dancing. He lifted his head to look at them. Nearer, nearer they came.
So warm, so bright, they danced like stars of fire. They stood before him
at last. From the centre of the radiating flame in one looked out a
woman's face, laughing, dimpled, with streaming yellow hair. In the centre
of the other were merry laughing ripples, like the bubbles on a glass of
wine. They danced before him.
"Who are you," asked the hunter, "who alone come to me in my solitude and
darkness?"
"We are the twins Sensuality," they cried. "Our father's name is Human-
Nature, and our mother's name is Excess. We are as old as the hills and
rivers, as old as the first man; but we never die," they laughed.
"Oh, let me wrap my arms about you!" cried the first; "they are soft and
warm. Your heart is frozen now, but I will make it beat. Oh, come to me!"
"I will pour my hot life into you," said the second; "your brain is numb,
and your limbs are dead now; but they shall live with a fierce free life.
Oh, let me pour it in!"
"Oh, follow us," they cried, "and live with us. Nobler hearts than yours
have sat here in this darkness to wait, and they have come to us and we to
them; and they have never left us, never. All else is a delusion, but we
are real, we are real, we are real. Truth is a shadow; the valleys of
superstition are a farce: the earth is of ashes, the trees all rotten; but
we--feel us--we live! You cannot doubt us. Feel us how warm we are! Oh,
come to us! Come with us!"
Nearer and nearer round his head they hovered, and the cold drops melted on
his forehead. The bright light shot into his eyes, dazzling him, and the
frozen blood began to run. And he said:
"Yes, why should I die here in this awful darkness? They are warm, they
melt my frozen blood!" and he stretched out his hands to take them.
Then in a moment there arose before him the image of the thing he had
loved, and his hand dropped to his side.
"Oh, come to us!" they cried.
But he buried his face.
"You dazzle my eyes," he cried, "you make my heart warm; but you cannot
give me what I desire. I will wait here--wait till I die. Go!"
