I
hated you. It is strange to think of that now. Kiss me good-by."

"I too will be strong," he said. "I will await the pleasure of the Lord.
Until His good time, my bride!"

Rising to his feet he held her in his arms, then kissed her upon the
lips and put her gently from him. For a moment she stood like a statue,
then with a lifted face and hands clasped at her bosom, she turned, and
slowly, but without a backward look, left the circle of rocks. Through
the opening he saw the slave come up to her, and saw her motion to him
to fall behind--another moment, and both dark figures had sunk below the
brow of the hill.

Stronger and stronger blew the wind, louder and louder swelled the voice
of the forest. Below, the wash of the river in its reeds, the dull
groaning of branch grating against branch, the fall of leaf and acorn,
the loud sighing of the pines, the cries of the owl, the panther, and
the wolf--above, the vast dome of the heavens and the fading stars. An
effulgence in the east; a silver crest, like the white rim of a giant
wave, upon the eastern hills; a pale splendor mounting slowly and calmly
upward--a dead world,--all her passion, all her pain, all toil and
strife over and done with,--shining down upon a sadder earth.

From beneath the shadowy banks there shot out into the middle of the
broad moonlit stream a long canoe, followed by a second and a third, and
turning, went swiftly down that long, bright, shimmering, rippling path.

In the last and smallest of the three boats a man rose from his seat in
the stern, and with his eyes upon the line of moon-whitened cliffs above
him, raised his plumed hat with a courteous gesture, then bent and spoke
to a cloaked and hooded figure sitting, still and silent, between him
and a burlier form. This canoe was rowed by negroes, and as they rowed
they sang. The wild chant--half dirge, half frenzy--that they raised was
suited to that waste which they were leaving.

The black lines upon the silver flood became mere dots, and the wailing
notes came up the stream faintly and more faintly still. For a while the
echoes rolled among the folded hills and the tall gray crags, but at
length they died away forever.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

[Transcriber's note: added omitted word "time" in "By this time his eyes"
on line 9427, original page 304, of this text.]

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Prisoners of Hope, by M