A. Merritt's Fantasy Magazine, February 1950 — page 121: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THE SEAL MAIDEN 121 till thy boat returns from Newfoundland. Thy absence will count for much.” Jean wept-over his fishing nets. Achille met Marie upon the hills next day, but his fiddle was silent. “What is this they say, that thou art pledged to Jean?” he asked. “Let them say,” Marie answered. “When we are ready we will leave Miquelon to- gether, thou and I.” “I love thee, Marie!” cried the boy, and strained his arms about her and kissed her lips. The girl looked at him in terror. Suddenly everything was changed for her. Her soul leaped up as something that has overslept. The sun was dancing on the snow, the pines were singing; sur- rounded her, it was everywhere, and she had never known it before. “I love thee, Achille!” she cried, and flung her arms about him. For a long minute they forgot all but each other. Out of the pines crept Jean Faguy. He was biting his bloodless lips and his hands were clenched. The lovers felt his malign presence blot out their sun. As Achille turned, Jean hurled him- self upon him with a scream, and felled him, and as the lame boy tried to rise he began beating him mercilessly. Sud- denly the girl’s hand shot forth. The knife which she had ripped from her bosom dented the buckle of the belt Jean wore and the point gashed his skin. He released Achille and staggered away. Marie bent over the lame boy, sobbing, and bathed his face with snow. Achille went back to his cabin upon the hills. He hung his fiddle upon the wall; he could not play that night. It seemed to him that he would never play again. The vague desires and the long thoughts of youth, the restlessness which it had assuaged, the dreams it had made real had grouped themselves round the figure of his beloved. He hated Miquelon now. He wanted her —her presence, her arms round him, her soft mouth, her love, her pity, that sense of two that made either invulnerable. He shivered in the unlit room. She would never come back to him. Since childhood he had learned that he could only possess what others refused. He had Marie’s love but Jean wanted her. His fiddle hung mute on the wall and he had only his dreams now. A shadow crepi,across the little aS dow-pane. The ‘door, ereaked in the night wind. Achille started, and his heart leaped and thumped tumultuously, for he thought that some one had tapped. He crossed the floor, stopped trembling, and dared not open. A hand was laid against the door. A whisper outside, not of the pines, and Achille flung the door open. A gust of icy wind rushed in. Marie stood there. Then the air grew insufferably hot. She stepped across the threshold and closed the door behind her. Achille dared not move; he was afraid that he would die. “Dost thou still love me?” she murmured, and led him back to his seat, knelt down, and placed her arms around him, her cheek resting against his. “They wanted to arrest me,” she said, laughing. “I went back, but I saw shadows of men against the firelight. I listened at the door. Jean was talking of sending me to the prison at St. Pierre. So I came back to thee.” Achille sat motionless and sbe kneeled there at his side contented. The little, bare cabin had become a palace; the boy, disfigured, bruised, lame, helpless, and the girl stared at each other in wonder and ecstasy. Each was trans- formed in the other’s eyes. These outcasts, rejected by all their world, had become greater than the world in their love for each other. Their in- nocence was stronger than their love, and mightier. They sat together at the cabin door, feeling neither the cold nor the fierce winter wind, and gazed over the sea. “I shall build thee a boat,” he said, in- terpreting her thoughts. “Thou dost not fear me as the rest do, Achille?” she asked. “I love thee,” answered Achille, and they kissed and crouched together in the dark- ness, their arms round each other. Suddenly the woods were filled with sound. Men sprang out from the pines, seized them, tore them apart. They flung the boy inside the hut and locked the door, and carried the girl down to the house of Jean Faguy. She did not struggle, for with her love the fierceness of her nature seemed to have departed. And take her where they chose, she cared not, while the world held Achille. JN HER accustomed corner the old mother nodded over her, folded hands, dozing her life away, Around the table sat Jean COMmiiclbooolk< S C@ in