Now a new life began in that humble studio. Life and happiness shone there, and the hustle and bustle of business kept them company. The twinkling morning star watched the progress of the work. It seemed that the clay had taken on life while she had been there and bent in loveliness over her image with its familiar features. "Now I know what life is!" beamed the artist. "It's love! It is being lifted above yourself, the rapture of losing yourself in beauty! What my friends call life and pleasure is unreal and as fleeting as a bubble; they know nothing of the pure, heavenly altar wine that initiates us into life!"
The marble block was placed, and the chisel cut away large pieces. Careful measurements were made, and the work proceeded. Little by little, the stone was transformed into a figure of beauty, Psyche, as beautiful and perfect as God's own image in the young girl. That weighty stone was changed into a light, dancing, aerial form, a charming Psyche, with the smile of divine innocence that had captured the young sculptor's heart.
The morning star saw it and understood all that was stirring in the young man's mind, understood the changing color of his cheeks, the look in his eyes, while he strove to utilize the gift God had granted him.
"You are a master like those in the time of the Greeks," said his friends. "Soon the whole world will be admiring your Psyche!"
"My Psyche!" he repeated. "Mine! Yes, she must be mine! I am an artist like the mighty ones of olden times! God has given me this gift in order to raise me to the level of the nobility!" He fell upon his knees and cried in gratitude to God; but he soon forgot Him and thought only of her and her image in marble, his Psyche who stood there as though carved from snow, blushing in the morning sunlight.
He went to see the living, moving Psyche, whose words were like music; he could bring her the news that the marble Psyche was completed at last. He walked through the courtyard, with its fountain trickling through dolphin shapes into the marble basin, where the calla lilies and fresh roses bloomed, and into a great, lofty antechamber, its walls splendid with tapestries and coats of arms. Handsomely dressed servants, haughty, and strutting like sleigh horses with their bells, passed to and fro; some were even stretched out lazily and overbearingly on the carved wooden benches, as much at their ease as if they were the masters of the house.
He explained his errand and was led up the carpeted marble staircase. Statues lined either side. He passed through splendid aparments hung with magnificent pictures and paved with shining mosaic; the wealth and show about him left him almost breathless. But his courage soon returned when he was kindly, almost cordially, received by the dignified, courteous old prince who, after a brief talk, bade him visit the young signorina, his daughter, who wished to see him. Again he was conducted by servants through beautiful halls and chambers, until he was ushered into a room whereof she herself was the pomp and splendor.
She spoke to him, and no solemn, churchly music could have greater power to melt the heart and raise the soul. He took her hand and pressed it to his lips; no rose could be so soft, but that light touch seemed to overpower him with a strong, magical spell. Words he never thought to speak rushed from his lips. He did not know what he was saying; is the volcano conscious when the burning lava flows from it? He told her of his love.
She drew herself up before him, astounded, offended, and haughty; then an expression of disgust, as though she had accidentally touched a wet, slimy frog, passed over her features; her cheeks flushed, and her lips grew pale; her eyes flashed and yet were as dark as the night.
"Maniac!" she said. "Away! Out of my sight!" And as she turned her back on him, her lovely face had the look of that legendary beauty with the stony face and the snakes in her hair.