United States or El Salvador ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
With a gesture, almost as passionate as his own, she turned upon Bale-Corphew. "You would denounce him before the People?" she said, incredulously. "You would trap him? One man against a hundred! Oh, it would be cowardly! Cruel!" Bale-Corphew's face flamed to a deeper red. "Cowardly? Cowardly? Do you know what you are saying? The man is a thief!"
A sense of frightened impotence fell upon her a knowledge that her enemy had a longer reach and a more powerful arm than she had guessed. By a great effort she controlled her feelings. "Thank you!" she said, quietly, "but I will not trouble Mr. Bale-Corphew. If I may, I will wait in the Place until the Gathering is assembled." Her companion bent his head. "Permission is granted!" he said.
In the sense that a personality always is dangerous. Among the six Arch-Mystics there is, to my thinking, only one man, and he interests me. He interests me, does Horatio Bale-Corphew!" The Prophet leaned forward in his chair. "I think I catch your meaning," he said. "Something of the same idea occurred to me when he rose from his seat to-night.
"Devereaux," he said, in a new voice a voice that unconsciously held something of the command that had marked it in the chapel "the Prophet of the Mystics has come to rule. He has not come to follow the laws that others that men like Bale-Corphew have seen fit to make. He has come to be a law unto himself!"
One was Devereaux, the Precursor; the other was Horatio Bale-Corphew. For one embarrassed moment all four looked at each other; then the Precursor hastened to save the situation. He made a long, profound obeisance, and stepped deferentially to the table. "Your pardon, Master!" he murmured. "We knew not that the immutable Soul was speaking from within you, calling one among us towards the Light!"
But the great moment of joy and comprehension could not last; other and more insistent factors were at work within her mind claiming, even demanding attention. Almost as the outer door closed upon Bale-Corphew, her hands dropped to her sides and an expression akin to terror crossed her eyes.
The lady is a widow no relations too much freedom vague aspirations after the ideal. She has sounded society and found it too shallow; sounded philosophy and found it too deep; and upon her horizon of desires and disappointments has loomed the colossal presence of Bale-Corphew enthusiast, mystic, leader of a fascinatingly unorthodox sect. What is the result?
For a moment for just one moment it seemed to her desperate gaze that his hard blue eyes softened; the next, their cold, unyielding glance disillusioned her of hope. "It is useless to appeal to me," he said; "but if you very much desire it, you can make your request to my brother Mystic Horatio Bale-Corphew. He is guarding the Prophet's Threshold."
A wave of color flushed old Arian's sightless face; an inarticulate sound escaped him, and he made a tremulous attempt to rise. But the movement was instantly checked by Bale-Corphew, who bent close to him and whispered quickly in his ear. Neither gesture nor whisper was noted by the Prophet.
There was a slight pause; and again he bent towards her. "Why have you stayed away?" She hesitated for a moment, spellbound by her emotion; then, making a sudden effort, she looked up. "I I was afraid." Her voice was so low and shaken that the words were a mere whisper. "Afraid? Afraid of what?" She made no answer. "Of what? Of Bale-Corphew?" He gave a slight, sarcastic laugh. "No!"
Word Of The Day