HEY-DIDDLE-DIDDLE!
We came to the Cells; where Ambrose took me into a cell just within the
passage.
I was startled, and stood perfectly astonished on the threshold; for
the walls were all carved out in figures of beautiful sculpture. The
subject was religious, depicting the martyrdoms of Christian saints.
But oh profanity! All prominent among those august visages, was the
sculptured head of Doctor Copicus!
Ambrose observed my admiration well pleased, and seemed to forget his
gloom.
“You wrought these works?” asked I.
“Ay,” said he, “I wrought them. ’Tis my talent, my delight ... I love
beauty overmuch ... overmuch,” he added heavily. “It obscures religion
in me. I am taken with the shape and outward form.... And yet that
shape and outward form is inherent in the Soul. And yet I know, thanks
to the Doctor, I know and understand, that all is of the Soul.”
“What mean you by the _Soul_?” asked I.
“The Soul,” said he, “is the All-pervading, All-constituting,
All-loving power and substance, in whom all souls do live and move and
have their being.”
“Thus spake the Doctor,” said I scoffing.
But Ambrose answered nothing.
“A seër, a prophet!” quoth I. “A just man and a merciful! How many
thousands of poor mariners, pray, hath this righteous preacher slain?”
Ambrose smote his forehead. “Have a care!” said he, “What did I tell
you? If the Doctor heard you----”
“Oh, but you tempt me!” cried I, “You tempt me! What! Would you have me
to believe that this pirate chief, this murderer----”
I broke off; for the door of the cell was thrown violently open, and
there entered, bursting in upon us, the little lad whom we had seen
near the volcan.
“Tirralirra!” cried he in his shrill voice, and stood stock and silent
before us. I looked at Ambrose, who stared on the lad.
“Well, Dominic?” said he in a quavering voice.
The lad fell to capering about the cell. His eyes glowed like lamps;
and, on a sudden, he cried:
“The mighty from their seats! The mighty from their seats! Death is
a pendulum! Death is a swing! Up--down! See--saw! It pulls down the
mighty from their seats, and exalteth the humble and meek! The clown is
up and the king down, hey-diddle-diddle for king and clown!”
And, stepping to Ambrose, he put a slip of paper in his hands.
Ambrose looked on it.
“After twenty days,” said he quietly. “After twenty days I die.”
I looked upon the parchment; thereon, in fierce scrawled characters,
was writ:
_Post Viginti Dies._
“Why, what is this?” said I.
“The mandate of the Doctor. Because I fetched not his sulphur,” said
Ambrose.
“Tirralirra!” cried the lad, and, with a hop and a skip, sped from the
cell.
Ambrose sat silent, his haggard gaze bent upon the floor; and I also
was silent. At length he spoke.
“Nay, but I am weary,” said he, “weary of it all.... Over the rocks,
over the flinty rocks, have lain all the courses of my life.... Always
uneasy!... Miserable!... Tormented! tormented! But, when the Doctor
revealed to me the hidden truth, then came joy unto my soul. No longer
tormented with those dark and hideous thoughts, no longer plunged in
deep-down gulfs of terror and despair.
“Let him, then, kill my body, since he hath given life unto my soul!
Ay, let him kill me, for I am a-weary! A-weary!”