CHAPTER III - PARTING, BUT NO FAREWELL
There is a slumber so deep that
it annihilates time. It is like a fragment of
eternity. Beneath its enchantment of vacancy,
a day seems like a thousand years, and a thousand
years might well pass as one day.
It was such a sleep that fell upon
Hermas in the Grove of Daphne. An immeasurable
period, an interval of life so blank and empty that
he could not tell whether it was long or short, had
passed over him when his senses began to stir again.
The setting sun was shooting arrows of gold under
the glossy laurel-leaves. He rose and stretched
his arms, grasping a smooth branch above him and shaking
it, to make sure that he was alive. Then he hurried
back toward Antioch, treading lightly as if on air.
The ground seemed to spring beneath
his feet. Already his life had changed, he knew
not how. Something that did not belong to him
had dropped away; he had returned to a former state
of being. He felt as if anything might happen
to him, and he was ready for anything. He was
a new man, yet curiously familiar to himself as
if he had done with playing a tiresome part and returned
to his natural state. He was buoyant and free,
without a care, a doubt, a fear.
As he drew near to his father’s
house he saw a confusion of servants in the porch,
and the old steward ran down to meet him at the gate.
“Lord, we have been seeking
you everywhere. The master is at the point of
death, and has sent for you. Since the sixth hour
he calls your name continually. Come to him quickly,
lord, for I fear the time is short.”
Hermas entered the house at once;
nothing could amaze him to-day. His father lay
on an ivory couch in the inmost chamber, with shrunken
face and restless eyes, his lean fingers picking incessantly
at the silken coverlet.
“My son!” he murmured;
“Hermas, my son! It is good that you have
come back to me. I have missed you. I was
wrong to send you away. You shall never leave
me again. You are my son, my heir. I have
changed everything. Hermas, my son, come nearer close
beside me. Take my hand, my son!”
The young man obeyed, and, kneeling
by the couch, gathered his father’s cold, twitching
fingers in his firm, warm grasp.
“Hermas, life is passing long,
rich, prosperous; the last sands, I cannot
stay them. My religion, a good policy Julian
was my friend. But now he is gone where?
My soul is empty nothing beyond very
dark I am afraid. But you know something
better. You found something that made you willing
to give up your life for it it must have
been almost like dying yet you were happy.
What was it you found? See, I am giving you everything.
I have forgiven you. Now forgive me. Tell
me, what is it? Your secret, your faith give
it to me before I go.”
At the sound of this broken pleading
a strange passion of pity and love took the young
man by the throat. His voice shook a little as
he answered eagerly:
“Father, there is nothing to
forgive. I am your son; I will gladly tell, you
all that I know. I will give you the secret of
faith. Father, you must believe with all your
heart, and soul, and strength in ”
Where was the word the
word that he had been used to utter night and morning,
the word that had meant to him more than he had ever
known? What had become of it?
He groped for it in the dark room
of his mind. He had thought he could lay his
hand upon it in a moment, but it was gone. Some
one had taken it away. Everything else was most
clear to him: the terror of death; the lonely
soul appealing from his father’s eyes; the instant
need of comfort and help. But at the one point
where he looked for help he could find nothing; only
an empty space. The word of hope had vanished.
He felt for it blindly and in desperate haste.
“Father, wait! I have forgotten
something it has slipped away from me.
I shall find it in a moment. There is hope I
will tell you presently oh, wait!”
The bony hand gripped his like a vice;
the glazed eyes opened wider. “Tell me,”
whispered the old man; “tell me quickly, for
I must go.”
The voice sank into a dull rattle.
The fingers closed once more, and relaxed. The
light behind the eyes went out.
Hermas, the master of the House of
the Golden Pillars, was keeping watch by the dead.