She moved nearer to him. “Ramiki!”
Ramiki cried out. “O Arzan! still she befools me!”
He had cried so loudly that his words appeared still to sound over the marsh and the river. Halmis stood still, then, turning, stepped from the boat upon the reedy riverbank. “Thou fool! not to know when!” said Halmis.
Ramiki rose from his mat at dawn, drank milk and ate barley cakes, and passed through the fields to the thick wood. After wandering for some time he found a tree that liked him. It was huge of trunk and spreading of branch, and near by, in a round basin, a spring murmured. Ramiki sat down beneath the tree. At first he looked at the boughs and the leaves and the birds, and at the sky between the boughs. Then he looked at the spring, and it made a centre for him—a small, bright, round pool, shot at by the arrows of the sun. The wood was still, and had a manifold fragrance. Ramiki felt still likewise.
Ramiki spent the day in the wood. He had barley cakes with him in a wallet. Now and again he moved about, once he slept a little. When he waked he saw a serpent drinking. About midday a great cloud mounted into the sky. At top it was dazzling white, but underneath and in hollows shadow-dark. Ramiki watched it until it sank again beneath the wood and there was only clear and open heaven. He watched it very intently, swaying his body back and forth as he watched. When it was gone his gaze returned to the spring.... He had a good day, a balmy, idea-flowing day!
It was so prosperous, his spirit was at once so fluent and so soothed, that earth and life, and Halmis in both, grew more than tolerable. Ramiki sat cross-legged in the wood and stared at the cloud or at the spring, until the god had given him the song he should sing. When he had it he relaxed, and resting against the tree let his mind go doze and play. The god had spoken and gone, but Ramiki would remember! After a time he sat upright again, and finding at hand a bit of wood, drew his knife from the sheath, and began to whittle an arrow. As he worked he hummed to himself. Once or twice he laughed. It slipped into his mind, from where he knew not, that that was a fine boulder to throw into the camp of women!... He felt so balm-bathed and free that he lost for a time any grudge against the camp of women, any grudge against Halmis.
The light began to weaken in the wood. Ramiki, moreover, was hungry. He rose from beneath the tree, and retraced his steps to the village. The sun was sinking as he came near. A red and gold light caressed the river-plain. He heard blow one of the long trumpets, and presently saw that folk were gathering to the central place where stood the god-stone. A boy passed him, running from the fields. Ramiki called after him. “What is doing?”
“Halmis-who-prophesies,” spoke the boy over his shoulder, “will tell the folk who go what they shall find!” He ran on.
The balm flowed away from Ramiki.
He turned to the river, and there was Halmis coming up from the water-side. He waited for her. She came even with him, and the red sunlight made burning and bright the red upon her forehead and the red in her hair.