"And humility!"
"You are resolved, then?"
"I am resolved!"
He paused a moment, then appeared to make up his mind.
"So be it!" he said--"But on your own head be your own mischance, if
any mischance should happen! I take no responsibility. Of your own will
you have come here--of your own will you elect to stay here, where
there is no one of your own sex with whom you can communicate--and of
your own will you must accept all the consequences. Is that agreed?"
His steel-blue eyes flashed with an almost supernatural brilliancy as
he put the question, and I was conscious of a sense of fear. But I
conquered this and answered simply:
"It is agreed!"
He gave me a keen glance that swept me as it were from head to
foot--then turning from me abruptly, struck a handle on his desk which
set a loud bell clanging in some outer corridor. My former guide
entered almost immediately, and Aselzion addressed him:
"Honorius,"--he said--"show this lady to her room, She will follow the
course of a probationer and student"--as he spoke, Honorius gave me a
look of undisguised amazement and pity--"The moment she desires to
leave, every facility for her departure is to be granted to her. As
long as she remains under instruction the rule for her, as you know, is
solitude and silence."
I looked at him, and thought how swiftly his face had changed. It was
no longer softened by the grave benevolence and kindness that had
sustained my courage,--a stern shadow darkened it, and his eyes were
averted. I saw I was expected to leave the room, but I hesitated.
"You will let me thank you,"--I murmured, holding out my hands
timidly--almost pleadingly.
He turned to me slowly and took my hands in his own.
"Poor child, you have nothing to thank me for!"--he said. "Bear in
mind, as one of your first lessons in the difficult way you are going,
that you have nothing to thank anyone for, and nothing to blame anyone
for in the shaping of your destiny but--Yourself! Go!--and may you
conquer your enemy!"
"My enemy?" I repeated, wonderingly.
"Yes--again Yourself! The only power any man or woman has ever had, or
ever will have, to contend with!"
He dropped my hands, and I suppose I must have expressed some mute
appeal in my upward glance at him, for the faintest shadow of a smile
came on his lips.
"God be with you!" he said, softly, and then with a gentle gesture
signed to me to leave him. I at once obeyed, and followed the guide
Honorius, who led me back to my own room, where, without speaking a
word, he closed and locked the door upon me as before. To my surprise,
I found my luggage which I had left at the inn placed ready for me--and
on a small dresser set in a niche of the wall which I had not noticed
before, there was a plate of fruit and dry bread, with a glass of cold
water. On going to look at this little refection, which was simply yet
daintily set out, I saw that the dresser was really a small lift,
evidently connected with the domestic offices of the house, and I
concluded that this would be the means by which all my meals would be
served. I did not waste much time in thinking about it, however,--I was
only too glad to be allowed to remain in the House of Aselzion on any
terras, and the fact that I was imprisoned under lock and key did not
now trouble me. I unpacked my few things, among which were three or
four favourite books,--then I sat down to my frugal repast, for which
hunger provided a keen appetite. When I had finished, I took a chair to
the open window and sat there, looking out on the sea. I saw my
friendly little rose leaning its crimson head against the wall just
below me with quite a confidential air, and it gave me a sense of
companionship, otherwise the solitude was profound. The sky was
darkening into night, though one or two glowing bars of deep crimson
still lingered as memories of the departed sun--and a pearly radiance
to the eastward showed a suggestion of the coming moon. I felt the
sense of deep environing silence closing me in like a wall--and looking
back over my shoulder from the window to the interior of my room it
seemed full of drifting shadows, dark and impalpable. I remembered I
had no candle or any other sort of light--and this gave me a passing
uneasiness, but only for a moment. I could go to bed, I thought, when I
was tired of watching the sea. At any rate, I would wait for the
moonrise,--the scene I looked upon was divinely peaceful and
beautiful,--one that a painter or poet would have revelled in--and I
was content. I was not conscious of any fear,--but I did feel myself
being impressed as it were and gradually overcome by the deepening
stillness and great loneliness of my surroundings. 'The rule for her is
solitude and silence.' So had said Aselzion. And evidently the rule was
being enforced.