through space, some terrible intangible weight dragging at his heart, and
all his body panting as it spun.

Grotesque faces came and went, and bright-eyed women floated by, laughing
at him, beckoning to him; but he could not come, because of this endless
going. He heard them singing, he felt the divine notes in his battered
soul; he tried to weep for the hopeless joy of it; but the tears came no
higher than his throat. Why did they mock him so? At last, all the
figures merged into one, and she had the face--ah, he had seen it
centuries ago!--of Madame Chalice. Strange that she was so young still,
and that was so long past--when he stood on a mountain, and, clambering
a high wall of rock, looked over into a happy No-man's Land.

Why did the face elude him so, flashing in and out of the vapours?
Why was its look sorrowful and distant? And yet there was that perfect
smile, that adorable aspect of the brow, that light in the deep eyes.
He tried to stop the eternal spinning, but it went remorselessly on;
and presently the face was gone; but not till it had given him ease of
his pain.

Then came fighting, fighting, nothing but fighting--endless charges of
cavalry, continuous wheelings and advancings and retreatings, and the mad
din of drums; afterwards, in a swift quiet, the deep, even thud of the
horses' hoofs striking the ground. Flags and banners flaunted gaily by.
How the helmets flashed, and the foam flew from the bits! But those
flocks of blackbirds flying over the heads of the misty horsemen--they
made him shiver. Battle, battle, battle, and death, and being born--he
felt it all.

All at once there came a wide peace and clearing, and the everlasting jar