ither in the garden--' no, that is not how it begins. 'Ah me! when
the mallows wither in the garden, and the green parsley, and the
curled tendrils of the anise, on a later day these live again and
spring in another year; but we men, we, the great and mighty, or
wise, when once we have died in the hollow earth we sleep, gone down
into silence, a fight long and endless and unawakening sleep."

"Begin, ye Sicilian Muses, begin the Dirge!"

And Evelyn listened, saying, "How very beautiful! how very
wonderful!"

"But you believe, Evelyn, that we do live again?"

"It is too late to argue that question; it is nearly midnight. I hope
you will like your room. Eliza has unstrapped your portmanteau, I
see. Your bed is comfortable, I think."

It surprised him that she should follow him into his room, and stand
there talking to him, talking even about the bed he was to sleep in.
It would have been easy to lay his hands upon her shoulder, saying,
"Evelyn, are we to be parted?" but something held him back. And he
listened to her story of the buying of the bed, hearing that it had
been forgotten in the interest excited by the rumour of certain
portfolios filled with engravings supposed to be of great value. The
wardrobe, too, had been bought at the same auction, and he looked
into its panels, praising them.

"But you want more light." She went over and lighted the candles on
the dressing-table, accomplishing the duties of hostess quite
unconcerned, ignoring the past. "One would think she had forgotten
it," he said to himself. "Are we to part like this? But it is for her
to decide. So quiet, so self-contained; it doesn't seem even to occur
to her." He waited, incapable of speech or action, paralysed, till
she bade him good-night. As soon as the door closed, or a moment
after, he began to realise his mistake. What he should have done was
to lay his hand upon her shoulder and lead her to the window-seat,
and sit with her there till a greyness came into the sky and a cold
air rustled in the trees. "Of course, of course," he muttered, for he
could see himself and her in the dawn together, united again and
tasting again in a kiss infinity. In her kiss he had tasted that
unity, that binding together of the mortal to the immortal, of the
finite to the infinite, which Paracelsus--He tried to recall the
words, "He who tastes a crust of bread has tasted of the universe,
even to the furthest star." She had always been his universe, and he