"Be bold?" said I.
"Ay," she returned; "that is the moral of my tale. Make me a song of it to-night, dear Will,--and tomorrow, perhaps, you may learn how this woman, too, entered into the Castle of Content."
"Madonna--!" I cried.
"It is late," said she, "and I must go."
"To-morrow--?" I said. My heart was racing now.
"Ay, to-morrow,--the morrow that by this draws very near. Farewell!" She was gone, casting one swift glance backward, even as the ancient Parthians are fabled to have shot their arrows as they fled; and, if the airier missile, also, left a wound, I, for one, would not willingly have quitted her invulnerate.
3. Night, and a Stormed Castle
I went forth into the woods that stand thick about Tiverton Manor, where I lay flat on my back among the fallen leaves, dreaming many dreams to myself,--dreams that were frolic songs of happiness, to which the papers in my jerkin rustled a reassuring chorus.
I have heard that night is own sister to death; now, as the ultimate torn cloud passed seaward, and the new-washed harvest-moon broke forth in a red glory, and stars clustered about her like a swarm of golden bees, I thought this night was rather the parent of a new life. But, indeed, there is a solemnity in night beyond all jesting: for night knits up the tangled yarn of our day's doings into a pattern either good or ill; it renews the vigor of the living, and with the lapsing of the tide it draws the dying toward night's impenetrable depths, gently; and it honors the secrecy of lovers as zealously as that of rogues. In the morning our bodies rise to their allotted work; but our wits have had their season in the night, or of kissing, or of junketing, or of high resolve; and the greater part of such noble deeds as day witnesses have been planned in the solitude of night. It is the sage counsellor, the potent physician that heals and comforts the sorrows of all the world: and night proved such to me, as I pondered on the proud race of Allonby, and knew that in the general record of time my name must soon be set as a sonorous word significant, as the cat might jump, for much good or for large evil.
And Adeliza loved me, and had bidden me be bold! I may not write of what my thoughts were as I considered that stupendous miracle.
But even the lark that daily soars into the naked presence of the sun must seek his woven nest among the grass at twilight; and so, with many yawns, I rose after an hour of dreams to look for sleep. Tiverton Manor was a formless blot on the mild radiance of the heavens, but I must needs pause for a while, gazing up at the Lady Adeliza's window, like a hen drinking water, and thinking of divers matters.