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The Regeneration of Lord Ernie Chapters IV - VI · Incredible Adventures

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Section two of Incredible Adventures by Algernon Blackwood. This LibriVox recordings in the public
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domain read by Ben Tucker, The Regeneration of Lord Ernie, chapter four.
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In the Englishman's mind, there came a crash, as though something fell.
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There was dust, confusion, noise, moral planitudes shouted at conventional admonitions,
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warnings laughed, and copy book maxims shriveled up above the lot, rising with
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a touch of grandeur, stood the pulpit figure of the Little Pasture, his
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big face shining clear through all the turmoil, strength and vision, and the
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flaming eyes, a commanding outline, with spiritual audacity in his heart. And
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Hendrick saw then that the man himself was standing erect in the center of the
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room, one finger raised to command attention, listening. Some considerable interval must
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have passed while he struggled with his inner confusion. Lason stood intently listening,
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his big head throwing a grote usque shadow on the wall and ceiling. Hark,
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he exclaimed, half whispering, so you hear that, listen. A
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deep sound, confused and roaring, passed across the night, far away and
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slightly booming. It entered the little room, so that the air seemed to
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tremble a moment to Hendrix, it held something ominous the wind, he whispered,
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as the noise died off into the distance. Yet a moment ago,
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the night was still enough, the stars were shining. There was tense excitement
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in the room. Just then it showed in Lasan's face, which had gone
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white as a cloth. Hendrix himself felt extraordinarily stirred. Not wind, but
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human voices. The older man said quickly, it's shouting. Listen, and
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his eyes ran round the room, coming to rest finely in a corner where
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his hat and cloak hung from a nail. A gesture accompanied the look.
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He wanted to be out. The tutor half rose to take his leave.
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You have doo tonight elsewhere, he stammered, I'm forgetting. His own instinct
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was to get away himself with bindy by the first early diligence he was afraid
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of yielding. Hush, whispered Lazan, peremptorily lise. He opened the window
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at the top, and through the crack where the stars peeped brightly, there
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came louder than before, the uproar of human voices floating through the night.
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From far away, the air of the great pine forest came in with it.
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Hendrix listened intently. A moment he positively jumped to feel a hand upon
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his arm. Laison's big head was thrust close up into his face. That's
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sick commotion in the village, he whispered. A messenger has come and gone.
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Some one has gone back with him. Tonight I shall be k needed
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down here. But tomorrow night, when the great ritual takes place. Upser
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Hendrix tried to push him away so as not to hear the words, but
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the little man seemed immovable as a rock. The impulse remained probable in the
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mind, without making the muscles work for the tutor sorely tempted long to dare,
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yet faltered in his will. If you felt like dickens yisk, the
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words continued seductively, We might please say, empty vessel, near enough to
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let it feel, then rescue it charged with energy in the nick of time,
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And the Pasture's eyes were aglow with enthusiasm, his voice even trembling at
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the thought of high adventure to save another's soul. Watch merely, Hendrix heard
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his own voice whisper, hardly aware that he was saying it without taking part.
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He said it thickly, stupidly, a man wavering and unsure of himself.
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It would be an experience, he stammered. I've never merely watch.
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Yes, Lucon, let him see, interrupted the other with eagerness. We
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must be very hevil. It's wet rying a less resort. They still stood
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close together. Hendrix felt the little man's breath on his face as he peered
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up at him. I admit the chance, he began, weakly. There
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is no chance, was the vigorous reply. There is only providence. You
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have been guided. But as to risk and failure, what of them?
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What's involved? He asked, Recklessness increasing in him new wine in old butters,
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was the answer. But hear you tell me the vessel is not damaged,
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but merely empty. The machinery is all right if he merely watches as
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from a distance. Yes, yes, the machinery is there. I agree.
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The boy has breeding health and all the physical qualities, good blood and
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nerves and muscles. It's only that life refuses to stay and drive them.
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His heart beat with violence. Even as he said it, he felt the
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energy and zeal from the older man pour into him. He was realizing in
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himself on a smaller scale, what might take place. The boy in large
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but still shrink Laison for the moment said no more. His spiritual discernment was
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equal to his boldness. Having planted the seed, he left it to grow
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or die. The decision was not for him. In the light of the
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single lamp, the two men sat facing each other, listening, waiting,
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while Lazan talked occasionally, but in the man kept silence. Some time passed,
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though how long the tutor could not say. In his mind was wild
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confusion. How could he justify such a mad proposal? Yet how could he
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refuse the opening? Preposterous though it seemed, the enticement was very great,
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Temptation rushed upon him. Striving to recall his normal world, he found it
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difficult. The face of the old marquess seemed a mere, lifeless picture on
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a wall. It watched but could not interfere. Here was an opportunity to
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take or leave. He fought the battle in terms of naked souls, while
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the ordinary four cornered morality hid its face. He heard himself explaining, delaying,
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hedging, half toying with the problem, But the redemption of a soul
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was at stake, and he tried to forget the environment and conditions of modern
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thought and belief. Sentences flashed at him. Out of the battle, I
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must take him back worse than when I started. Or what a violent being
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like Mosston or a redeemed converted system with new energy. It's a chance and
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my last moreover odd half comic detail, there was the support of the church
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of a Protestant clergyman whose fundamental beliefs were similar to the evangelical persuasions of the
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boy's family. Conversion as demoniacal possession were both traditions of the blood. After
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all, the old Marquess might understand and approve. You took the opening God
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set in your way. In his wisdom, you showed faith and courage fought.
