ue, for
she died whispering it herself; yes, it grew fainter and fainter until
it ceased with her breath. So, when I thought that my hour had come, I
sang it also, for the first time, for I tried to be brave, and wished
to go as my forefathers went. It is a foolish old custom, but I like old
customs. I am ashamed that you should have heard it. I thought myself
alone. That is all."

"You are a very strange young lady," said Morris, staring at her.

"Strange?" she answered, laughing. "Not at all; only I wanted to show
those scores of dead people that their traditions and spirit still lived
on in me, their poor modern child. Think how glad they must have been
to hear the old chant as they swept by in the wind just now, waiting to
give me welcome."

Morris stared still harder. Was this beautiful girl mad? He knew
something of the old Norse literature and myths. A fantastic vision rose
up in his mind of her forebears, scores and hundreds of them gathered
at some ghostly Walhalla feast, listening to the familiar paean as it
poured from her fearless heart, and waiting to rise and greet her, the
last newcomer of their blood, with "_Skoll_, daughter, _skoll!_"

She watched him as though she read his thought.

"You see, they would have been pleased; it is only natural," she said;
"and I have a great respect for the opinion of my ancestors."

"Then you are sure they still exist in some shape or form, and are
conscious?"

She laughed again. "Of course I am sure. The world of spirits, as I
think, is the real world. The rest is a nightmare; at least, it seems
like a nightmare, because we don't know the beginning or the end of the
dream."

"The old Egyptians thought something like that," said Morris
reflectively. "They only lived to die."

"But we," she answered, "should only die to live, and that is why I try
not to be afraid. I daresay, however, I mean the same as they did, only
you do not seem to have put their thought quite clearly."

"You are right; I meant that for them death was but a door."

"That is better, I think," she said. "That was their thought, and
that is my thought; and," she added, searching his face, "perhaps your
thought also."

"Yes," he answered, "though somehow you concentrate it; I have never
seen things, or, rather, this thing, quite so sharply."

"Because you have never been in a position to see them; they have not
been brought home to you. Or your mind may have wanted an interpreter.
Perhap