"What is that?"
"A man who calls demons and spirits of the air, as you would call your pet birds, and they come to him."
"May the unknown God love me!" cried Agatha, shuddering. "What are the demons like?"
"Not like our sculptures, believe me," answered Plancina. "I dare not tell you; I have seen what no words can say."
She paused, shrugged her shoulders, and then added,
"Some forms were like the human, with red fire in the veins instead of blood, and white fire in the bones instead of marrow; eyes they possessed that had no comfort in them. They had the air of being utterly without interest in any thing, only that their eyes were filled with fear; yet it seemed to me with knowledge, too: unspeakable fear, immense knowledge; wells and pools they appeared, full of fear and knowledge. When they glanced upon you, there were pale rays of hatred strangely combined with an expression of indifference, fear, knowledge, and hatred. If you looked at the eyes, when they looked not at you, you saw nothing but an expression of fear and knowledge; but when they did look at you, you saw fear, knowledge, and hatred too. All these faces mocked without smiling, and scoffed without enjoyment. Something, I thought, was dripping down the wan cheeks, and there was a look of fixed surprise long ago, of long-past astonishment—the trace left, and the feeling gone. The emotion of boundless amazement had once been there; the signs of it were left all over the countenance, but, if I may so speak, petrified—an immedicable scar, an ineffaceable vestige. The character of the countenance was that of a dead astonishment—the astonishment was dead; it was no longer an active sentiment. It had been some boundless wonder; the greatest which that creature had ever experienced, and the event which had caused it had apparently been the most serious which that being had ever known."
"What a truly tremendous description!" exclaimed Agatha.
The other made no reply; and before any further conversation could occur between them, a young man, in the dark-brown habiliments of a slave, entered the garden from the inn, and after a hasty glance in various directions, approached the bower. His features were very good; he was well made, of a pleasing address, and had a look of uncommon intelligence. He possessed, in a small degree, and a humble way, that undefinable air of elegance which mental culture sheds over the countenance; but with this advantage he betrayed certain symptoms of awkwardness and timidity. Standing at a little distance from the door of the arbor, he made a low bow to Plancina, and said he was the bearer of some commands.
"Commands from whom?" she demanded.
He answered, bowing low again, by merely stating that his name was Claudius.