| THE CHILD AT THE BROOKSIDE "Thou wilt love her dearly," repeated Hester Prynne, as she and the minister sat watching little Pearl. "Dost thou not think her beautiful? And see with what natural skill she has made those simple flowers adorn her! Had she gathered pearls, and diamonds, and rubies in the wood, they could not have become her better! She is a splendid child! But I know whose brow she has!"
"Dost thou know, Hester," said Arthur Dimmesdale, with an unquiet smile, "that this dear child, tripping about always at thy side, hath caused me many an alarm? Methought—oh, Hester, what a thought is that, and how terrible to dread it!—that my own features were partly repeated in her face, and so strikingly that the world might see them! But she is mostly thine!"
"No, no! Not mostly!" answered the mother, with a tender smile. "A little longer, and thou needest not to be afraid to trace whose child she is. But how strangely beautiful she looks with those wild flowers in her hair! It is as if one of the fairies, whom we left in dear old England, had decked her out to meet us."
It was with a feeling which neither of them had ever before experienced, that they sat and watched Pearl's slow advance. In her was visible the tie that united them. She had been offered to the world, these seven past years, as the living hieroglyphic, in which was revealed the secret they so darkly sought to hide—all written in this symbol—all plainly manifest—had there been a prophet or magician skilled to read the character of flame! And Pearl was the oneness of their being. Be the foregone evil what it might, how could they doubt that their earthly lives and future destinies were coned when they beheld at once the material union, and the spiritual idea, in whom they met, and were to dwell immortally together; thoughts like these—and perhaps other thoughts, which they did not acknowledge or define—threw an awe about the child as she came onward.
"Let her see nothing strange—no ion or eagerness—in thy way of accosting her," whispered Hester. "Our Pearl is a fitful and fantastic little elf sometimes. Especially she is generally intolerant of emotion, when she does not fully comprehend the why and wherefore. But the child hath strong affections! She loves me, and will love thee!"
"Thou canst not think," said the minister, glancing aside at Hester Prynne, "how my heart dreads this interview, and yearns for it! But, in truth, as I already told thee, children are not readily won to be familiar with me. They will not climb my knee, nor prattle in my ear, nor answer to my smile, but stand apart, and eye me strangely. Even little babes, when I take them in my arms, weep bitterly. Yet Pearl, twice in her little lifetime, hath been kind to me! The first time—thou knowest it well! The last was when thou ledst her with thee to the house of yonder stern old Governor."
"And thou didst plead so bravely in her behalf and mine!" answered the mother. "I it; and so shall little Pearl. Fear nothing. She may be strange and shy at first, but will soon learn to love thee!"
By this time Pearl had reached the margin of the brook, and stood on the further side, gazing silently at Hester and the clergyman, who still sat together on the mossy tree-trunk waiting to receive her. Just where she had paused, the brook chanced to form a pool so smooth and quiet that it reflected a perfect image of her little figure, with all the brilliant picturesqueness of her beauty, in its adornment of flowers and wreathed foliage, but more refined and spiritualized than the reality. This image, so nearly identical with the living Pearl, seemed to communicate somewhat of its own shadowy and intangible quality to the child herself. It was strange, the way in which Pearl stood, looking so steadfastly at them through the dim medium of the forest gloom, herself, meanwhile, all glorified with a ray of sunshine, that was attracted thitherward as by a certain sympathy. In the brook beneath stood another child—another and the same—with likewise its ray of golden light. Hester felt herself, in some indistinct and tantalizing manner, estranged from Pearl, as if the child, in her lonely ramble through the forest, had strayed out of the sphere in which she and her mother dwelt together, and was now vainly seeking to return to it.
There were both truth and error in the impression; the child and mother were estranged, but through Hester's fault, not Pearl's. Since the latter rambled from her side, another inmate had been itted within the circle of the mother's feelings, and so modified the aspect of them all, that Pearl, the returning wanderer, could not find her wonted place, and hardly knew where she was.
"I have a strange fancy," observed the sensitive minister, "that this brook is the boundary between two worlds, and that thou canst never meet thy Pearl again. Or is she an elfish spirit, who, as the legends of our childhood taught us, is forbidden to cross a running stream? Pray hasten her, for this delay has already imparted a tremor to my nerves."
