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Laurence Stanninghame, gazing upon her, realized with a dull, dead ache at the heart, that all his self-boasted strength was but the veriest weakness. And now he had come to say farewell. "I can hardly realize that we shall not see each other again," Lilith said, after a transparently feeble attempt or two on the part of both of them to talk on indifferent subjects. "When do you expect to return?
Whereupon Saddoc asked him if he numbered Lilith, Adam's first wife, among the evil angels. A question Manahem did not answer, and, being eager to tell the story, he turned to Jesus, who he guessed did not know it, and began at once to tell it, after warning Jesus that it was among their oldest stories though not to be found in the Scriptures.
On the way I met a few farmer-looking men on horseback, and just before entering the village saw at a little distance a white creature very like my Lilith with a man on its back, coming towards me. As they drew nearer, I was certain of the mare, and, thinking it possible the rider might be Mr Osborne, withdrew into a thicket on the road-side.
I believe I was trying to realize the immensity and silence of the midnight ocean, as far as that tin-pot racket down there would allow one to realize anything. Then it occurred to me how long it would take for the intense solitude to drive a man mad if he were cast away alone in it." "Not long, I should think," answered Lilith, gazing seriously out over the smooth, oily sea.
I have just heard there is to be a special train made up we are in too late for the regular mail-train, you know. So I shall leave for Kimberley in about two or three hours' time." Lilith looked disappointed. "I thought you would have stayed here at least a few days," she said.
Lilith in a moment of terror acknowledges that her dignified reserve was the cloak of passion, and Eve acknowledges that her profession of love was transferred to the wrong man; both ladies recover their self-possession and resume their make-believe decorums, and Adam, like a gallant gentleman, will not see through what is transparent. These are harmless jests at the ironies of life.
Desire of mine and of the unhuman Thing, did we grasp at Eve or Lilith? At the fire on the hearth or the cold phosphorescence of swamp and marsh? A drift of fragrance was afloat on the air. A delicate stir of movement passed by me. I raised my head from my hands, expectant. "I am here," her familiar voice told me. "Desire, you had to come, tonight."
"To-night, as thou seest, is watch-night," said the man; "for to-morrow my latest-born is to be circumcised. This is my fifth child, and all the others have died suddenly at midnight, although up to then there has been no sign of sickness. I know not why Lilith should have such a grudge against my progeny.
"I have done now," he said. "Well, Lilith you see what that token of your love has rescued me from. It was given as an amulet or charm, and right well has it fulfilled its purpose. But to what end?" "Did you did you come back with what you went for," she broke forth at last, as with an effort. "Yes. Therein, too, you proved yourself a true prophet. And now tell me something about yourself."
He gazed a moment at the spot. "It is not on the leopard; it is in the woman!" he said. "Nor will it leave thee until it hath eaten to thy heart, and thy beauty hath flowed from thee through the open wound!" She gave a glance downward, and shivered. "Lilith," said Adam, and his tone had changed to a tender beseeching, "hear me, and repent, and He who made thee will cleanse thee!"
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