Now, this was purely owing to the fact that he had suddenly found himself a stranger to himself. It was, in a manner, as if he had lived in blindness with a man for years, having, perhaps, without fully recognizing the fact, some mental conception of him. Then, on being miraculously restored to sight, he had discovered that the reality was totally at variance with that same mental conception.
The recovery of sight had come gradually. It had not been an instantaneous miracle. At the first he thought, doubtless, if he considered the fact at all, and he was probably only partially aware of it, that the variance between the reality and what his partially restored sight beheld, was due to his own faulty vision. Now, with clear sight restored, he beheld a complete stranger, and it left him bewildered. He didn’t know the man at all. He didn’t even recognize his speech. It is small wonder that he was bewildered; it is small wonder that he spent solitary hours in a futile attempt to reconstruct his preconceived notions of the man.
I believe that the moment when David got a first blurred glimpse of this stranger, was in Father Maloney’s odd little parlour. He had had another glimpse of him at the Castle; and since then, little by little, the glimpses had resolved themselves into full vision. And through it all, with it all, was a queer sense of vibratory forces at work.
It was in the parlour, also, that the first vibration had struck upon him—a quite definite vibration, though inexplicable. It had rung clearly for a brief space, gradually growing fainter, till he wondered if it had indeed rung, or was merely imagination on his part. It had been repeated at the Castle, and had left no doubt in his mind. Since then it had been renewed at intervals, ringing each time longer and louder. I can best describe it as some kind of mental telephone call, though he was, at present, at a complete loss as to the message waiting to be delivered.
“The fact is, David P. Delancey,” he remarked more than once, “that somehow your moorings have been cut, and the Lord only knows where you are drifting.”
Very early in the morning, the sun not far above the horizon, and the trees casting long shadows on the grass, David set out for a walk.
It was by no means the first time that he had risen thus betimes. The clean, fresh spirit of the morning appealed to him, also its detachment. It seemed, at that hour, so extraordinarily aloof from the affairs of men, wrapped, in a sense, in its own quiet meditations. Later the sun, the little breezes, the sweet earth scents seemed to give forth warmth, freshness, and fragrant odours for the benefit of mankind. At this hour it was wrapped in meditation, a meditation approaching ecstasy.
He went softly, fearing almost to disturb the stillness, yet he did not altogether feel himself an intruder. There was, in a strange sense, something of communion between his spirit and the spirit of the silent morning, in spite of its detachment.
The route he had chosen led first across the moorland,—wide stretches of purple heather. He walked without indulging in any special train of thought. His eyes were open to the details of nature around him, his brain alert to absorb them in pure pleasure.