CHAPTER XXXI. THE SEXTON'S OLD HORSE
I stood and watched the last gleam of the white leopardess melt away,then turned to follow my guide--but reluctantly. What had I to do withsleep? Surely reason was the same in every world, and what reason couldthere be in going to sleep with the dead, when the hour was calling thelive man? Besides, no one would wake me, and how could I be certain ofwaking early--of waking at all?--the sleepers in that house let morningglide into noon, and noon into night, nor ever stirred! I murmured, butfollowed, for I knew not what else to do.
The librarian walked on in silence, and I walked silent as he. Time andspace glided past us. The sun set; it began to grow dark, and I felt inthe air the spreading cold of the chamber of death. My heart sank lowerand lower. I began to lose sight of the lean, long-coated figure, and atlength could no more hear his swishing stride through the heather.But then I heard instead the slow-flapping wings of the raven; and, atintervals, now a firefly, now a gleaming butterfly rose into the raylessair.
By and by the moon appeared, slow crossing the far horizon.
"You are tired, are you not, Mr. Vane?" said the raven, alighting on astone. "You must make acquaintance with the horse that will carry you inthe morning!"
He gave a strange whistle through his long black beak. A spot appearedon the face of the half-risen moon. To my ears came presently thedrumming of swift, soft-galloping hoofs, and in a minute or two, out ofthe very disc of the moon, low-thundered the terrible horse. His maneflowed away behind him like the crest of a wind-fighting wave, tornseaward in hoary spray, and the whisk of his tail kept blinding the eyeof the moon. Nineteen hands he seemed, huge of bone, tight of skin, hardof muscle--a steed the holy Death himself might choose on which to rideabroad and slay! The moon seemed to regard him with awe; in her scarylight he looked a very skeleton, loosely roped together. Terrificallylarge, he moved with the lightness of a winged insect. As he drew near,his speed slackened, and his mane and tail drifted about him settling.
Now I was not merely a lover of horses, but I loved every horse I saw.I had never spent money except upon horses, and had never sold a horse.The sight of this mighty one, terrible to look at, woke in me longing topossess him. It was pure greed, nay, rank covetousness, an evil thingin all the worlds. I do not mean that I could have stolen him, but that,regardless of his proper place, I would have bought him if I could. Ilaid my hands on him, and stroked the protuberant bones that humped ahide smooth and thin, and shiny as satin--so shiny that the very shapeof the moon was reflected in it; I fondled his sharp-pointed ears,whispered words in them, and breathed into his red nostrils the breathof a man's life. He in return breathed into mine the breath of a horse'slife, and we loved one another. What eyes he had! Blue-filmy like theeyes of the dead, behind each was a glowing coal! The raven, with wingshalf extended, looked on pleased at my love-making to his magnificenthorse.
"That is well! be friends with him," he said: "he will carry you all thebetter to-morrow!--Now we must hurry home!"
My desire to ride the horse had grown passionate.
"May I not mount him at once, Mr. Raven?" I cried.
"By all means!" he answered. "Mount, and ride him home."
The horse bent his head over my shoulder lovingly. I twisted my handsin his mane and scrambled onto his back, not without aid from certainprotuberant bones.
"He would outspeed any leopard in creation!" I cried.
"Not that way at night," answered the raven; "the road isdifficult.--But come; loss now will be gain then! To wait is harderthan to run, and its meed is the fuller. Go on, my son--straight tothe cottage. I shall be there as soon as you. It will rejoice my wife'sheart to see son of hers on that horse!"
I sat silent. The horse stood like a block of marble.
"Why do you linger?" asked the raven.
"I long so much to ride after the leopardess," I answered, "that I canscarce restrain myself!"
"You have promised!"
"My debt to the Little Ones appears, I confess, a greater thing than mybond to you."
"Yield to the temptation and you will bring mischief upon them--and onyourself also."
"What matters it for me? I love them; and love works no evil. I willgo."
But the truth was, I forgot the children, infatuate with the horse.
Eyes flashed through the darkness, and I knew that Adam stood in hisown shape beside me. I knew also by his voice that he repressed anindignation almost too strong for him.
"Mr. Vane," he said, "do you not know why you have not yet done anythingworth doing?"