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Be it from me to condemn you. The picture on the wall looked
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down at him and spoke the words the wild hypothesis of the intrepid little missionary
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pasture swept him with an effect like hypnotism. Then suddenly something in him seemed
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to decide finally for itself. He flung himself morality in all upon this vigorous
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other personality. He leaned across the table his face close to the lamp.
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His voice shook as he spoke. Would you he asked? Then knew the
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question foolish, and that such a man would shrink from nothing where the redemption
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of his soul was at stake. Knew also that the question was proof that
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his own decision was already made. There was something grotesque almost in the torrent
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of colloquial French. Leson proceeded to pour forth while the other sat listening in
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amazement, half ashamed and half exhilarated. He looked at the stalwart figure,
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the wiry bowed legs as he paced the floor, the shortness of the goat
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sleeves, and the absence of shirt cuffs round the powerful lean wrists. It
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was a great fighting man. He watched, a man afraid of nothing in
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heaven or earth, prepared to lead a forlorn hope into a hostile, unknown
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land. And the sight, combined with what he heard, set the seal
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upon his half hearted decision. He would take the risk and go. Pifoi
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exclaimed the little pasture as though it might have been an oath, his loud
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whisper breaking through into a guttural sound. Puffy bah, would that my people
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had machinery like that so that I could use it. I've no material to
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work on, no force to direct, nothing but heavy sodden clay jelly,
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he cried, negative, useless, look warm stuff at best. He lowered
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his voice suddenly so as to listen at the same time. I might as
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well be a becker kneading dieu, he continued, say, dyke and yield
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and drink again. They never attack and drive. They're not worth laboring to
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save. He struck the wooden table with his fist, making the lamp rattle
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while his listener started and drew back. What good can weak souls, though
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spotless, be to God? The best have long ago gone up to them.
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Then he jerked his leonine old head towards the mountains where Sarey's life.
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There's hope, he stamped his foot as he said it, But the lukewarm
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pofuy, I will spew them out of my mouth. He paused by the
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window a moment, listened attentively, then resumed his pacing to and fro.
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Clearly, he longed for action. Indifference half heartedness had no place in his
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composition, and Hendrix felt his own slower blood take fire as he listened,
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ah cried lasan louder, what a batter I could fight up there? For
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God? Could I but live among sim stems the flow of the dark,
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strong vitality. Then twist it round and up, up, up, and
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he jerked his fingers skywards. It's the great sinners we want, not the
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meek faced saints. There's enough among those devils to bring a whole kantan to
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the great footstool. Could I but direct it? He paused a moment,
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standing over his astonished visitor. Brings a boy up with you, and let
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him drik his field, and pray, pray, I say that he become
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a violent sinner first, in orders that let or there shall be something worth
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offering to God of a one sinner that were a bent death. A rapid,
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nervous knocking interrupted the flow of words, and the figure of a woman
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stood upon the threshold. With the opening of the door came also again the
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roaring from the night outside. Hendrix saw the tall, somewhat disheveled outline of
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the wife. He remembered her vaguely, though she could hardly see him now
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in his darker corner, and recalled the fact that she had been sent out
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to Laison in his missionary days. A worthy, illiterate but adoring woman.
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She wore a shawl, Her hair was untidy, her eyes fixed and staring
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her husband's sturdy little figure. As he rose stood level with her. Chin.
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You hear his jules, she whispered, thickly. Say Garon has brought
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him down. You'll be Nittis and the village. She said it anxiously,
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though Hendrix understood the patois with difficulty. They talked excitedly together a moment in
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the doorway, their outlines blocked against the corridor, where a single oil lamp
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flickered. She warned, urging something he expostulated. Fragments reached Hendrix in his
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corner. Clearly the woman worshiped her husband like a king, yet feared for
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his safety. He, for his part, comforted her, scolded a little,
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argued, told her to believe in God and go back to bed.
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Shall take you too, and you'd never learn it's not your parish anyhow,
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a touch of anguish in her tone. But Lasin was impatient to be off.
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He led her down the passage. My parish is wherever I can help.
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I belong to God. Nothing can harm me but to live andand wock
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he gives me. The steps went farther away. As he guided her to
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the stairs. Outside, the roar of voices rose and fell. Whend brought
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the drifting sound. Wind carried it away. It was like the thunder of
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the sea. And the Englishman, using the little scene as a flashlight upon
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his own attitude, saw it for an instant as God might have seen it.
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Laison's point of view was high, scanning a very wide horizon, his
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eye being single, the whole body was full of light. The risk,
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it suddenly seemed, was nothing to shirk it. Indeed the merest cowardice.
