To bear you in safety away.
Maria!
Why, then, repulse my fond love?
Black I am, whilst you are white;
Night and the day, when united,
Bring forth the beautiful light.
Maria!
CHAPTER V.
A prolonged quavering note upon the guitar, like a sob, concluded the song. I was beside myself with rage. King—black—slave! A thousand incoherent ideas were awakened by this extraordinary and mysterious song. A maddening desire to finish for once and all with this unknown being, who dared to mingle the name of Marie with songs of love and menace, took possession of me. I grasped my rifle convulsively and rushed from the summer-house. Marie stretched out her arms to detain me, but I was already in the thicket from which the voice appeared to have come. I searched the little wood thoroughly, I beat the bushes with the barrel of my rifle, I crept behind the trunks of the large trees, and walked through the high grass.
Nothing—nothing—always nothing! This fruitless search added fuel to the fire of my anger. Was this insolent rival always to escape from me like a supernatural being? Was I never to be able to find out who he was, or to meet him? At this moment the tinkling of bells roused me from my reverie. I turned sharply round, the dwarf Habibrah was at my side.