Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1882-01-19
MY OWN RIVAL.

Perfection iSOlateS. had known this
long before, and cared nothing, but the
day that saw Louis Rimaux at my feet /
comprehended the desolation of mag
nifcence, the curse of a beauty so ex-
treme as my own. You think he was
my lover. No, a thousand removes
from that. 1 never had a lover, not
withstanding the fact that there had
been many at my feet before him; but I
repeat, never cared till this day, till I
found out, listening to this man who
begged no love of me, but only that he
might make of me an idol unto hims elf,
that had heart; then how could be
m idol, for what idol ever had heart,
or cared for its worshiperp
He was more than eloquent, but, alas!
remembered certain outbursts of his
before Murillo's pictures in the art gal
leries of Rome, and recognized the par
ellel. He was on his knees before me.
Oh, that he had risen to the level of my
heart instead, that he had taken me in
his arms, that his smooth, flowing
speech had tripped upon his tongue!
The nursery door must have been a
bit ajar. Anything serves Lulu for
cradle song. Bending, happy as any
saint in Heaven, above her sleeping
babe, she will vet sing so one might
fancy her heart was breaking, if one did
not know that singers still less than
poets feel what they sing. At this mo-
ment there floated down the stairs,
ssThou art so near, and yet so far.''
"My soul has possessed her voice." l
thought, looking down ON Rimaux, whom
might have laid my hand upon as 1
sat-Rimaux, between whom and me
stretched immensely.
Still / was tempted sore. Is not half
loaf better than no bread? Yet how is
hunger helped by stone? If I dared
risk circumstance, disease, the pail of
possession, yet waited for me Time, the
iconoclast, from whom one may escape
only by deaths door. Ruin is less kind
to loneliness in nature than in art-it
denies it even the picturesque. The ug-
hest old women one sees have always
been young beauties, I remembered,
and the thought stung me to cry out, a
little sharply perhaps, the words with
which l had dallied so long, the words
for which 1 knew his heart held but one
answer:
"Wait,'' said, interrupting him in
the midst of his rapid tide Of words.
ssDo you love meP''
up in my beautiful face, seeing that on
ly, thinking of that only, as he spoke.
His tones, his words, clashed hollow
and alien in my ears with little Scotch
lullaby, simple and homely and sweet,
which Lulu now sung.
"Do you love meP' said again, with
an emphasis so marked and bitter that
it reused him to comprehension of me
and himself. He did not speak directly,
and, watching his face, I knew I had
judged him aright-he might be cruel,
but he could not be untrue
Sc 1t is not for you, Regina" he said
at last. " You do not need it. Love,
the common love which man gives wom-
an, embraces tenderness, and tenderness
implies pity, though it be latent and I'M
developed. Look" he said, leading me
before one of the mirrors with which
the room was lined, "you are a god
dess, you are perfection! Do you then
demand tenderness, do you inspire
pityp No; love clasps at its own level,
heart to heart, but it is thus for you,
Regina" throwing himself again at my
feet, and again pouring out know not
what wild rawlings of my beauty.
Rise, Monsieur Rimaux," said,
smiling a little, ssit is not worth so
much supplication, this favor which it
seems to me ] can grant you at small
cost to myself. Every one comedies
YOUR skin as an artist. Come, will sit
to you, and you shall have the portrait |
for your own. Perfection, as a woman,
must soon decay; as portrait, you
may possess and preserve unscathed !
for lifetime that which you admire in
me-" Ill -. :,
"Ah, but" he said, little confused |
st the turn had given the affair, ''did
/ not say you were goddess rather than
a woman?"
r.Then I may not wed a mortal" I |
answered. 81 must wait for my Olym-
plan mate"
/ spoke lightly, mockingly, for was
in an agony, now that I had fathomed
exactly his feeling for me, lest he should
suspect what had prompted me to de-
mand of him if he loved me, lest he !