"Come, dearest child!" said Hester encouragingly, and stretching out both her arms. "How slow thou art! When hast thou been so sluggish before now? Here is a friend of mine, who must be thy friend also. Thou wilt have twice as much love henceforward as thy mother alone could give thee! Leap across the brook and come to us. Thou canst leap like a young deer!"
Pearl, without responding in any manner to these honey-sweet expressions, remained on the other side of the brook. Now she fixed her bright wild eyes on her mother, now on the minister, and now included them both in the same glance, as if to detect and explain to herself the relation which they bore to one another. For some unable reason, as Arthur Dimmesdale felt the child's eyes upon himself, his hand—with that gesture so habitual as to have become involuntary—stole over his heart. At length, assuming a singular air of authority, Pearl stretched out her hand, with the small forefinger extended, and pointing evidently towards her mother's breast. And beneath, in the mirror of the brook, there was the flower-girdled and sunny image of little Pearl, pointing her small forefinger too.
"Thou strange child! why dost thou not come to me?" exclaimed
Hester. Pearl still pointed with her forefinger, and a frown gathered on her brow—the more impressive from the childish, the almost baby-like aspect of the features that conveyed it. As her mother still kept beckoning to her, and arraying her face in a holiday suit of unaccustomed smiles, the child stamped her foot with a yet more imperious look and gesture. In the brook, again, was the fantastic beauty of the image, with its reflected frown, its pointed finger, and imperious gesture, giving emphasis to the aspect of little Pearl.
"Hasten, Pearl, or I shall be angry with thee!" cried Hester Prynne, who, however, inured to such behaviour on the elf-child's part at other seasons, was naturally anxious for a more seemly deportment now. "Leap across the brook, naughty child, and run hither! Else I must come to thee!" But Pearl, not a whit startled at her mother's threats any more than mollified by her entreaties, now suddenly burst into a fit of ion, gesticulating violently, and throwing her small figure into the most extravagant contortions. She accompanied this wild outbreak with piercing shrieks, which the woods reverberated on all sides, so that, alone as she was in her childish and unreasonable wrath, it seemed as if a hidden multitude were lending her their sympathy and encouragement. Seen in the brook once more was the shadowy wrath of Pearl's image, crowned and girdled with flowers, but stamping its foot, wildly gesticulating, and, in the midst of all, still pointing its small forefinger at Hester's bosom. "I see what ails the child," whispered Hester to the clergyman, and turning pale in spite of a strong effort to conceal her trouble and annoyance, "Children will not abide any, the slightest, change in the accustomed aspect of things that are daily before their eyes. Pearl misses something that she has always seen me wear!" "I pray you," answered the minister, "if thou hast any means of pacifying the child, do it forthwith! Save it were the cankered wrath of an old witch like Mistress Hibbins," added he, attempting to smile, "I know nothing that I would not sooner encounter than this ion in a child. In Pearl's young beauty, as in the wrinkled witch, it has a preternatural effect. Pacify her if thou lovest me!"
Hester turned again towards Pearl with a crimson blush upon her cheek, a conscious glance aside clergyman, and then a heavy sigh, while, even before she had time to speak, the blush yielded to a deadly pallor. "Pearl," said she sadly, "look down at thy feet! There!—before thee!—on the hither side of the brook!" |
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LA NIA JUNTO AL ARROYUELO —T la amars tiernamente,—repiti Ester mientras en unin de Dimmesdale contemplaban a Perla.—No la encuentras bella? Y mira con qu arte tan natural ha convertido en adorno esas flores tan sencillas. Si hubiera recogido perlas, y diamantes, y rubes en el bosque, no le sentaran mejor. Es una nia esplndida! Pero bien s a qu frente se parece la suya.
—Sabes t, Ester,—dijo Arturo Dimmesdale con inquieta sonrisa,—que esta querida nia, que va siempre dando saltitos a tu lado, me ha producido ms de una alarma? Me pareca... oh Ester!... qu pensamiento es ese, y qu terrible la idea!... Me pareca que los rasgos de mis facciones se reproducan en parte en su rostro, y que todo el mundo podra reconocerlas. Tal es su semejanza! Pero ms que todo es tu imagen.
