run," he called; "you cannot overtake her. This is our
way."

As he spoke he turned in the opposite direction.

"She has more magic at her finger-tips than I care to know!" he added
quietly.

"We must do what we can!" I said, and ran on, but sickening as I saw her
dwindle in the distance, stopped, and went back to him.

"Doubtless we must," he answered. "But my wife has warned Mara, and she
will do her part; you must sleep first: you have given me your word!"

"Nor do I mean to break it. But surely sleep is not the first thing!
Surely, surely, action takes precedence of repose!"

"A man can do nothing he is not fit to do.--See! did I not tell you Mara
would do her part?"

I looked whither he pointed, and saw a white spot moving at an acute
angle with the line taken by the leopardess.

"There she is!" he cried. "The spotted leopardess is strong, but the
white is stronger!"

"I have seen them fight: the combat did not appear decisive as to that."

"How should such eyes tell which have never slept? The princess did
not confess herself beaten--that she never does--but she fled! When she
confesses her last hope gone, that it is indeed hard to kick against
the goad, then will her day begin to dawn! Come; come! He who cannot act
must make haste to sleep!"

CHAPTER XXXI. THE SEXTON'S OLD HORSE

I stood and watched the last gleam of the white leopardess melt away,
then turned to follow my guide--but reluctantly. What had I to do with
sleep? Surely reason was the same in every world, and what reason could
there be in going to sleep with the dead, when the hour was calling the
live man? Besides, no one would wake me, and how could I be certain of
waking early--of waking at all?--the sleepers in that house let morning
glide into noon, and noon into night, nor ever stirred! I murmured, but
followed, for I knew not what else to do.

The librarian walked on in silence, and I walked silent as he. Time and
space glided past us. The sun set; it began to grow dark, and I felt in
the air the spreading cold of the chamber of death. My heart sank lower
and lower. I began to lose sight of the lean, long-coated figure, and at
length could no more hear his swishing stride through the heather.
But then I heard instead the slow-flapping wings of the raven; and, at
intervals, now a firefly, now a gleaming butterfly rose into the rayless
air.

By and by the moon appeared, slow crossing the far horizon.

"You are tired, are