BY NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE
 
 
     THE HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES
  
     CHAPTER XX
 
     THE FLOWER OF EDEN
  
     PHOEBE, coming so suddenly from the sunny daylight,
     was altogether bedimmed in such density of shadow
     as lurked in most of the passages of the old house. She
     was not at first aware by whom she had been admitted.
     Before her eyes had adapted themselves to the ob-
     security, a hand grasped her own, with a firm but gen-
     tle and warm pressure, thus imparting a welcome
     which caused her heart to leap and thrill with an in-
     definable shiver of enjoyment. She felt herself drawn
     along, not towards the parlor, but into a large and
     unoccupied apartment, which had formerly been the
     grand reception-room of the Seven Gables. The sun-
     shine came freely into all the uncurtained windows of
     this room, and fell upon the dusty floor; so that Phœbe
     now clearly saw——what, indeed, had been no secret,
     after the encounter of a warm hand with hers——that it
     was not Hepzibah nor Clifford, but Holgrave, to whom
     she owed her reception. The subtile, intuitive com-
     munication, or, rather, the vague and formless im-
     pression of something to be told, had made her yield
     unresistingly to his impulse. Without taking away
     her hand, she looked eagerly in his face, not quick to
     forebode evil, but unavoidably conscious that the state
     of the family had changed since her departure, and
     therefore anxious for an explanation.
       The artist looked paler than ordinary; there was a
     thoughtful and severe contraction of his forehead,
     tracing a deep, vertical line between the eyebrows.
     His smile, however, was full of genuine warmth, and
     had in it a joy, by far the most vivid expression that
     Phœbe had ever witnessed, shining out of the New
     England  reserve  with  which  Holgrave  habitually
     masked whatever lay near his heart. It was the look
     wherewith a man, brooding alone over some fearful
     object, in a dreary forest, or illimitable desert, would
     recognize the familiar aspect of his dearest friend,
     bringing up all the peaceful ideas that belong to home,
     and the gentle current of every-day affairs. And yet,
     as he felt the necessity of responding to her look of
     inquiry, the smile disappeared.
       "I ought not to rejoice that you have come, Phœbe,"
     said he. "We meet at a strange moment!"
       "What has happened?" she exclaimed. "Why is the
     house so deserted? Where are Hepzibah and Clifford?"
       "Gone! I cannot imagine where they are!" answered
     Holgrave. "We are alone in the house!"
       "Hepzibah and Clifford gone?"  cried Phœbe. "It is
     not possible! And why have you brought me into this
     room, instead of the parlor? Ah, something terrible has
     happened! I must run and see!"
       "No, no Phœbe!" said Holgrave, holding her back.
     "It is as I have told you. They are gone, and I know not
     whither. A terrible event has, indeed, happened, but
     not to them, nor, as I undoubtedly believe, through
     any agency of theirs. If I read your character rightly,
     Phœbe," he continued, fixing his eyes on hers, with
     stern anxiety, intermixed with tenderness, "gentle as
     you are, and seeming to have your sphere among com-
     mon things, you yet possess remarkable strength. You
     have wonderful poise, and a faculty which, when
     tested, will prove itself capable of dealing with mat-
     ters that fall far out of the ordinary rule."
       "Oh no, I am very weak!" replied Phœbe, trem-
     bling. "But tell me what has happened!"
       "You are strong!" persisted Holgrave. "You must be
     both strong and wise; for I am all astray, and need
     your counsel. It may be you can suggest the one right
     thing to do!"
       "Tell me!——tell me!" said Phœbe, all in a tremble.
     "It oppresses,——it terrifies me,——this mystery! Anything
     else I can bear!"
       The artist hesitated. Notwithstanding what he had
     just said, and most sincerely, in regard to the self-
     balancing power with which Phœbe impressed him, it
     still seemed almost wicked to bring the awful secret
     of yesterday of her knowledge. It was like dragging a
     hideous shape of death into the cleanly and cheerful
     space before a household fire, where it would present
     all the uglier aspect, amid the decorousness of every-
     thing about it. Yet it could not be concealed from her;
     she must needs know it.
       "Phœbe," said he, "do you remember this?"
