Lilith
Lilith
Lilith
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do.<br />
The librarian walked on in silence, and I walked silent as he. Time and space glided past us. The sun set; it<br />
began to grow dark, and I felt in the air the spreading cold of the chamber of death. My heart sank lower and<br />
lower. I began to lose sight of the lean, long−coated figure, and at length could no more hear his swishing<br />
stride through the heather. But then I heard instead the slow−flapping wings of the raven; and, at intervals,<br />
now a firefly, now a gleaming butterfly rose into the rayless air.<br />
By and by the moon appeared, slow crossing the far horizon.<br />
"You are tired, are you not, Mr. Vane?" said the raven, alighting on a stone. "You must make acquaintance<br />
with the horse that will carry you in the morning!"<br />
He gave a strange whistle through his long black beak. A spot appeared on the face of the half−risen moon.<br />
To my ears came presently the drumming of swift, soft−galloping hoofs, and in a minute or two, out of the<br />
very disc of the moon, low−thundered the terrible horse. His mane flowed away behind him like the crest of a<br />
wind−fighting wave, torn seaward in hoary spray, and the whisk of his tail kept blinding the eye of the moon.<br />
Nineteen hands he seemed, huge of bone, tight of skin, hard of muscle−−a steed the holy Death himself might<br />
choose on which to ride abroad and slay! The moon seemed to regard him with awe; in her scary light he<br />
looked a very skeleton, loosely roped together. Terrifically large, he moved with the lightness of a winged<br />
insect. As he drew near, his speed slackened, and his mane and tail drifted about him settling.<br />
Now I was not merely a lover of horses, but I loved every horse I saw. I had never spent money except upon<br />
horses, and had never sold a horse. The sight of this mighty one, terrible to look at, woke in me longing to<br />
possess him. It was pure greed, nay, rank covetousness, an evil thing in all the worlds. I do not mean that I<br />
could have stolen him, but that, regardless of his proper place, I would have bought him if I could. I laid my<br />
hands on him, and stroked the protuberant bones that humped a hide smooth and thin, and shiny as satin−−so<br />
shiny that the very shape of the moon was reflected in it; I fondled his sharp−pointed ears, whispered words<br />
in them, and breathed into his red nostrils the breath of a man's life. He in return breathed into mine the<br />
breath of a horse's life, and we loved one another. What eyes he had! Blue−filmy like the eyes of the dead,<br />
behind each was a glowing coal! The raven, with wings half extended, looked on pleased at my love−making<br />
to his magnificent horse.<br />
"That is well! be friends with him," he said: "he will carry you all the better to−morrow!−−Now we must<br />
hurry home!"<br />
My desire to ride the horse had grown passionate.<br />
"May I not mount him at once, Mr. Raven?" I cried.<br />
"By all means!" he answered. "Mount, and ride him home."<br />
The horse bent his head over my shoulder lovingly. I twisted my hands in his mane and scrambled onto his<br />
back, not without aid from certain protuberant bones.<br />
"He would outspeed any leopard in creation!" I cried.<br />
<strong>Lilith</strong><br />
"Not that way at night," answered the raven; "the road is difficult.−− But come; loss now will be gain then!<br />
To wait is harder than to run, and its meed is the fuller. Go on, my son−−straight to the cottage. I shall be<br />
there as soon as you. It will rejoice my wife's heart to see son of hers on that horse!"<br />
<strong>Lilith</strong> 99