“Yet once again,” he murmured, “once again ere I forsake the flesh, are my ears blest with that voice! It is the song of the eternal woman! For me she sings!—Sing on, siren; my soul is a listening universe, and therein nought but thy voice!”
He paused, and began afresh:—
“It is the wind in the tree of life! Its leaves rustle in words of love. Under its shadow I shall lie, with her I loved—and killed! Ere that day come, she will have forgiven and forgotten, and all will be well!
“Hark the notes! Clear as a flute! Full and stringent as a violin! They are colours! They are flowers! They are alive! I can see them as they grow, as they blow! Those are primroses! Those are pimpernels! Those high, intense, burning tones—so soft, yet so certain—what are they? Jasmine?—No, that flower is not a note! It is a chord!—and what a chord! I mean, what a flower! I never saw that flower before—never on this earth! It must be a flower of the paradise whence comes the music! It is! It is! Do I not remember the night when I sailed in the great ship over the ocean of the stars, and scented the airs of heaven, and saw the pearly gates gleaming across myriads of wavering miles!—saw, plain as I see them now, the flowers on the fields within! Ah, me! the dragon that guards the golden apples! See his crest—his crest and his emerald eyes! He comes floating up through the murky lake! It is Geryon!—come to bear me to the gyre below!”
He turned, and with a somewhat quickened step left the room, hastily shutting the door behind him, as if to keep back the creature of his vision.
Strong-hearted and strong-brained, Donal had yet stood absorbed as if he too were out of the body, and knew nothing more of this earth. There is something more terrible in a presence that is not a presence than in a vision of the bodiless; that is, a present ghost is not so terrible as an absent one, a present but deserted body. He stood a moment helpless, then pulled himself together and tried to think. What should he do? What could he do? What was required of him? Was anything required of him? Had he any right to do anything? Could anything be done that would not both be and cause a wrong? His first impulse was to follow: a man in such a condition was surely not to be left to go whither he would among the heights and depths of the castle, where he might break his neck any moment! Interference no doubt was dangerous, but he would follow him at least a little way! He heard the steps going down the stair, and made haste after them. But ere they could have reached the bottom, the sound of them ceased; and Donal knew the earl must have left the stair at a point from which he could not follow him.
CHAPTER XXIX.
EPPY AGAIN.
He would gladly have told his friend the cobbler all about the strange occurrence; but he did not feel sure it would be right to carry a report of the house where he held a position of trust; and what made him doubtful was, that first he doubted whether the cobbler would consider it right. But he went to see him the next day, in the desire to be near the only man to whom it was possible he might tell what he had seen.
The moment he entered the room, where the cobbler as usual sat at work by his wife, he saw that something was the matter. But they welcomed him with their usual cordiality, nor was it many minutes before mistress Comin made him acquainted with the cause of their anxiety.
“We’re jist a wee triblet, sir,” she said, “aboot Eppy!”