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He went up and seized the pasture's hand. Tomorrow, he said, a
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trifle shakily, perhaps, yet looking straight into his eyes. If we stay
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over, I'll bring the lad with me. Provided he comes willingly. He
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will stay over. Interrupted the other with decision, come to supper at seven,
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Come in mountain boots. Use persuasion, but not force. He shall
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see it from a distance, without taking part. From a distance, yes,
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the tutor repeated, but without taking part. I knows his signs.
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The pasture broke in significantly. We can or rescue him. In Zynick of
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time, charged with energy and life. Yet before the danger gets a sudden
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clinger of bells drowned the whispering voice, cutting the sentence in the middle.
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It was like an alarm of fire. Leason sprang sharply round the signal.
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He cried the signal from his jutch. Someone's been taken. I must go
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at once, I shall be needed. He had his hat and cloak on.
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In a moment, was through the passage and into the street, Hendricks
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following at his heels. The whole place seemed alive, Yet the roadway was
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deserted, and no lights showed at the windows of the houses. Only from
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the farther end of the village, where stood the cabaret, came a roar
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of voices, shouting, crying, singing. The impression was that the population
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was centered there. Far in the starry sky, a line of fires blazed
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upon the heights, throwing a lurid reflection above the deep black valley. Excitement
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filled the night. But how ext extraordinary, exclaimed Hendrix, hurrying to overtake
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his alert companion. What life there is about? Everything's on the rush.
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They went faster, almost running. I feel the waves of it beating even
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here, he followed breathlessly. A messenger has come a gun, replied Lazan
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in a sharp, decided voice. What you feel here is but the overflow.
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This is the aftermath. I must walk down here with my people.
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I'll work with you, began the other, but Lasan stopped him. Keep
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yourself for tomorrow. Night, upsire, he said, with grave authority,
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pointing to the fiery line upon the heights, and at the same time quickening
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his pace along the street. At the moment, he cried, looking back,
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your place is yonder. He jerked his head toward the carpenter's house among
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the vineyards. The next minute he was gone. Chapter five, and Hendrix,
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a credited tutor to a sprigue of nobility in the twentieth century, asked
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himself suddenly how such things could possibly be. The adventure took on abruptly a
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touch of nightmare. Only the light in the sky above the cabaret windows and
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the roar of voices where men drank and saying, brought home the reality of
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it all. With a shudder of apprehension. He glanced at the lurid glare
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upon the mountains. He was committed now, not because he had merely promised,
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but because he had definitely made up his mind. Lighting a match,
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he saw by his watch that the visit had lasted over two hours. It
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was after eleven. He hurried, letting himself in with the big house key,
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and going on tiptoe up the granite stairs, and his mind rose a
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picture of the boy as he had known him all these weary sightseeing months,
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the mild brown eyes, the facile indolence, the pliant, watery emotions of
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the listless creature. But behind him now, like storm clouds, the hope's
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desires fears the pasture's talk had conjured up. The yearning to save stirred strongly
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in his heart, and more of the little man's reckless spiritual audacity came with
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it. His own affection for the lad was genuine, but impatience and adventure
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pushed eagerly through the tenderness. If only, oh, if only, he
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could put life into that great six foot, big boned frame, some energy
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as of fire and wind, into that inert machinery of mind and body.
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The idea was utterly incredible, but surely no harm could come of trying the
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experiment. There were the huge and elemental forces, of course, in nature
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and if. A sound in the bedroom as he crept softly past the door
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caught his attention, and he paused a moment to listen. Lord Ernie was
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not asleep then, after all, he wondered why the sound got somehow at
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his heart. There was shuffling behind the door. There was a voice too,
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or was it voices? He knocked, Who is it? Came at
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once, in a tone he hardly recognized, and as he answered, it's
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awe, it must Hendricks let me in. There followed a renewal of the
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shuffling, but without the sound of voices, and the door flew open.
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It was not even locked. Lord Ernie stood before him, dressed to go
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out. In the faint starlight. The tall, ungainly figure filled the doorway,
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erect and huge, the shoulders squared, the trunk no longer drooping.
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The listlessness was gone. He stood upright, limbs straight and alert. The
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sagging limp had vanished from the knees. He looked in this semi darkness like
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another person, almost monstrous, and the tutor drew back instinctively, catching an
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instant at his breath. But my dear boy, who aren't you sleep?
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He stammered, He glanced half nervously about him. I heard you talking,
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surely. He fumbled for a match, but before he found it, the
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other had turned on the electric switch. The light flared out. There was
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no one else in the room. There's anything wrong with you? What's the
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matter, but the boy answered quietly, though in a deeper voice than Hendricks
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had ever known in him before. I'm all right, Only I couldn't sleep.
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I've been watching those fires on the mountains. I I wanted to go
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out and see. He still held the field glasses in his hand, swinging
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them vigorously by the strap. The room was littered with clothes just unpacked,
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the heavy shooting boots in the middle of the floor, and Hendricks, noticing
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these signs, felt a wave of excitement sweep through him. Caught somehow from
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the presence of the boy. There was a sense of vitality in the room,
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as though a rush of active movement had just passed through it. Both
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windows stood wide open, and the roar of voices was clearly audible. Lord
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Ernie turned his head to listen. That's only the village people drinking and shouting,
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said Hendrix, closely watching each movement that he made it's perfectly natural,
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bindy, that you feel too excited to sleep. We're in the mountains.