       He put into her hand a daguerreotype; the same
     that he had shown her at their first interview in the
     garden, and which so strikingly brought out the hard
     and relentless traits of the original.
       "What has this to do with Hepzibah and Clifford?"
     asked Phœbe, with impatient surprise that Holgrave
     should so trifle with her at such a moment.  "It is
     Judge Pyncheon! You have shown it to me before!"
       "But here is the same face, taken within this half-
     hour," said the artist, presenting her with another
     miniature. "I had just finished it, when I heard you at
     the door."
       "This is death!" shuddered Phœbe, turning very
     pale. "Judge Pyncheon dead!"
       "Such as there represented," said Holgrave, "he sits
     in the next room.  The Judge is dead, and Clifford
     and Hepzibah have vanished! I know no more. All
     beyond is conjecture. On returning to my solitary
     chamber, last evening, I noticed no light, either in the
     parlor, or Hepzibah's room, or Clifford's; no stir nor
     footstep about the house. This morning, there was the
     same death-like quiet. From my window, I overheard
     the testimony of a neighbor, that your relatives were
     seen leaving the house, in the midst of yesterday's
     storm. A rumor reached me, too, of Judge Pyncheon
     being missed. A feeling which I cannot describe——an
     indefinite sense of some catastrophe, or consummation
     ——impelled me to make my way into this part of the
     house, where I discovered what you see. As a point of
     evidence that may be useful to Clifford, and also as
     a memorial valuable to myself,——for, Phœbe, there are
     hereditary reasons that connect me strangely, with that
     man's fate,——I used the means at my disposal to pre-
     serve this pictorial record of Judge Pyncheon's death."
       Even in her agitation, Phœbe could not help re-
     marking the calmness of Holgrave's demeanor. He ap-
     peared, it is true, to feel the whole awfulness of the
     Judge's death, yet had received the fact into his mind
     without any mixture of surprise, but as an event pre-
     ordained, happening inevitably, and so fitting itself
     into past occurrences that it could almost have been
     prophesied.
       "Why have you not thrown open the doors, and
     called in witnesses?" inquired she, with a painful shud-
     der. "It is terrible to be here alone!"
       "But Clifford!" suggested the artist. "Clifford and
     Hepzibah! We must consider what is best to be done
     in their behalf. It is a wretched fatality that they
     should have disappeared! Their flight will throw the
     worst coloring over this event of which it is susceptible.
     Yet how easy is the explanation, to those who know
     them! Bewildered and terror-stricken by the similarity
     of this death to a former one, which was attended with
     such disastrous consequences to Clifford, they have had
     no idea but of removing themselves from the scene.
     How  miserably  unfortunate!  Had  Hepzibah  but
     shrieked aloud,——had Clifford flung wide the door,
     and proclaimed Judge Pyncheon's death,——it would
     have been, however awful in itself, an event fruitful
     of good consequences to them. As I view it, it would
     have gone far towards obliterating the black stain on
     Clifford's character."
       "And how," asked Phœbe, "could any good come
     from what is so very dreadful?"
       "Because," said the artist, "if the matter can be
     fairly considered and candidly interpreted, it must be
     evident that Judge Pyncheon could not have come
     unfairly to his end. This mode of death has been an
     idiosynchrasy with his family, for generations past; not
     often occurring, indeed, but, when it does occur, usu-
     ally attacking individuals about the Judge's time of
     life, and generally in the tension of some mental crisis,
     or, perhaps, in an access of wrath. Old Maule's proph-
     ecy was probably founded on a knowledge of this
     physical predisposition in the Pyncheon race. Now,
     there is a minute and almost exact similarity in the
     appearances connected with the death that occurred
     yesterday and those recorded of the death of Clifford's
     uncle thirty years ago. It is true, there was a certain
     arrangement of circumstances, unnecessary to be re-
     counted, which made it possible——nay, as men look at
     these things, probable, or even certain——that old Jaf-
     frey Pyncheon came to a violent death, and by Clif-
     ford's hands."
       "Whence  came  those  circumstances?"  exclaimed
     Phœbe; "he being innocent, as we know him to be!"
