“I shall not sleep to-night,”—said his brother moodily—“Something has occurred to me—a suggestion—an idea which I am impatient to work out without loss of time. And, Féraz,—if I succeed in it—you shall know the result to-morrow.”
This promise, which implied such a new departure from El-Râmi’s customary reticence concerning his work, really alarmed Féraz more than gratified him.
“For Heaven’s sake be careful!” he exclaimed—“You attempt so much,—you want so much,—perhaps more than can in law and justice be given. El-Râmi, my brother, leave something to God—you cannot, you dare not take all!”
“My dear visionary,” replied El-Râmi gently—“You alarm yourself needlessly, I assure you. I do not want to take anything except what is my own,—and, as for leaving something to God, why, He is welcome to what He makes of me in the end—a pinch of dust!”
“There is more than dust in your composition—” cried Féraz impetuously—“There is divinity! And the divinity belongs to God, and to God you must render it up, pure and perfect. He claims it from you, and you are bound to give it.”
A tremor passed through El-Râmi’s frame, and he grew paler.
“If that be true, Féraz,” he said slowly and with emphasis—“if it indeed be true that there is divinity in me,—which I doubt!—why, then let God claim and take his own particle of fire when He will, and as He will! Good-night!”
Féraz caught his hands and pressed them tenderly in his own.
“Good-night!” he murmured—“God does all things well, and to His care I commend you, my dearest brother.”
And as El-Râmi turned away and left the room he gazed after him with a chill sense of fear and desolation,—almost as if he were doomed never to see him again. He could not reason his alarm away, and yet he knew not why he should feel any alarm,—but, truth to tell, his interior sense of vision seemed still to smart and ache with the radiance of the light he had seen in his “star” and that roseate sunset-flush of “glory in the south” created by the clustering angels who were “the friends of Lilith.” Why were they there?—what did they wait for?—how should Lilith know them or have any intention of joining them, when she was here,—here on the earth, as he, Féraz, knew,—here under the supreme dominance of his own brother? He dared not speculate too far; and, trying to dismiss all thought from his mind, he was proceeding towards his own room, there to retire for the night, when he met Zaroba coming down the stairs. Her dark withered face had a serene and almost happy expression upon it,—she smiled as she saw him.