he looks
into the blank before him--as a warrior seeking vainly for enemies in
ambush. Slowly he closes the door, and goes back again.

A knocking....

"Ghosts, eh? Invisible things? Come in, then--I'm ready."

And he faces about once more.

Again the knocking--and now he perceives a little bird seated outside
on the window-sill, peeping into the room.

"You, is it? Away--off to the woods with you! This is no place for
innocent things. Or what did you think to find? Greedy, evil eyes, and
groans, and hearts dripping blood. To the woods, and stay there, out
of reach of all this misery!"

But the bird lifts its head, and looks into his eyes.

"Do you hear? Away, go away!"

He taps at the window-pane himself. The bird flies off.

* * * * *

Once more cold fear comes over him; his pulses halt in dread.

"Not yet--not yet--no! One by one, to tear me slowly to pieces.
Shadows of vengeance, retribution, following everywhere; burning eyes
glaring at me from behind, fear that makes me tremble at every sound,
and start in dread at every stranger's face. And if I forget for a
moment, and think myself free, one of them comes again ... ghosts,
ghosts...."

He sat down heavily.

"Why do they follow me still? Is it not enough that I have lived like
a hunted beast so long? Because I loved you once? And what did we
swear to each other then--have you forgotten? Never to think of each
other but with thankfulness for what each had given! We were rich, and
poured out gold with open hands--why do you come as beggars now? And
talk of poverty--as if I were not poorer than any of you all! Or do
you come to mourn, to weep with me over all that we have lost?

"But still you come and ask, and ask, as if I were your debtor, and
would not pay. Mad thought! I was your poet, and made you songs of
love. Life was a poem, and love red flowers between. What use to tell
me now that the poem was a promise, the red flowers figures on a
score that I must pay? Go, and leave me in peace! I cannot pay! You
know--you know I have pawned all I had long since--all, to the last
wrack!"

His own thought filled him with new horror; drops of sweat stood out
on his forehead.

"And you, that have suffered most of all--what had I left for you?
You, a princess among the rest, the only one that never looked up to
me humbly, but stepped bravely to meet me as an equal. Yours was the
hardest lot of all--for I gave you the dr