—No, no es as,—respondi la madre con una tierna sonrisa. Espera algn tiempo, no mucho, y no necesitars asustarte ante la idea de que se vea de quin es hija. Pero qu singularmente bella parece con esas flores silvestres con que se ha adornado el cabello! Se dira que una de las hadas que hemos dejado en nuestra querida Inglaterra la ha ataviado para que nos salga al encuentro.
Con un sentimiento que jams hasta entonces ninguno de los dos haba experimentado, contemplaban la lenta marcha de Perla. En ella era visible el lazo que los una. En estos siete aos que haban transcurrido, fue la nia para el mundo un jeroglfico viviente en que se revelaba el secreto que ellos de tal modo trataron de ocultar: en este smbolo estaba todo escrito, todo patente de un modo sencillo, a haber existido un profeta o un hbil mago capaces de interpretar sus caracteres de fuego. Sea cual fuere el mal pasado, cmo podran dudar que sus vidas terrenales y sus futuros destinos estaban entrelazados, cuando vean ante s tanto la unin material como la idea espiritual en que ambos se confundan, y en que haban de morar juntos inmortalmente? Pensamientos de esta naturaleza,—y quizs otros que no se confesaban o no describan,—revistieron a la nia de una especie de misteriosa solemnidad a medida que se adelantaba.
—Que no vea nada extrao, nada apasionado, ni ansiedad alguna en tu manera de recibirla y dirigirte a ella,—le dijo Ester al ministro en voz baja.—Nuestra Perla es a veces como un duende fantstico y caprichoso. Especialmente no puede tolerar las fuertes emociones, cuando no comprende plenamente la causa ni el objeto de las mismas. Pero la nia es capaz de afectos intensos. Me ama y te amar.
—T no tienes una idea,—dijo el ministro mirando de soslayo a Ester,—de lo que temo esta entrevista, y al mismo tiempo cunto la anhelo. Pero la verdad es, como ya te he dicho, que no me gano fcilmente la voluntad de los nios. No se me suben a las rodillas, no me charlan al odo, no responden a mi sonrisa; sino que permanecen alejados de m y me miran de una manera extraa. Aun los recin nacidos lloran fuertemente cuando los tomo en brazos. Sin embargo, Perla ha sido cariosa para conmigo dos veces en su vida. La primera vez... bien sabes cuando fue! La ltima, cuando la llevaste contigo a la casa del severo y anciano Gobernador.
—Y cuando t abogaste tan valerosamente en favor de ella y mo,—respondi la madre.—Lo recuerdo perfectamente, y tambin deber recordarlo Perla. No temas nada! Al principio podr parecerte singular y hasta huraa, pero pronto aprender a amarte.
Ya Perla haba llegado a la orilla del arroyuelo, y all se qued contemplando silenciosamente a Ester y al ministro, que permanecan sentados juntos en el tronco musgoso del viejo rbol, esperando que viniese. Precisamente donde la nia se haba detenido, el arroyuelo formaba un charco tan liso y tranquilo que reflejaba una imagen perfecta de su cuerpecito, con toda la pintoresca brillantez de su belleza, que realzaba su adorno de flores y hojas, si bien ms espiritualizada y delicada que en la realidad. Esta imagen, casi tan idntica a lo que era Perla, pareca comunicar algo de su cualidad intangible y flotante a la nia misma. La manera en que Perla permaneca all, mirndoles fijamente al travs de la semi-obscuridad de la selva, era realmente extraa; iluminada ella, sin embargo, por un rayo de sol atrado all por cierta oculta simpata. Ester misma se senta de un modo vago y misterioso como alejada de su hija; como si sta, en su paseo solitario por la selva, se hubiera apartado por completo de la esfera en que tanto ella como su madre habitaban juntas, y estuviese ahora tratando de regresar, aunque en vano, al perdido hogar.
Y en esta sensacin haba a la vez verdad y error: hija y madre se sentan ahora mutuamente extraas, pero por culpa de Ester, no de Perla. Mientras la nia se paseaba solitariamente, otro ser haba sido itido en la esfera de los sentimientos de la madre, modificando de tal modo el aspecto de las cosas, que Perla, al regresar de su paseo, no pudo hallar su acostumbrado puesto y apenas reconoci a su madre.
