait, quite neat, but all her front hair loose and wanton, the
fez cocked backward, while I caught glimpses of her fugitive heels
lifting out of the dropping slipper-sole. She is pretty clever, but not
clever enough, for that butterfly escaped, and in one instant I saw her
change into weary and sad, for on this earth is nothing more fickle than
that Proteus face, which resembles a landscape swept with cloud-shadows
on a bright day. Fast beat my heart that morning, owing to the
consciousness that, while I saw, I was unseen, yet might be seen.
Another noontide, three weeks afterwards, I came upon her a good way up
yonder to the west of the palace, sleeping on her arm in an alley
between overgrown old trellises, where rioting wild vine buried her in
gloom: but I had not been peeping through the bushes a minute, when she
started up and looked wildly about, her quick consciousness, I imagine,
detecting a presence: though I think that I managed to get away unseen.
She keeps her face very dirty: all about her mouth was dry-stained with
a polychrome of grape, _mûrs_, and other coloured juices, like
slobbering _gamins_ of old. I could also see that her nose and cheeks
are now sprinkled with little freckles.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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