* * * * *
Presently I fell asleep, but awoke, deep in the night, to find my
uncle brooding in a chair by my bed. The moon was high in the
unclouded heaven. There was no sound or stirring in all the world--a
low, unresting, melancholy swish and sighing upon the rocks below my
window, where the uneasy sea plainted of some woe long forgot by all
save it, which was like a deeper stillness and silence. The Lost Soul
was lifted old and solemn and gray in the cold light and shadow of
the night. I was troubled: for my uncle sat in the white beam,
striking in at my window, his eyes staring from cavernous shadows, his
face strangely fixed and woful--drawn, tragical, set in no incertitude
of sorrow and grievous pain and expectation. I was afraid--'twas his
eyes: they shook me with fear of the place and distance from which it
seemed he gazed at me. 'Twas as though a gulf lay between, a place of
ghostly depths, of echoes and jagged rock, dark with wind-blown
shadows. He had brought me far (it seemed) upon a journey, leading me;
and having now set my feet in other paths and turned my face to a City
of Light, lifted in glory upon a hill, was by some unworthiness turned
back to his own place, but stayed a moment upon the cloudy cliff at
the edge of darkness, with the night big and thick beyond, to watch me
on my way.
"Uncle Nick," said I, "'tis wonderful late in the night."
"Ay, Dannie," he answered; "but I'm wantin' sore t' sit by you here a
spell."
"I'll not be able," I objected, "t' go t' sleep."
"'Twill do no hurt, lad," said he "if I'm wonderful quiet. An' I'll be
quiet--wonderful quiet."
"But I'm _wantin'_ t' go t' sleep!"
"Ah, well," said he, "I'll not trouble you, then. I would not have you
lie awake. I'll go. Good-night. God bless you, lad!"