The pathetic words sank deep into the tortured heart of the man, listening out in the dusk and dew, with the murmur of the sea in his ears and the heavy perfume of flowers all around. He pressed his heavy brow against the back of his seat, murmuring over the words:
"'There never was a love like mine!'"
Azalea stopped singing, but played on in dreamy mood a low, sad nocturne.
Suddenly, through the stillness of the garden, a faint sound reached his ear—a sound like a human sigh, then:
"Donald!"
With a start and a cry he lifted his head.
"Donald," was breathed tremulously upon the air again.
But there was no one near. Thrilling with awe, he glared into the darkness. The night was dark, and there in the shade of the tall firs and shrubberies, the shadows were dense. He could barely distinguish the outlines of his own hand. And yet as he gazed the voice called him again, softly, tenderly, beseechingly:
"Donald!"
"Who is there? Who calls?" he asked eagerly, and no voice replied, but out of the darkness there began to form before him at a little distance a faint, silvery something like a cloud taking shape and form. It grew more and more dense until it assumed the form of a woman—a mist-woman, shadowy, faint, yet luminous with a soft, unearthly glow, and beautiful as an angel with spiritual face, and slender, beckoning hands.