"Because I have been a fool," I answered.
"Wherein?"
"In everything."
"Which do you count your most indiscreet action?"
"Bringing the princess to life: I ought to have left her to her justfate."
"Nay, now you talk foolishly! You could not have done otherwise than youdid, not knowing she was evil!--But you never brought any one to life!How could you, yourself dead?"
"I dead?" I cried.
"Yes," he answered; "and you will be dead, so long as you refuse todie."
"Back to the old riddling!" I returned scornfully.
"Be persuaded, and go home with me," he continued gently. "Themost--nearly the only foolish thing you ever did, was to run from ourdead."
I pressed the horse's ribs, and he was off like a sudden wind. I gavehim a pat on the side of the neck, and he went about in a sharp-drivencurve, "close to the ground, like a cat when scratchingly she wheelsabout after a mouse," leaning sideways till his mane swept the tops ofthe heather.
Through the dark I heard the wings of the raven. Five quick flaps Iheard, and he perched on the horse's head. The horse checked himselfinstantly, ploughing up the ground with his feet.
"Mr. Vane," croaked the raven, "think what you are doing! Twice alreadyhas evil befallen you--once from fear, and once from heedlessness:breach of word is far worse; it is a crime."
"The Little Ones are in frightful peril, and I brought it upon them!" Icried. "--But indeed I will not break my word to you. I will return, andspend in your house what nights--what days--what years you please."
"I tell you once more you will do them other than good if you goto-night," he insisted.
But a false sense of power, a sense which had no root and was merelyvibrated into me from the strength of the horse, had, alas, rendered metoo stupid to listen to anything he said!
"Would you take from me my last chance of reparation?" I cried. "Thistime there shall be no shirking! It is my duty, and I will go--if Iperish for it!"
"Go, then, foolish boy!" he returned, with anger in his croak. "Take thehorse, and ride to failure! May it be to humility!"
He spread his wings and flew. Again I pressed the lean ribs under me.
"After the spotted leopardess!" I whispered in his ear.
He turned his head this way and that, snuffing the air; then started,and went a few paces in a slow, undecided walk. Suddenly he quickenedhis walk; broke into a trot; began to gallop, and in a few moments hisspeed was tremendous. He seemed to see in the dark; never stumbled, notonce faltered, not once hesitated. I sat as on the ridge of a wave. Ifelt under me the play of each individual muscle: his joints were soelastic, and his every movement glided so into the next, that not oncedid he jar me. His growing swiftness bore him along until he flew ratherthan ran. The wind met and passed us like a tornado.
Across the evil hollow we sped like a bolt from an arblast. No monsterlifted its neck; all knew the hoofs that thundered over their heads! Werushed up the hills, we shot down their farther slopes; from the rockychasms of the river-bed he did not swerve; he held on over them hisfierce, terrible gallop. The moon, half-way up the heaven, gazed witha solemn trouble in her pale countenance. Rejoicing in the power of mysteed and in the pride of my life, I sat like a king and rode.
We were near the middle of the many channels, my horse every othermoment clearing one, sometimes two in his stride, and now and thengathering himself fo
r a great bounding leap, when the moon reached thekey-stone of her arch. Then came a wonder and a terror: she began todescend rolling like the nave of Fortune's wheel bowled by the gods, andwent faster and faster. Like our own moon, this one had a human face,and now the broad forehead now the chin was uppermost as she rolled. Igazed aghast.
Across the ravines came the howling of wolves. An ugly fear began toinvade the hollow places of my heart; my confidence was on the wane! Thehorse maintained his headlong swiftness, with ears pricked forward, andthirsty nostrils exulting in the wind his career created. But there wasthe moon jolting like an old chariot-wheel down the hill of heaven, withawful boding! She rolled at last over the horizon-edge and disappeared,carrying all her light with her.
The mighty steed was in the act of clearing a wide shallow channel whenwe were caught in the net of the darkness. His head dropped; its impetuscarried his helpless bulk across, but he fell in a heap on the margin,and where he fell he lay. I got up, kneeled beside him, and felt him allover. Not a bone could I find broken, but he was a horse no more. I satdown on the body, and buried my face in my hands.
Lilith: A Romance Page 31