Chapter XXII

She spoke, then left abruptly. Strange it was,
With what abhorrence I would shrink from her
While speaking thus. Not selfish seem’d she all,
But so insensible; and these, our tastes,
These dainty despots of desire, our tastes
The worst of tyrants are; nor brook offense.
I wellnigh hated her. Yet minded thus,
While musing on her moods that seemed so hard—
Have not you noticed at the arsenal,
At times, when watching those grim helmets there,
All suddenly, upon their polish’d brass
A wondrous brightness? then, within the disk,
Your own face hideous render’d? So with me:
Amid her harsher traits that there appear’d,
Shone soon the brighter metal; out of it,
Leer’d back to greet me my own hideousness!—
For I, it seem’d, had been the selfish one.
Had I regarded her, my father’s wish,
That suitor’s choice?—Nay, I had thought of none,
None saving Haydn.
Then I ask’d again,
Could this be true—the thing my sister said,—
Could aught so sweet as Haydn’s love exude
From moods, all mushroom’d by disease? I thought
How marvellously throng’d with strange weird shapes
Deep halls of fancy loom, when lighted up
By fires of fever; how, with trust complete,
The weak lean oft on all beside themselves,
And soon I blamed my heart that it could dare
To lure his poor, weak, crazed confession on;
And then I flush’d, and broke in passionate sobs,
To think Doretta dared to hint such things.