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The air stimulates tremendously. It makes the heart beat faster. I did not
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depress the lad with questions. But I never felt like this in the Rockies
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or the Himalayas. Came the swift rejoinder. As he moved to the window
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and looked out. There was nothing in India or Japan like that. He
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swept his hand towards the wooded heights that towered above the village, so close.
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He talked volubly. All those things we saw there were sham done on
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purpose for tourists up there. It's real. I've been watching through the glasses
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till I felt I simply must go and join it. You can see men
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dancing round the fires and big rushing women. Oh, mister Hendricks, isn't
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it all glorious? All too glorious and ripping for words? And his brown
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eyes shone like lamps. You mean that it's spontaneous natural? The other guided
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him, welcoming the new enthusiasm, yet still bewildered by the startling change.
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It was not mere nerves, he saw, There was nothing morbid in it.
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They're doing it, I because they have to came the decided answer,
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and because they feel it. They're not just copying the world. He put
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his hand upon the other's arm. There was dry heat in it that Hendricks
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felt even through his clothes. And that's what I want, the boy went
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on, raising his voice. What I've always wanted without knowing it real things
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that can make me alive. I've often had it in my dreams, you
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know. But now I've found it. But I didn't know. You'd never
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told me of those dreams. The boy's cheeks flushed so that the color and
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the fire in his eyes made him positively splendid. He answered slowly, as
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out of some part he had hitherto kept deliberately concealed, because I never could
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get hold of it in words. It sounded so silly, even to myself,
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and I thought Father would train it all away and laugh at it.
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It's awfully far down in me, but it's so real. I knew it
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must come out one day, and that I should find it. Oh,
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I say, mister Hendrix, and he lowered his voice, leaning out across
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the window sill. Suddenly that fills me up and feeds me. He pointed
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to the heights and gives me life. The life I've seen till now was
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only a kind of show. It starved me. I want to go up
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there and feel it pouring through my blood. He filled his lungs with the
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strong mountain air and paused while he exhaled it slowly, as though tasting it
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with delight and understanding. Then he burst out again, I vote we go.
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Will you come with me? What do you say? Eh? They
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stared at each other hard a moment, something as primitive and irresistible as love
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passed through the air between them. With a great effort, the older man
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kept the balance true. Not to night, not now, he said firmly,
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U su light to morrow if you like, with pleasure. But to
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morrow night, cried the boy, with a rush, when the fires are
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blazing and the wind is loose, not in a stupid daylight. All right,
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tomorrow night, and my old friend Monsieur Lessin shall be our guide.
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He knows the way, and he knows the people too. Lord Ernie seized
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his hands with enthusiasm. His vigor was so disconcerting that it seemed to effect
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his physical appearance. The body grew almost visibly. His very clothes hung on
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him Differently, he was no longer a non entity yawning beneath an ancient pedigree
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and title. He was an aggressive personality. The boy in him rushed into
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manhood, as it were, while still retaining boyish speech and gesture. It
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was uncanny. We'll go more than once. I vote go again and again.
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This is a place and a half. It's my place with a vengeance.
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Not exactly the kind of place your father would wish you to linger in,
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His tutor interrupted, but we might stay a day or two, especially
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as you like it. So it's far better than the towns and the rotten
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embassies, better than fifty simlas and bombays and filthy Cairos cried the other eagerly.
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It's just the thing I need, And when I get home, i'll
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show him something. I'll prove it. Why they simply won't know me,
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he laughed, and his face shone with a kind of vivid radiance and the
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glare of the electric light. The transformation was more than curious, waiting a
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moment to see if more would follow. Hendrix moved slowly then towards the door,
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with the remark that it was advisable now to go to bed, since
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they would be up late the following night. When he noticed for the first
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time that the pillow and sheets were crumpled, and that the bed had already
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been lain in the first suspicion flashed back upon him with new certainty. Lord
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Ernie was already taking off his heavy coat preparatory to undressing. He looked up
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quickly at the altered tone of voice. Bendy, the tutor said, with
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a touch of gravity. You were alone just now, won't you? Of
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course? The other sat up from stooping over his boots with his hands resting
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on the bed behind him. He looked straight into his companion's eyes. Lying
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was not among his faults, he answered slowly, after a decided interval.
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I I was asleep, he whispered, evidently trying to be accurate, yet
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hesitating how to describe the thing he had to say. And I had a
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dream, one of my real, vivid dreams when something happens, only this
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time it was more real than ever before it was. He paused, searching
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for words, then added, sweet and awful, and Hendrix repeated the surprising
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sentence, sweet and awful, Bendy, what in the world do you mean,
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boy? Lord Ernie seemed puzzled himself by the choice of words he used.
