"Two short hours," he muttered, "only two. Stara, why don't you come? I'm waiting."
Rapidly his excitement grew; the sweat poured down his grey, working face, and he staggered as he walked.
"Stara, speak!" he shouted, and then stopped dead, with eyes glaring into the gloom.
"Yes, yes," he whispered, "you're coming. I can hear those harps again, they're sounding louder. Ah!" with a scream, "the light—the light, Stara, beloved," and Hector threw out his arms, swayed for a moment, and then, falling forward on to the ground, lay motionless.
A quarter of an hour passed, and then a faint tremor shook the still figure. He moved restlessly, tossing out his arms, then painfully raised himself on his elbow, and looked vacantly around.
Slowly the light of understanding returned to his eyes. He struggled to his feet, and groping his way to a chair lay back in it for some minutes, panting; then from his pocket he produced another flask—a tiny gold one—and putting it to his lips gulped down the contents.
Rapidly the liquid fire ran through his numbed body, and a faint colour returned to his cheeks. He sat up, his eyes bright with exultation. "Königgratz, she said," he murmured, "only the one word, but enough," and then, with full strength restored, he hurried over to the desk, and seizing pencil and paper began feverishly to write.
For over an hour he sat, covering sheet after sheet with his round sprawling caligraphy, and flinging each sheet on the ground when finished, till a heap of paper rose by his side. His task completed, he gathered up the documents, pinned them together, and read them rapidly through. This done, he flung the bundle on the desk, and striding across to a large blackboard standing at one end of the tent chalked on it a picture—if it could be so designated when the drawing would have disgraced a child of ten.
Barely was the work completed and the artist's signature subscribed, when footsteps were heard approaching. Hastily covering the board with a cloth, Hector returned to his desk, which he reached as Godwin entered, with gloom written on his face.
"Raven!" roared Hector at the sight, and then ran to the tent-pole and began to shin rapidly up it, where he chanted, from the top: