The Worm Ouroboros | Page 2

and he sung this song with a mighty
voice--"
Here I ride swift steed. His flank flecked with rime. Rain from his mane
drips. Horse mighty for harm; Flames flare at each end. Gall glows in
the midst. So fares it with Flosi's redes As this flaming brand flies; And
so fares it with Flosi's redes As this flaming brand flies.
"'Then he thought he hurled the firebrand east towards the fells before
him, and such a blaze of fire leapt up to meet it that he could not see the
fells for the blaze. It seemed as though that man rode east among the
flames and vanished there.
"'After that he went to his bed, and was senseless for a long time, but at
last he came to himself. He bore in mind all that had happened, and told

his father, but he bade him tell it to Hjallti Skeggi's son. So he went and
told Hjallti, but he said he had seen "the Wolf's Ride, and that comes
ever before great tidings."'"
They were silent awhile; then Lessingham said suddenly, "Do you
mind if we sleep in the east wing to-night?"
"What, in the Lotus Room?"
"Yes."
"I'm too much of a lazy-bones to-night, dear," she answered.
"Do you mind if I go alone, then? I shall be back to breakfast. I like my
lady with me; still, we can go again when next moon wanes. My pet is
not frightened, is she?"
"No!" she said, laughing. But her eyes were a little big. Her fingers
played with his watch-chain. "I'd rather," she said presently, "you went
later on and took me. All this is so odd still: the House, and that; and I
love it so. And after all, it is a long way and several years too,
sometimes, in the Lotus Room, even though it is all over next morning.
I'd rather we went together. If anything happened then, well, we'd both
be done in, and it wouldn't matter so much, would it?"
"Both be what?" said Lessingham. "I'm afraid your language is not all
that might be wished."
"Well, you taught me!" said she; and they laughed.
They sat there till the shadows crept over the lawn and up the trees, and
the high rocks of the mountain shoulder beyond burned red in the
evening rays. He said, "If you like to stroll a bit of way up the fell-side,
Mercury is visible to-night. We might get a glimpse of him just after
sunset."
A little later, standing on the open hillside below the hawking bats, they
watched for the dim planet that showed at last low down in the west

between the sunset and the dark.
He said, "It is as if Mercury had a finger on me tonight, Mary. It's no
good my trying to sleep to-night except in the Lotus Room."
Her arm tightened in his. "Mercury?" she said. "It is another world. It is
too far."
But he laughed and said, "Nothing is too far."
They turned back as the shadows deepened. As they stood in the dark
of the arched gate leading from the open fell into the garden, the soft
clear notes of a spinet sounded from the house. She put up a finger.
"Hark," she said. "Your daughter playing Les Barricades."
They stood listening. "She loves playing," he whispered. "I'm glad we
taught her to play." Presently he whispered again, "Les Barricades
Mysterieuses. What inspired Couperin with that enchanted name? And
only you and I know what it really means. Les Barricades
Mysterieuses."
That night Lessingham lay alone in the Lotus Room. Its casements
opened eastward on the sleeping woods and the sleeping bare slopes of
Illgill Head. He slept soft and deep; for that was the House of
Postmeridian, and the House of Peace.
In the deep and dead time of the night, when the waning moon peered
over the mountain shoulder, he woke suddenly. The silver beams shone
through the open window on a form perched at the foot of the bed: a
little bird, black, round-headed, short-beaked, with long sharp wings,
and eyes like two stars shining. It spoke and said, "Time is."
So Lessingham got up and muffled himself in a great cloak that lay on
a chair beside the bed. He said, "I am ready, my little martlet." For that
was the House of Heart's Desire.
Surely the martlet's eyes filled all the room with starlight. It was an old
room with lotuses carved on the panels and on the bed and chairs and

roof-beams; and in the glamour the carved flowers swayed like
waterlilies in a lazy stream. He went to the window, and the little
martlet sat on his shoulder. A chariot coloured like the halo about the
moon waited by the window, poised