Lilith
Lilith
Lilith
You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles
YUMPU automatically turns print PDFs into web optimized ePapers that Google loves.
<strong>Lilith</strong><br />
CHAPTER XXII. BULIKA<br />
I had lost all notion of my position, and was walking about in pure, helpless impatience, when suddenly I<br />
found myself in the path of the leopardess, wading in the blood from her paw. It ran against my ankles with<br />
the force of a small brook, and I got out of it the more quickly because of an unshaped suspicion in my mind<br />
as to whose blood it might be. But I kept close to the sound of it, walking up the side of the stream, for it<br />
would guide me in the direction of Bulika.<br />
I soon began to reflect, however, that no leopardess, no elephant, no hugest animal that in our world preceded<br />
man, could keep such a torrent flowing, except every artery in its body were open, and its huge system went<br />
on filling its vessels from fields and lakes and forests as fast as they emptied themselves: it could not be<br />
blood! I dipped a finger in it, and at once satisfied myself that it was not. In truth, however it might have<br />
come there, it was a softly murmuring rivulet of water that ran, without channel, over the grass! But sweet as<br />
was its song, I dared not drink of it; I kept walking on, hoping after the light, and listening to the familiar<br />
sound so long unheard−−for that of the hot stream was very different. The mere wetting of my feet in it,<br />
however, had so refreshed me, that I went on without fatigue till the darkness began to grow thinner, and I<br />
knew the sun was drawing nigh. A few minutes more, and I could discern, against the pale aurora, the<br />
wall−towers of a city−−seemingly old as time itself. Then I looked down to get a sight of the brook.<br />
It was gone. I had indeed for a long time noted its sound growing fainter, but at last had ceased to attend to it.<br />
I looked back: the grass in its course lay bent as it had flowed, and here and there glimmered a small pool.<br />
Toward the city, there was no trace of it. Near where I stood, the flow of its fountain must at least have<br />
paused!<br />
Around the city were gardens, growing many sorts of vegetables, hardly one of which I recognised. I saw no<br />
water, no flowers, no sign of animals. The gardens came very near the walls, but were separated from them<br />
by huge heaps of gravel and refuse thrown from the battlements.<br />
I went up to the nearest gate, and found it but half−closed, nowise secured, and without guard or sentinel. To<br />
judge by its hinges, it could not be farther opened or shut closer. Passing through, I looked down a long<br />
ancient street. It was utterly silent, and with scarce an indication in it of life present. Had I come upon a dead<br />
city? I turned and went out again, toiled a long way over the dust−heaps, and crossed several roads, each<br />
leading up to a gate: I would not re−enter until some of the inhabitants should be stirring.<br />
What was I there for? what did I expect or hope to find? what did I mean to do?<br />
I must see, if but once more, the woman I had brought to life! I did not desire her society: she had waked in<br />
me frightful suspicions; and friendship, not to say love, was wildly impossible between us! But her presence<br />
had had a strange influence upon me, and in her presence I must resist, and at the same time analyse that<br />
influence! The seemingly inscrutable in her I would fain penetrate: to understand something of her mode of<br />
being would be to look into marvels such as imagination could never have suggested! In this I was too<br />
daring: a man must not, for knowledge, of his own will encounter temptation! On the other hand, I had<br />
reinstated an evil force about to perish, and was, to the extent of my opposing faculty, accountable for what<br />
mischief might ensue! I had learned that she was the enemy of children: the Little Ones might be in her<br />
danger! It was in the hope of finding out something of their history that I had left them; on that I had received<br />
a little light: I must have more; I must learn how to protect them!<br />
Hearing at length a little stir in the place, I walked through the next gate, and thence along a narrow street of<br />
tall houses to a little square, where I sat down on the base of a pillar with a hideous bat−like creature atop.<br />
Ere long, several of the inhabitants came sauntering past. I spoke to one: he gave me a rude stare and ruder<br />
word, and went on.<br />
<strong>Lilith</strong> 75