middle.
The road descended by an easy gradient, and was for a long distance comparatively smooth. The freezing point seemed higher than on Earth, for the few inches of snow through which they trudged felt almost warm to their naked feet. Maskull's soles were by now like tough hides. The moonlit snow was green and dazzling. Their slanting, abbreviated shadows were sharply defined, and red-black in colour. Maskull, who walked on Sullenbode's right hand, looked constantly to the left, toward the galaxy of glorious distant peaks.
'You cannot belong to this world,' said the woman. 'Men of your stamp are not to be looked for here.'
'No, I have come here from Earth.'
'Is that larger than our world?'
'Smaller, I think. Small, and overcrowded with men and women. With all those people, confusion would result but for orderly laws, and therefore the laws are of iron. As adventure would be impossible without encroaching on these laws, there is no longer any spirit of adventure among the Earthmen. Everything is safe, vulgar, and completed.'
'Do men hate women there, and women men?'
'No, the meeting of the sexes is sweet, though shameful. So poignant is the sweetness that the accompanying shame is ignored, with open eyes. There is no hatred, or only among a few eccentric persons.'
'That shame surely must be the rudiment of our Lichstorm passion. But now say - why did you come here?'
'To meet with new experiences, perhaps. The old ones no longer interested me.'
'How long have you been in this world?'
'This is the end of my fourth day.'
'Then tell me what you have seen and done during those four days. You cannot have been inactive.'
'Great misfortunes have happened to me.'
He proceeded briefly to relate everything that had taken place from the moment of his first awakening in the scarlet desert. Sullenbode listened, with half-closed eyes, nodding her head from time to time. Only twice did she interrupt him. After his description of Tydomin's death, she said, speaking in a low voice - 'None of us women ought by right of nature to fall short of Tydomin in sacrifice. For that one act of hers, I almost love her, although she brought evil to your door.' Again, speaking of Gleameil, she remarked, 'That grand-souled girl I admire the most of all. She listened to her inner voice, and to nothing else besides. Which of us others is strong enough for that?'
When his tale was quite over, Sullenbode said, 'Does it not strike you, Maskull, that these women you have met have been far nobler than the men?'
'I recognise that. We men often sacrifice ourselves, but only for a substantial cause. For you women almost any cause will serve. You love the sacrifice for its own sake, and that is because you are naturally noble.'
Turning her head a little, she threw him a smile so proud, yet so sweet, that he was struck into silence.
They tramped on quietly for some distance, and then he said, 'Now you understand the sort of man I am. Much brutality, more weakness, scant pity for anyone - Oh, it has been a bloody journey!'
She laid her hand on his arm. 'I, for one, would not have it less rugged.'
'Nothing good can be said of my crimes.'
'To me you seem like a lonely giant, searching for you know not what… The grandest that life holds… You at least have no cause to look up to women.'
'Thanks, Sullenbode!' he responded, with a troubled smile.
'When Maskull passes, let people watch. Everyone is thrown out of your road. You go on, looking neither to right nor left.'
'Take care that you are not thrown as well,' said Corpang gravely.
'Maskull shall do with me whatever he pleases, old skull! And for whatever he does, I will thank him… In place of a heart you have a bag of loose dust. Someone has described love to you. You have had it described to you. You have heard that it is a small, fearful, selfish joy. It is not that - it is wild, and scornful, and sportive, and bloody… How should you know.'
'Selfishness has far too many disguises.'
'If a woman wills to give up all, what can there be selfish in that?'
'Only do not deceive yourself. Act decisively, or fate will be too swift for you both.'
Sullenbode studied him through her lashes. 'Do you mean death - his death as well as mine?'
'You go too far, Corpang,' said Maskull, turning a shade darker. 'I don't accept you as the arbiter of our fortunes.'
'If honest counsel is disagreeable to you, let me go on ahead.'
The woman detained him with her slow, light fingers. 'I wish you to stay with us.'
'Why?'
'I think you may know what you are talking about. I don't wish to bring harm to Maskull. Presently I'll leave you.'
'That will be best,' said Corpang.
Maskull looked angry. 'I shall decide - Sullenbode, whether you go on, or back, I stay with you. My mind is made up.'
An expression of joyousness overspread her face, in spite of her efforts to conceal it. 'Why do you scowl at me, Maskull?'
He returned no answer, but continued walking onward with puckered brows. After a dozen paces or so, he halted abruptly. 'Wait, Sullenbode!'
The others came to a standstill. Corpang looked puzzled, but the woman smiled. Maskull, without a word, bent over and kissed her lips. Then he relinquished her body, and turned around to Corpang.
'How do you, in your great wisdom, interpret that kiss?'
'It requires no great wisdom to interpret kisses, Maskull.'
'Hereafter, never dare to come between us. Sullenbode belongs to me.'
'Then I say no more; but you are a fated man.'
From that time forward he spoke not another word to either of the others.
A heavy gleam appeared in the woman's eyes. 'Now things are changed, Maskull. Where are you taking me?'
'Choose, you.'
'The man I love must complete his journey. I won't have it otherwise. You shall not stand lower than Corpang.'
'Where you go, I will go.'
'And I - as long as your love endures, I will accompany you even to Adage.'
'Do you doubt its lasting?'
'I wish not to… Now I will tell you what I refused to tell you before. The term of your love is the term of my life. When you love me no longer, I must die.'
'And why?' asked Maskull slowly.
'Yes, that's the responsibility you incurred when you kissed me for the first time. I never meant to tell you.'
'Do you mean that if I had gone on alone, you would have died?'
'I have no other life but what you give me.'
He gazed at her mournfully, without attempting to reply, and then slowly placed his arms around her body. During this embrace he turned very pale, but Sullenbode grew as white as chalk.
A few minutes later the journey toward Adage was resumed.
They had been walking for two hours. Teargeld was higher in the sky and nearer the south. They had descended many hundred feet, and the character of the ridge began to alter for the worse. The thin snow disappeared, and gave way to moist, boggy ground. It was all little grassy hillocks and marshes. They began to slip about and become draggled with mud. Conversation ceased; Sullenbode led the way, and the men followed in her tracks. The southern half of the landscape grew grander. The greenish light of the brilliant moon, shining on the multitude of snow-green peaks, caused it to appear like a spectral world. Their nearest neighbour towered high above them on the other side of the valley, due south, some five miles distant. It was a slender, inaccessible, dizzy
