elf beside Martina.

"Now, in the darkness you are the better guide," she whispered. "Lead
on, I'll follow, holding to your robe."

So I crept forward warily and safely, as the blind can do, till
presently she exclaimed,

"Halt, here is light again. I think that the roof of the tomb, for by
the paintings on the walls such it must be, has fallen in. It seems
to be a kind of central chamber, out of which run great galleries that
slope downwards and are full of bats. Ah! one of them is caught in
my hair. Olaf, I will go no farther. I fear bats more than ghosts, or
anything in the world."

Now, I considered a while till a thought struck me. On my back was my
beggar's harp. I unslung it and swept its chords, and wild and sad they
sounded in that solemn place. Then I began to sing an old song that
twice or thrice I had sung with Heliodore in Byzantium. This song told
of a lover seeking his mistress. It was for two voices, since in the
song the mistress answered verse for verse. Here are those of the lines
that I remember, or, rather, the spirit of them rendered into English. I
sang the first verse and waited.

"Dear maid of mine,
/ I bid my strings
Beat on thy shrine
/ With music's wings.
Palace or cell
/ A shrine I see,
If there thou dwell
/ And answer me."

There was no answer, so I sang the second verse and once more waited.

"On thy love's fire
/ My passion breathes,
Wind of Desire
/ Thy incense wreathes.
Greeting! To thee,
/ Or soon or late,
I, bond or free,
/ Am dedicate."

And from somewhere far away in the recesses of that great cave came the
answering strophe.

"O Love sublime
/ And undismayed,
No touch of Time
/ Upon thee laid.
That that is thine;
/ Ended the quest!
I seek _my_ shrine
/ Upon _thy_ breast."

Then I laid down the harp.

At last a voice, the voice of Heliodore speaking whence I knew not,
asked,

"Do the dead sing, or is it a living man? And if so, how is that man
named?"

"A living man," I replied, "and he is named Olaf, son of Thorvald,
or otherwise Michael. That name was given him in the cathedral at
Byzantium, where first his eyes fell on a certain Heliodore, daughter of
Magas the Egyptian, whom now he seeks."

I heard the sound of footsteps creeping towards me and Heliodore's voice
say,

"Let me see your face, you who name