"Gabrielle," I could see her and the objects everywhere plainly, by the flooding light that momentarily grew more and more brilliant, "Gabrielle. What is it? Are you sick?"
There was no answer; her eyes were closed again, and her hands seemed stiffened together in the figure of prayer. I placed her on one of the stools, and without relinquishing my hold of her, opened the basket of food and wine, took out a flask and pressed it between her lips. She responded. The wine revived her, and like a dazed person, she stared about her as if lost.
"Gabrielle, here I am—Alfred, your brother. Speak, Gabrielle. O! speak."
Sentient life was returning, its force was reawakened, and she opened her arms, and embraced me, and—blessed sound—her words entered my ears, soft, low, almost gasping.
"Alfred. See. The Spirits are here. My summons has been heard. Quintado has kept his word. It is all as he said. Listen, Alfred. There are voices—a sort of music; singing or—is it sighing? Ah! This ends the war. And the cries, the shouts, Alfred. What are they?"
The light had become more and more strong—it rained now upon old La Ferté, and its solitary tower, and its ruins, the wandering ancient park with trees and bushes started outward, clothed in the strange splendor. The glory of it filled the skies, and it beat upon the motionless crowds revealing their compacted and scattered groups. And the people? Everywhere was confusion or consternation. A widespread agitation was expressed in uplifted hands, in bowed heads, in kneeling bodies. We could see that, indistinctly, on the country-side, beyond La Ferté. But it was the mammoth voice of that people that Gabrielle had heard, rising—rising—blotting out the ethereal music, until its indescribable weirdness, its inarticulate ululations were like some animal expiration of immeasurable magnitude. It shot a singular terror into my heart. Was this indeed the End of the Earth?
"Gabrielle," I whispered, "let us go. We cannot stay here. This light, this influence—these ghostly crowds. I cannot—you cannot stand it. Come—come."
I lifted her to her feet, forced her again to drink of the wine and drank myself. And then we turned to the steps to descend. Everything was in a bright light, and the light was accompanied now by gleaming shooting darts or rays, that split it in streaks of phosphorescent—nothing else quite describes it—cleavages.
I thought I saw faces—but they were like thoughts only. Gabrielle clung closely to me, and shielded her eyes from the marvellous picture, that increased its stupendous power every minute. I took one last look through the broad gap in the parapet. The clouds of glory were still descending, sometimes in rolling folds, and the billowy masses or reservoirs of light that had reached the earth were visibly hastening onward along the track of that distant endless marshalled host, like dust-storms of countless sparks. I thought too, different from the colossal moan of the multitude, I caught the sharp note of distant cries. Was that the beginning of that "terrible Paralysis" Quintado in his vision to Gabrielle had threatened? I thought so.
I almost carried Gabrielle down the winding stairs. Her interest increased, animation awakened, the vitality of her tired nerves was renewed; she seemed suddenly thrilled with an exorbitant curiosity. At the foot of the long descent, painfully traversed, as I could not bring with me my little lantern, though the exterior splendor sent innumerable dashes of light through chinks and narrow eyelets, that dimly lit our winding way—at the foot, Gabrielle seemed quickened into an almost delirious activity.