And the sudden contrast caused a shock that put a blank, perhaps,
upon his mind, so that he lost the standard of remembered things. For
it was no longer merely a particular adventure; it seemed a habit
and a natural joy resumed. It was not new. He knew the momentum of
an accustomed happiness, mislaid, it may be, but certainly familiar. They sped across the gravel paths that intersected the well-groomed
lawn, they leaped the flower-beds, so laboriously shaped in mockery,
they clambered over the ornamental iron railings, scorning the easier
five-barred gate into the park. The longer grass then shook the dew
in soaking showers against his knees. He stooped, as though in some
foolish effort to turn up something, then realised that his legs, of
course, were bare. _Her_ garment was already high and free, for she,
too, was barelegged like himself. He saw her little ankles, wet and
shining in the moonlight, and flinging himself down, he kissed them
happily, plunging his face into the dripping, perfumed grass. Her
ringing laughter mingled with his own, as she stooped beside him the
same instant; her hair hung in a silver cloud; her eyes gleamed through
its curtain into his; then, suddenly, she soaked her hands in the heavy
dew and passed them over his face with a softness that was like the
touch of some scented southern wind. "Now you are anointed with the Night," she cried. "No one will know
you. You are forgotten of the world. Kiss me!" "We'll play for ever and ever," he cried, "the eternal game that was
old when the world was yet young," and lifting her in his arms he
kissed her eyes and lips. There was some natural bliss of song and
dance and laughter in his heart, an elemental bliss that caught them
together as wind and sunlight catch the branches of a tree. She leaped
from the ground to meet his swinging arms. He ran with her, then tossed
her off and caught her neatly as she fell. Evading a second capture,
she danced ahead, holding out one shining arm that he might follow. Hand in hand they raced on together through the clean summer moonlight. Yet there remained a smooth softness as of fur against his neck and
shoulders, and he saw then that she wore skins of tawny colour that
clung to her body closely, that he wore them too, and that her skin,
like his own, was of a sweet dusky brown. Then, pulling her towards him, he stared into her face. She suffered
the close gaze a second, but no longer, for with a burst of sparkling
laughter again she leaped into his arms, and before he shook her free
she had pulled and tweaked the two small horns that hid in the thick
curly hair behind, and just above, the ears. And that wilful tweaking turned him wild and reckless. That touch ran
down him deep into the mothering earth. He leaped and ran and sang with
a great laughing sound. The wine of eternal youth flushed all his veins
with joy, and the old, old world was young again with every impulse of
natural happiness intensified with the Earth's own foaming tide of life. From head to foot he tingled with the delight of Spring, prodigal with
creative power. Of course he could fly the bushes and fling wild across
the open! Of course the wind and moonlight fitted close and soft about
him like a skin! Of course he had youth and beauty for playmates, with
dancing, laughter, singing, and a thousand kisses! For he and she were
natural once again. They were free together of those long-forgotten
days when "Pan leaped through the roses in the month of June...!" With the girl swaying this way and that upon his shoulders, tweaking
his horns with mischief and desire, hanging her flying hair before
his eyes, then bending swiftly over again to lift it, he danced to
join the rest of their companions in the little moonlit grove of pines
beyond....


3

They rose somewhat pointed, perhaps, against the moonlight, those
English pines--more with the shape of cypresses, some might have
thought. A stream gushed down between their roots, there were mossy
ferns, and rough grey boulders with lichen on them. But there was
no dimness, for the silver of the moon sprinkled freely through the
branches like the faint sunlight that it really was, and the air ran
out to meet them with a heady fragrance that was wiser far than wine. The girl, in an instant, was whirled from her perch on his shoulders
and caught by a dozen arms that bore her into the heart of the jolly,
careless throng. Whisht! Whew! Whir! She was gone, but another, fairer
still, was in her place, with skins as soft and knees that clung as
tightly. Her eyes were liquid amber, grapes hung between her little
breasts, her arms entwined about him, smoother than marble, and as
cool. She had a crystal laugh. But he flung her off, so that she fell plump among a group of bigger
figures lolling against a twisted root and roaring with a jollity that
boomed like wind through the chorus of a song. They seized her, kissed
her, then sent her flying. They were happier with their glad singing. They held stone goblets, red and foaming, in their broad-palmed hands. "The mountains lie behind us!" cried a figure dancing past. "We are
come at last into our valley of delight. Grapes, breasts, and rich red
lips! Ho! Ho! It is time to press them that the juice of life may run!" He waved a cluster of ferns across the air and vanished amid a cloud of
song and laughter. "It is ours. Use it!" answered a deep, ringing voice. "The valleys are
our own. No climbing now!" And a wind of echoing cries gave answer from
all sides. "Life! Life! Life! Abundant, flowing over--use it, use it!" A troop of nymphs rushed forth, escaped from clustering arms and lips
they yet openly desired. He chased them in and out among the waving
branches, while she who had brought him ever followed, and sped past
him and away again. He caught three gleaming soft brown bodies, then
fell beneath them, smothered, bubbling with joyous laughter--next freed
himself and, while they sought to drag him captive again, escaped and
raced with a leap upon a slimmer, sweeter outline that swung up--only
just in time--upon a lower bough, whence she leaned down above him with
hanging net of hair and merry eyes. A few feet beyond his reach, she
laughed and teased him--the one who had brought him in, the one he ever
sought, and who for ever sought him too.... It became a riotous glory of wild children who romped and played with
an impassioned glee beneath the moon. For the world was young and they,
her happy offspring, glowed with the life she poured so freely into
them. All intermingled, the laughing voices rose into a foam of song
that broke against the stars. The difficult mountains had been climbed
and were forgotten. Good! Then, enjoy the luxuriant, fruitful valley
and be glad! And glad they were, brimful with spontaneous energy,
natural as birds and animals that obeyed the big, deep rhythm of a
simpler age--natural as wind and innocent as sunshine. Yet, for all the untamed riot, there was a lift of beauty pulsing
underneath.