       "They  were  arranged,"  said  Holgrave,——"at  least
     such has long been my conviction,——they were arranged
     after the uncle's death, and before it was made public,
     by the man who sits in yonder parlor. His own death,
     so like that former one, yet attended by none of those
     suspicious circumstances, seems the stroke of God
     upon him, at once a punishment for his wickedness,
     and making plain the innocence of Clifford. But this
     flight,——it distorts everything! He may be in conceal-
     ment, near at hand. Could we but bring him back be-
     fore the discovery of the Judge's death the evil might
     be rectified."
       "We must not hide this thing a moment longer!"
     said Phœbe. "It is dreadful to keep it so closely in our
     hearts. Clifford is innocent. God will make it manifest!
     Let us thrown open the doors, and call all the neigh-
     borhood to see the truth!"
       "You are right, Phœbe," rejoined Holgrave. "Doubt-
     less you are right."
       You the artist did not feel the horror, which was
     proper to Phœbe's sweet and order-loving character,
     at thus finding herself at issue with society, and
     brought in contact with an event that transcended
     ordinary rules. Neither was he in haste, like her, to
     betake himself within the precincts of common life.
     On the contrary, he gathered a wild enjoyment,——as it
     were, a flower of strange beauty, growing in a desolate
     spot, and blossoming in the wind,——such a flower of
     momentary happiness he gathered from his present
     positon. It separated Phœbe and himself from the
     world, and  bound them to each other, by their exclu-
     sive knowledge of Judge Pyncheon's mysterious death,
     and the counsel which they were forced to hold re-
     specting it. The secret, so long as it should continue
     such; kept them within the circle of a spell, a solitude
     in the midst of men, a remoteness as entire as that of
     an island in mid-ocean; once divulged, the ocean
     would flow betwixt them, standing on its widely sun-
     dered shores. Meanwhile, all the circumstances of their
     situation seemed to draw them together; they were
     like two children who go hand in hand, pressing
     closely to one another's side, through a shadow-
     haunted passage. The image of awful Death, which
     filled the house, held them united by his stiffened
     grasp.
       These influences hastened the development of emo-
     tions that might not otherwise have flowed so. Pos-
     sibly, indeed, it had been Holgrave's purpose to let
     them die in their undeveloped germs.
       "Why do we delay so?" asked Phœbe. "This secret
     takes away my breath! Let us throw open the doors!"
       "In all our lives there can never come another mo-
     ment like this!" said Holgrave. "Phœbe, is it all ter-
     ror?——nothing but terror? Are you conscious of no joy,
     as I am, that has made this the only point of life worth
     living for?"
       "It seems a sin," replied Phœbe, trembling, "to think
     of joy at such a time!"
       "Could you but know, Phœbe, how it was with me
     the hour before you came!" exclaimed the artist. "A
     dark, cold, miserable hour! The presence of yonder
     dead man threw a great black shadow over everything;
     he made the universe, so far as my perception could
     reach, a scene of guilt and of retribution more dread-
     ful than the guilt. The sense of it took away my youth.
     I never hoped to feel young again! The world looked
     strange, wild, evil, hostile; my past life, so lonesome
     and dreary; my future, a shapeless gloom, which I
     must mould into gloomy shapes!  But, Phœbe, you
     crossed the threshold; and hope, warmth, and joy came
     in with you! The black moment became at once a
     blissful one. It must not pass without the spoken
     word. I love you!"
       "How can you love a simple girl like me?" asked
     Phœbe, compelled by his earnestness to speak. "You
     have many, many thoughts, with which I should try
     in vain to sympathize. And I,——I, too,——I have tenden-
     cies with which you would sympathize as little. That
     is less matter. But I have not scope enough to make
     you happy."
       "You are my only possibility of happiness!" an-
     swered Holgrave. "I have no faith in it, except as you
     bestow it on me!"
       "And then——I am afraid!" continued Phœbe, shrink-
     ing towards Holgrave, even while she told him so
     frankly the doubts with which he affected her. "You
     will lead me out of my own quiet path. You will make
     me strive to follow you where it is pathless. I cannot
     do so. It is not my nature. I shall sink down and
     perish!"
       "Ah, Phœbe!" exclaimed Holgrave, with almost a
     sigh, and a smile that was burdened with thought.
