That night Hermes had no voice for him.
Else might the wise god have said, "Many reeds grow together by the river, and men tread them at will, and none are the worse. But in one reed of a million song is hidden; and when a man carelessly breaks that reed in twain, he may miss its music often and long,—yea, all the years of his life."
But Hermes that night spake not.
And he brake his reed, and cast it behind him.
CHAPTER V.
When the dawn came, it found her lying face downward among the rushes by the river. She had run on, and on, and on blindly, not knowing whither she fled, with the strange force that despair lends; then suddenly had dropped, as a young bull drops in the circus with the steel sheathed in its brain. There she had remained insensible, the blood flowing a little from her mouth.
It was quite lonely by the waterside. A crane among the sedges, an owl on the wind, a water-lizard under the stones, such were the only moving things. It was in a solitary bend of the stream; its banks were green and quiet; there were no dwellings near; and there was no light anywhere, except the dull glow of the lamp above the Calvary.
No one found her. A young fox came and smelt at her, and stole frightened away. That was all. A sharp wind rising with the reddening of the east blew on her, and recalled her to consciousness after many hours. When her eyes at length opened, with a blank stare upon the grayness of the shadows, she lifted herself a little and sat still, and wondered what had chanced to her.
The first rays of the sun rose over the dim blue haze of the horizon. She looked at it and tried to remember, but failed. Her brain was sick and dull.