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I don't know exactly, he went on, honestly, only I mean
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that it was awfully real and splendid, A bit of my own life somewhere
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somewhere else where. It lies hidden away behind a lot of days and months
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that choke it up. I can never get at it except in woods and
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places quite alone, hearing the wind and making fires, or in sleep.
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He hid his face in his hands a moment, then looked up with a
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hint of censure in his eyes. Why didn't you tell me that such things
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were done? You never told me, he repeated. I didn't know it
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myself until this evening. Lessay, I thought you knew everything. Lord Ernie
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broke in in that same half chiding tone. Monsieur lesse Eyh told me to
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night. For the first time, said Hendrix, firmly, that such people
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and practices existed till now, I had never dreamed that such superstitions survived anywhere
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in the world at all. He resented the reproach, but he was also
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aware that the boy resented his authority. For the first time, his ascendancy
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seemed in question. His voice his eye. His manner did not quell as
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formerly. So you mean when you say sweet and awful, that it was
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very real to you, he asked. He insisted, now with purpose,
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is that it bendy? The other replied eagerly enough, Yes, that's it.
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I think partly this time it was more than dreaming. It was real.
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I got there, I remembered that's what I meant, And after I
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woke up, the thing still went on. The man seemed still in the
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room beside the bed, calling me to get up and go with him.
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But what man? The tutor leaned upon the back of a chair to steady
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himself. The wind just then went past the open windows with a singing rush.
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The dark man who passed us in the village, and who pointed to
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the fires on the height, he came with the wind. You remember,
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he pulled my coat. The boy stood up as he said it. He
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came a crossed the naked, boarding his step, light and dancing fire that
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heats but does not burn. And when that blows the heart alighter. Something
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I forget now exactly you heard it too, He whispered the words with excitement,
27:14
raising his arms and knees as in the opening movements of a dance.
27:18
Hendrix kept his own excitement down, but with a distinctly conscious effort. I
27:22
heard nothing of the kind, he said, calmly. I was only thinking
27:26
of getting home dry you say, he asked, with decision, that you
27:33
heard those words? Lord Ernie stood back a little. It was not that
27:37
he wished to conceal, but that he felt uncertain how to express himself in
27:42
the street. He said, I heard nothing. The words rose up in
27:48
my own head, as it were. But in the dream, and afterwards
27:52
too, when I was wide awake, I heard them out loud, clearly.
27:56
Fire that heats but does not burn, and wind that blows the heart
27:59
to fly. That's how it was in French. Bendy, you heard it
28:03
in French. Oh, it was no language at all. The eye said
28:07
it both times. He spoke as naturally as though it were Durbah, he
28:11
described again. Only this new aggressive certainty was in his voice and manner.
28:17
Mister Hendricks, he went on, eagerly. You understand what I mean,
28:21
don't you. When certain people look at one, words start up in the
28:25
mind as though one heard them spoken. I heard the words in my head,
28:27
I suppose, only they seemed so familiar, as though I'd known them
28:32
before always. Of course, Bendy, I understand. But this man,
28:37
tell me did he stay on after you woke up? And how did he
28:41
go? He looked round at the barely furnished room for hiding places. It
28:48
was really the dream you carried on after waking, wasn't it? Then,
28:52
Bendy laughed, but inwardly, as to himself, there was the faintest possible
28:56
hint of derision in his voice. No doubt, he said, only it
29:00
was one of my big real dreams. And how he went. I can't
29:04
explain it all, for I didn't see you knocked at the door. I
29:07
turned and found myself standing in the room, dressed to go out. There
29:11
was a rush of wind outside the window, and when I looked, he
29:15
was no longer there. The same minute you came in. It was all
29:18
as quick as that I suppose I dressed in my sleep. They stood for
29:22
several minutes, staring at each other, without speaking. The tutor hesitated between
29:27
several courses of action, unable for the life of him to decide upon any
29:32
particular one. His instinct on the whole was to stop nothing, but to
29:36
encourage all possible expression while keeping rigorous watch and guard repression. It seemed to
29:41
him just then was the least desirable line to take. Somewhere there was truth
29:47
in the affair. He felt out of his depth, his authority impaired,
29:51
and under these temporary disadvantages he might so easily make a grave mistake injuring instead
29:56
of helping. While Lord Derney finished his undressing, he leaned out of the
30:00
window, taking great drafts of keen night air, watching the blazing fires and
30:04
listening to the roar of voices now dying down in the distance, and the
30:10
voice of his thinking whispered to him, Let it all come out, repress
30:15
nothing, let him have the entire adventure. If it's nonsense, it can't
30:21
endure, and if it's true, it's inevitable. He drew his head in
30:26
and moved towards the door. Then it's settled, he said, quietly,
30:30
as though nothing unusual had happened. We'll go up there to morrow night with
30:36
Monsieur lesin to show us the way, and you'll go to sleep, now,
30:38
won't you, For to morrow we may be up very late. Promise
30:42
me, Bendy, I'm dead tired, came the answer from the sheets.
30:48
I certainly shan't dream any more. If that's what you mean, I promise.
30:52
Hendrix turned the light out and went softly from the room. He could
30:56
always trust the boy. Good Night, Bendy, he said, good night.
