Knowing nothing of darkness, or stars, or moon, Photogen spent his
days in hunting. On a great white horse he swept over the grassy
plains, glorying in the sun, fighting the wind, and killing the
buffaloes.
One morning, when he happened to be on the ground a little earlier
than usual, and before his attendants, he caught sight of an animal
unknown to him, stealing from a hollow into which the sunrays had not
yet reached. Like a swift shadow it sped over the grass, slinking
southward to the forest. He gave chase, noted the body of a buffalo it
had half eaten, and pursued it the harder. But with great leaps and
bounds the creature shot farther and farther ahead of him, and
vanished. Turning therefore defeated, he met Fargu, who had been
following him as fast as his horse could carry him.
"What animal was that, Fargu?" he asked. "How he did run!"
Fargu answered he might be a leopard, but he rather thought from his
pace and look that he was a young lion.
"What a coward he must be!" said Photogen.
"Don't be too sure of that," rejoined Fargu. "He is one of the
creatures the sun makes uncomfortable. As soon as the sun is down, he
will be brave enough."
He had scarcely said it, when he repented nor did he regret it the
less when he found that Photogen made no reply. But alas! said was
said.
"Then," said Photogen to himself, "that contemptible beast is one of
the terrors of sundown, of which Madam Watho spoke!"
He hunted all day, but not with his usual spirit. He did not ride so
hard, and did not kill one buffalo. Fargu to his dismay observed also
that he took every pretext for moving farther south, nearer to the
forest. But all at once, the sun now sinking in the west, he seemed to
change his mind, for he turned his horse's head, and rode home so fast
that the rest could not keep him in sight. When they arrived, they
found his horse in the stable, and concluded that he had gone into the
castle. But he had in truth set out again by the back of it. Crossing
the river a good way up the valley, he reascended to the ground they
had left, and just before sunset reached the skirts of the forest.
The level orb shone straight in between the bare stems, and saying to
himself he could not fail to find the beast, he rushed into the wood.
But even as he entered, he turned, and looked to the west. The rim of
the red was touching the horizon, all jagged with broken hills. "Now,"
said Photogen, "we shall see;" but he said it in the face of a darkness
he had not proved. The moment the sun began to sink among the spikes
and saw-edges, with a kind of sudden flap at his heart a fear
inexplicable laid hold of the youth; and as he had never felt anything
of the kind before, the very fear itself terrified him. As the sun
sank, it rose like the shadow of the world, and grew deeper and
darker. He could not even think what it might be, so utterly did it
enfeeble him. When the last flaming scimitar-edge of the sun went out
like a lamp, his horror seemed to blossom into very madness. Like the
closing lids of an eye--for there was no twilight, and this night no
moon--the terror and the darkness rushed together, and he knew them
for one. He was no longer the man he had known, or rather thought
himself. The courage he had had was in no sense his own--he had only
had courage, not been courageous; it had left him, and he could
scarcely stand--certainly not stand straight, for not one of his
joints could he make stiff or keep from trembling. He was but a spark
of the sun, in himself nothing.
The beast was behind him--stealing upon him! He turned. All was dark
in the wood, but to his fancy the darkness here and there broke into
pairs of green eyes, and he had not the power even to raise his
bow-hand from his side. In the strength of despair he strove to rouse
courage enough--not to fight--that he did not even desire--but to run.
Courage to flee home was all he could ever imagine, and it would not
come. But what he had not, was ignominiously given him. A cry in the
wood, half a screech, half a growl, sent him running like a
boar-wounded cur. It was not even himself that ran, it was the fear
that had come alive in his legs: he did not know that they moved. But
as he ran he grew able to run--gained courage at least to be a coward.
The stars gave a little light. Over the grass he sped, and nothing
followed him. "How fallen, how changed," from the youth who had
climbed the hill as the sun went down! A mere contempt to himself, the
self that contemned was a coward with the self it contemned! There lay
the shapeless black of a buffalo, humped upon the grass: he made a
wide circuit, and swept on like a shadow driven in the wind. For the
wind had arisen, and added to his terror: it blew from behind him. He
reached the brow of the valley, and shot down the steep descent like a
falling star. Instantly the whole upper country behind him arose and
pursued him! The wind came howling after him, filled with screams,
shrieks, yells, roars, laughter, and chattering, as if all the animals
of the forest were careering with it. In his ears was a trampling
rush, the thunder of the hoofs of the cattle, in career from every
quarter of the wide plains to the brow of the hill above him! He fled
straight for the castle, scarcely with breath enough to pant.
As he reached the bottom of the valley, the moon peered up over its
edge. He had never seen the moon before--except in the daytime, when
he had taken her for a thin bright cloud. She was a fresh terror to
him--so ghostly! so ghastly! so gruesome!--so knowing as she looked
over the top of her garden-wall upon the world outside! That was the
night itself! the darkness alive--and after him! the horror of
horrors coming down the sky to curdle his blood, and turn his brain to
a cinder! He gave a sob, and made straight for the river, where it ran
between the two walls, at the bottom of the garden. He plunged in,
struggled through, clambered up the bank, and fell senseless on the
grass.