—Una singular idea se ha apoderado de m,—dijo el enfermizo ministro.—Se me figura que este arroyuelo forma el lmite entre dos mundos, y que nunca ms has de encontrar a tu Perla. acaso es ella una especie de duende o espritu encantado a los que, como nos decan en los cuentos de nuestra infancia, les est prohibido cruzar una corriente de agua? Te ruego que te apresures, porque esta demora ya me ha puesto los nervios en conmocin.
—Ven, querida nia,—dijo Ester animndola y extendiendo los brazos hacia ella.—Ven: qu lenta eres! Cundo, antes de ahora, te has mostrado tan floja? Aqu est un amigo mo que tambin quiere ser tu amigo. En adelante tendrs dos veces tanto amor como el que tu madre sola puede darte. Salta sobre el arroyuelo y ven hacia nosotros. T puedes saltar como un corzo.
Perla, sin responder de ningn modo a estas melosas expresiones, permaneci al otro lado del arroyuelo, fijando los brillantes ojos ya en su madre, ya en el ministro, o incluyendo a veces a entrambos en la misma mirada, como si quisiera descubrir y explicarse lo que haba de comn entre los dos. Debido a inexplicable motivo, al sentir Arturo Dimmesdale que las miradas de la nia se clavaban en l, se llev la mano al corazn con el gesto que le era tan habitual y que se haba convertido en accin involuntaria. Al fin, tomando cierto aspecto singular de autoridad, Perla extendi la mano sealando con el dedo ndice evidentemente el pecho de su madre. Y debajo, en el cristal del arroyuelo, se vea la imagen brillante y llena de flores de Perla, sealando tambin con su dedito.
—Nia singular, por qu no vienes donde estoy?—exclam Ester.
Perla tena extendido aun el dedo ndice, y frunci el entrecejo, lo que le comunicaba una significacin ms notable, atendidas las facciones infantiles que tal aspecto tomaban. Como su madre continuaba llamndola, lleno el rostro de inusitadas sonrisas, la nia golpe la tierra con el pie con gestos y miradas aun ms imperiosos, que tambin reflej el arroyuelo, as como el dedo extendido y el gesto imperioso de la nia.
—Apresrate, Perla, o me incomodar,—grit Ester, quien, acostumbrada a semejante modo de proceder de parte de su hija en otras ocasiones, deseaba, como era natural, un comportamiento algo mejor en las circunstancias actuales.—Salta el arroyuelo, traviesa nia, y corre hacia aqu: de lo contrario yo ir a donde t ests.
Pero Perla no hizo caso de las amenazas de su madre, como no lo haba hecho de sus palabras afectuosas, sino que rompi en un arrebato de clera, gesticulando violentamente y agitando su cuerpecito con las ms extravagantes contorsiones, acompaando esta explosin de ira de agudos gritos que repercuti la selva por todas partes; de modo que a pesar de lo sola que estaba en su infantil e incomprensible furor, pareca que una oculta multitud la acompaaba y hasta la alentaba en sus acciones. Y en el agua del arroyuelo se reflej una vez ms la colrica imagen de Perla, coronada de flores, golpeando el suelo con el pie, gesticulando violentamente y apuntando con el dedo ndice al seno de Ester.
—Ya s lo que quiere esta nia,—murmur Ester al ministro, y palideciendo, a pesar de un gran esfuerzo para ocultar su disgusto y su mortificacin, dijo:—los nios no permiten el ms leve cambio en el aspecto acostumbrado de las cosas que tienen diariamente a la vista. Perla echa de menos algo que siempre me ha visto llevar.
—Si tienes algn medio de apaciguar a la nia,—le dijo el ministro,—te ruego que lo hagas inmediatamente. Excepto el furor de una vieja hechicera, como la Sra. Hibbins,—agreg tratando de sonrer,—nada hay que me asuste tanto como un arrebato de clera cual ste en un nio. En la tierna belleza de Perla, as como en las arrugas de la vieja hechicera, tiene ese arrebato algo de sobrenatural. Apacguala, si me amas.
Ester se dirigi de nuevo a Perla, con el rostro encendido, dando una mirada de soslayo al ministro, y exhalando luego un hondo suspiro; y aun antes de haber tenido tiempo de hablar, el color de sus mejillas se convirti en mortal palidez.
—Perla,—dijo con tristeza,—mira a tus pies.... Ah... frente a t... al otro lado del arroyuelo. |
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