31:02
Came the drowsy reply. Up Stairs, He lingered a long time over
31:07
his own undressing, listening, waiting, watching for the least sound below,
31:11
but nothing happened. Once, for his own peace of mind, he stole
31:15
stealthily downstairs to the boy's door. Then, reassured by the heavy breathing that
31:21
was distinctly audible, he went up finally and got into bed himself. The
31:26
night was very still. Now it was cool, and the stars were brilliant
31:30
over lake and forest and mountain. No voices broke the silence. He only
31:34
heard the tinkle of the little streams beyond the vineyards, and by midnight he
31:40
was sound asleep. Chapter six and next day broke as soft and brilliant as
31:47
though October had stolen it from June. The Alps gleamed through an almost summary
31:52
haze across the lake. The air held no hint of coming winter, and
31:56
the Jura mountains wore the true blue of memory. And Hendrick's patches of red
32:01
and yellow splashed the great pine woods here and there where beech and ash put
32:06
autumn in the vast dark carpet. The Tutor woke clear headed and refreshed.
32:10
All that had happened the night before seemed out of proportion and unreasonable. There
32:16
had been exaggerated emotion in it, in himself because he returned to a place
32:22
still charged with potent memories of youth, and in Lord Ernie, because the
32:25
lad was overwrought by the electrical disturbance of the atmosphere. The nearness of the
32:30
ancestral halls, which they both disliked, had emphasized it. The ominous wild
32:36
weather had favored it, and the coincidence of these pagan rites of superstitious peasants
32:40
had focussed it all into a melodramatic form, with an added touch of the
32:45
supernatural that was highly picturesque and dangerously suggestive. Hendrix recovered his common sense judgment
32:52
asserted itself again. Yet for all that certain things remained authentic, the effect
32:58
upon the boy was not illusion, nor his words about fire and wind mere
33:01
meaningless invention. There hid some undivined and significant correspondence between the gaps and his
33:08
deficient nature. In these two turbulent elements, the talk with Leison, as
33:14
the conduct of his wife remained authentic. Those facts were too steady to be
33:17
dismissed, the pasture too genuinely in earnest to be cataloged in dream. Neither
33:24
daylight nor common sense could dissipate their actuality. Truth lay somewhere in it all.
33:31
Thus the day for the tutor was a battle that shifted, with varying
33:35
fortune, between doubt and certainty. In the morning, his mind was decided
33:38
the wild experiment was unjustifiable. In the afternoon, as the sunshine grew faint
33:44
and melancholy, became interesting for what harm could come of it. But towards
33:51
the evening, when shadows lengthened across the purple forests and the trees stood motionless
33:55
in the calm and windless air, the adventure seemed, as it had seen
34:00
the night before, not only justifiable, but right and necessary. It only
34:05
became inevitable, however, when, after tea together on the balcony, Lord
34:08
Ernie, mentioning the subject for the first time that day, asked pointedly what
34:13
time the pasture expected them to supper. Then, noticing the flash of hesitancy,
34:19
in his companion's eyes. Added in his strange, deep voice, he
34:22
promised, we should go withdrawal after that was out of the question. To
34:29
retract would have meant for one thing, final loss of the boy's confidence,
34:32
a possibility not to be contemplated for a moment. Until this moment, no
34:37
word of the preceding night had passed. The lips of either Lord Ernie had
34:42
been quiet and preoccupied, silent rather, but never listless. He was peaceful,
34:46
perhaps subdued a little, yet with a suppressed energy in his bearing that
34:51
Hendrix watched with secret satisfaction. The tutor, closely observant, detected nothing out
34:57
of gear. Life stirred strongly in him. There was purpose, interest,
35:01
will, there was desire, but there was nothing to cause alarm. Availing
35:07
himself then of the lad's absorption in his own affairs, he wandered forth alone
35:12
upon his sentimental tour of inspection. No ghost of emotion rose to stalk beside
35:16
him. That early tragedy, he now saw, clearly, had been no
35:21
more than youthful explosion of mere physical passion, wholesome and natural, but due
35:27
chiefly to propinquity, his thoughts ran idly on. He was even congratulating himself
35:32
upon escape and freedom, when abruptly he remembered a phrase Bindy had used the
35:37
night before, and stumbled suddenly upon a clue. When least expecting it,
35:40
he came to a sudden halt. The significance of it crashed through his mind
35:45
and startled him. There are big, rushing women. It was the first
35:50
reference to the other sex as evidence of their attraction. For him, Hendrix
35:53
had ever known to pass his lips hitherto, though twenty years of age,
35:59
the lad had no spoken of women, as though he was aware of their
36:01
terrible magic, he had not discovered them as females necessary to every healthy male.