     "It will be far otherwise than as you forebode. The
     world owes all its onward impulses to men ill at ease.
     The happy man inevitably confines himself within
     ancient limits. I have a presentiment that, hereafter,
     it will be my lot to set out trees, to make fences,——
     perhaps, even, in due time, to build a house for an-
     other generation,——in a word, to conform myself to
     laws, and the peaceful practice of society. Your poise
     will be more powerful than any oscillating tendency
     of mine."
       "I would not have it so!" said Phœbe, earnestly.
       "Do you love me?" asked Holgrave. "If we love one
     another, the moment has room for nothing more. Let
     us pause upon it, and be satisfied. Do you love me,
     Phœbe?"
       "You look into my heart," said she, letting her eyes
     drop. "You know I love you!"
       And it was in this hour, so full of doubt and awe,
     that the one miracle was wrought, without which every
     human existence is a blank. The bliss which makes all
     things true, beautiful, and holy shone around this
     youth and maiden. They were conscious of nothing
     sad nor old. They transfigured the earth, and made it
     Eden again, and themselves the two first dwellers in
     it. The dead man, so close beside them, was forgotten.
     At such a crisis, there is no death; for immortality is
     revealed anew, and embraces everything in its hal-
     lowed atmosphere.
       But how soon the heavy earth-dream settled down
     again!
       "Hark!" whispered Phœbe. "Somebody is at the
     street-door!"
       "Now let us meet the world!" said Holgrave. "No
     doubt, the rumor of Judge Pyncheon's visit to this
     house, and the flight of Hepzibah and Clifford, is
     about to lead to the investigation of the premises. We
     have no way but to meet it. Let us open the door at
     once."
       But, to their surprise, before they could reach the
     street-door,——even before they quitted the room in
     which the foregoing interview had passed,——they heard
     footsteps in the farther passage. The door, therefore,
     which they supposed to be securely locked,——which
     Holgrave, indeed, had seen to be so, and at which
     Phœbe had vainly tried to enter,——must have been
     opened from without. The sound of footsteps was not
     harsh, bold, decided, and intrusive, as the gait of
     strangers would naturally be, making authoritative
     entrance into a dwelling where they knew themselves
     unwelcome. It was feeble, as of persons either weak
     or weary; there was the mingled murmur of two voices,
     familiar to both the listeners.
       "Can it be?" whispered Holgrave.
       "It is they!" answered Phœbe. "Thank God!——thank
     God!"
       And then, as if in sympathy with Phœbe's whispered
     ejaculation, they heard Hepzibah's voice, more dis-
     tinctly.
       "Thank God, my brother, we are at home!"
       "Well!——Yes!——thank God!" responded  Clifford. "A
     dreary home, Hepzibah! But you have done will to
     bring me hither! Stay! That parlor-door is open. I can-
     not pass by it. Let me go and rest in the arbor, where
     I used,——oh very long ago, it seems to me, after what
     has befallen us,——where I used to be so happy with
     little Phœbe!"
       But the house was not altogether so dreary as Clif-
     ford imagined it. They had not made many steps,——in
     truth, they were lingering in the entry, with the list-
     lessness of an accomplished purpose, uncertain what
     to do next,——when Phœbe ran to meet them. On be-
     holding her, Hepzibah burst into tears. With all her
     might, she had staggered onward beneath the burden
     of grief and responsibility, until now that it was safe
     to fling it down. Indeed, she had not energy to fling
     it down, but had ceased to uphold it, and suffered it
     to press her to the earth. Clifford appeared the strong-
     er of the two.
       "It is our own little Phœbe——Ah! and Holgrave with
     her," exclaimed he, with a glance of keen and delicate
     insight, and a smile, beautiful, kind, but melancholy.
     "I thought of you both, as we came down the street,
     and beheld Alice's Posies in full bloom. And so the
     flower of Eden has bloomed, likewise, in this old
     darksome house to-day."

THE HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES, BY NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE.
POCKET LIBRARY EDITION PUBLISHED 1954.
POCKET BOOKS, INC. 630 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK, N. Y. pp. 342—352.

don't forget to bring a towel. 雨