36:07
It was not purity, of course, but ignorance. He had felt
36:09
nothing. Something had now awakened sex in him, so that he knew himself
36:14
a man and naked, and it had revolutionized the world for him. This
36:20
new life came from the roots, transforming listless indifference into positive desire. The
36:24
will woke out of sleep, and all the currents of his system took aggressive
36:29
form. For all energy, intellectual, emotional, or spiritual, is fundamentally
36:35
one, it is primarily sexual. Hendrix paused in his sentimental walk, marveling
36:40
that he had not realized sooner, this simple truth. It brought a certain
36:45
logical meaning even into the pagan rites upon the mountains, these ancient rites,
36:50
which symbolized the marriage of the two tremendous elements of wind and fire, heat
36:53
and air. And the Lad's quiet, busy mood that morning confirmed his simple
36:59
discovery. It involved restraint and purpose. Lord Ernie was alive. Hendrix would
37:06
take home with him to those ancestral halls, a vessel bursting with energy,
37:10
creative energy. It was admirable that he should witness from a safe distance this
37:16
primitive ceremony of crude pagan origin. It was the very thing, and the
37:22
tutor hurried back to the house among the vineyards, aware that his responsibility had
37:25
increased, but persuaded more than ever that his course was justified. The sky
37:31
held calm and cloudless through the day, the forests brooding beneath the hazy autumn
37:37
sunshine, indications that the second hurricane lay brewing among the heights were not wanting,
37:42
however, to experienced eyes. Almost a preternatural silence reigned. There was
37:47
a warm heaviness in the placid atmosphere. The surface of the lake was patched
37:52
and streaky, the extreme clarity of the air an ominous omen distant objects were
37:58
too close towards sunset. Moreover, the streaks and patches vanished, as though
38:02
sucked below, while thin strips of tenuous cloud appeared from nowhere above the northern
38:07
cliffs. They moved with great rapidity at an enormous height, touched with a
38:14
lurid brilliance. As the sun sank out of sight. And when Hendrick strolled
38:17
over with Lord Ernie to Lachiere for supper, there came a sudden rush of
38:22
heated wind that set the branches sharply rattling, then died away as abruptly as
38:27
it rose. They seemed reflected too, these disturbances in the human atmospheres.
38:32
About the supper table there was suppression of various emotions, emotions presaging violence.
38:39
Lord Ernie was exhilarated, Hendrick's uneasy and preoccupied, the pasture grave and thoughtful,
38:46
and Hendrix was another, feeling as well, that he had lightly summoned
38:51
a storm which might carry him off his feet. The boy's excitement increased it
38:54
as wind puffs fan a starting fire. His own judgment had somewhere late in
39:00
faults betraying him into this incredible adventure, and yet he could not stop it.
39:06
The Pasture's influence was over him. Perhaps he was ashamed to turn back.
39:09
He was committed. The unusual circumstances found the weakness in his character.
39:15
For somewhere in the preposterous superstition there lay a big, forgotten truth. He
39:20
could not believe it, and yet he did believe it. The world had
39:23
forgotten how to live truly close to nature. A desultory conversation was carried on,
39:29
chiefly between the two men, while the boy ate hungrily, and Madame
39:34
Lezan watched her husband with anxiety as she served a simple meal. So you
39:38
are coming with us, and you like to come, the Pasture observed quietly.
39:43
Hendrix's translating Lord Ernie replied with a gesture of unmistakable enthusiasm. A wild
39:50
lot of men and women, Leasan went on, keeping his eye hard upon
39:53
him. Was an interesting worship of their uncopied from very ancient time. They
40:00
live on their heights and mix little with us valleyfolk. You shall see the
40:05
ceremonies to night. They get the wind and fire into themselves, don't they
40:10
asked the boy keenly and somewhat to the distress of the translator who rendered it,
40:15
they get into wind and fire, they wash up wind and fire,
40:22
Lasan replied, and they do it by means of a wonderful dance that somehow
40:27
imitates the leap of flame and the headlong rush of wind. If you copy
40:32
the movements and gestures of a person, you discover the emotion that causes them.
40:38
You share it. Their idea is apparently that by imitating the movements,
40:44
they invite or attract the force, draw these elemental powers into their systems,
40:51
so that in the end he stopped, suddenly, catching the tutor's eye,
40:55
Lord Ernie seemed to understand without translation, laid down his knife and fork,
41:00
and was leaning forward across the table, listening with deep absorption. His expression
41:07
was alert with a new intelligence that was almost cunning. An acute sensibility seemed
41:10
to have awakened in him. A spit laughing, I suppose, he said,
41:16
in an undertone to Hendrix quickly, if you imitate a laughter, you
41:21
laugh yourself in the end and feel all the jolly excitement of laughter. Is
41:25
that what he means? The tutor nodded with assumed indifference. Imitation is always
41:31
infectious, he said lightly. But of course you will not imitate these people
41:36
yourself, Bendy, We'll just look on from a distance. From a distance,
41:43
repeated the boy, obviously disappointed. What's the good of that? A
41:46
look of obstinacy passed across his altered face. Hendrix met his eyes squarely at
41:52
a circus. He said, firmly, you just watch. You don't imitate
41:57
the clown, do you? If you look on long enough, ye do,
42:00
was the rather dogged reply. Well take the Russian dances we saw in
42:06
Moscow, the other insisted, patiently. You felt the power and beauty without
42:10
jumping up and whirling in your stoll. Bendy half glared at him. There
42:16
was almost contempt in his quiet answer. But yer, mind world with them,
42:22
and later your body would too. Otherwise it's given you nothing. He
42:27
paused a second. I can only get the fun of riding by being on
42:30
a horse's back and doing his movements exactly with him, not my watching him.
42:37
Hendrick smiled and shrugged his shoulders. He did not wish to discourage the
42:40
enthusiasm lying behind this analysis. The uneasiness in him grew apace. He said
42:46
something rapidly in French, using an undertone and laughter to confuse the actual words.
42:52
Of course, we must not interfere with their ceremonies. Put in the
42:57
pasture with decision. It's sacred to them. We can hide amongst the trees
43:01
and watch. You would not leave your sit in church to imitate the priest,
43:05
would you? He glanced smilingly at the eager youth before him. If
43:10
he did something real, I would, It was said, with a bright
43:14
flash in the eyes. Anything real I copy like a shot, only I
43:20
never find it. The reply was disconcerting rather, and Hendrix, as he
43:24
hurriedly translated, made a clatter with his knife and fork. For something in
43:28
him rose to meet the truth behind the curious words. From that moment,
43:32
as though catching a little of the boy's exhilaration, he passed under a kind
43:37
of spell. Perhaps it was in spite of the exaggeration oddly stimulating this dull
43:43
little meal at the village, quire masked an accumulating vehemence. Eager to break
43:47
loose, he heard the old father's voice, whiz an hinjux, you have
43:52
accomplished one days he would take back the boy alive. Yet all the time
44:00
there were streaks and patches on his soul as upon the surface of the lake
44:02
that afternoon, there were signs of terror. He felt himself letting go,
44:07
an increasing recklessness, a yielding up more and more of his own authority to
44:13
that of this triumphant boy. Bendy understood the meaning of it all and felt
44:17
secure. Hendrix faltered, hesitated, stood on the defensive, yet ever less
44:23
and less. Already he accepted the other's guidance. Already Lord Ernie's leadership was
44:30
in the ascendant. Conviction invariably holds dominion over doubt. They ate little.
44:37
It was near the end of the meal when the wind, falling from a
44:39
clear and starlit sky, struck its first violent blow, dropping with the force
44:45
of an explosion that shook the wooden house, and passing with a roar towards
44:49
the distant lake. The oil lamp suspended from the ceiling trembled. The pasture
44:53
looked apprehensively at the shuttered windows, and Lord Ernie, with startling abruptness,
44:59
stood up. His eyes were shining, His voice was brisk, alert and
45:04
deep. The wind, the wind, he cried, Think what it'll be
45:09
up there? We shall feel it on our bodies. His enthusiasm was like
45:15
a rush of air across the table and the fire. He went on,
45:20
The flames will look all over and tear about the sky. I feel wild
45:24
and full of them already, how splendid. And the flame of the little
45:30
lamp leaped higher in the chimney as he set it. The violence of the
45:35
coup de gerrans is extraordinary, explained Leza, as he got up to turn
45:39
down the wick as his second outburst. The rest of his sentence was drowned
45:45
by the noise of Hendrick's voice, telling the boy to sit down and finish
45:49
his supper. And at the same moment, the pasture's wife came in,
45:52
as though a stroke of winds drove behind her down the passage. The door
45:57
slammed in the draft. There was a momentary con fusion in the room,
46:00
above which her voice rose, shrill and frightened. Is if ires are a
46:05
light, Jules? She whispered in her half intelligible patois the forest is burning?
46:10
O lelonsi upper Ridge. Her face was pale, and her speech came
46:15
stumbling. She lowered her lips to her husband's ear. So be looking out
46:20
for recruits to night? Is it necessary? Is it thrife? For you
46:23
to go. She glanced uneasily at the English visitors. You knows the danger.
46:30
He stopped her with a gesture. Those who look on at life accomplish
46:35
nothing, he answered impatiently. One must act, always act. Chances are
46:40
sent to be taken, not stared at. He rose, pushing past her
46:45
into the passage, and as he did so, she gave him one swift,
46:49
comprehensive look of tenderness and admiration, then hurried after him to find his
46:53
hat and cloak. Willingly, she would have kept him at home that night.
46:59
Yet gladly and another sense, she saw him go. She fumbled in
47:02
her movements, ready to laugh or cry or pray. Hendrix saw her pain
47:07
and understood it was singular how the woman's attitude intensified his own misgivings. Her
47:14
behavior, the mere expression of her face alone made the adventure so absolutely real.
47:21
Three minutes later they were in the village street, Hendrix and Lord Ernie.
47:24
The latter, impatient in the road beyond, saw her tall figure stoop
47:29
to embrace him. I shall pray all night. I shall watch from my
47:32
window for your return. God who speaks from the whirlwind, and whose pathway
47:37
is as ifire, we'll go with you, remembers the younger men. It
47:42
is ever the younger men that they seek to take. Her words were half
47:45
hysterical. The kiss was given and taken. The open doorway framed her outline
47:52
a moment. Then the buttress of the church blotted her out and they were
47:54
off end of Section two.