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The Lost Continent-Part43_C.J.Cutcliffe Hyne(1865-1944)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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of essences to sweeten the air of their neighbourhood." She lifted

her eyebrows and looked up at me. "Truly a quiet little gathering



of old acquaintances. Why, there is Deucalion, that once I took

the flavour of and threw aside when he cloyed me."



"I have Nais here," I said, "and presently we two will be all

that are left alive of this nation."



"Nais is quite welcome to my leavings," she laughed. "I will

look down upon your country cooings when presently I go back to the



Place behind the stars from which I came. You are a very rustic

person, Deucalion. They tell me too that three or four of these



smelling old men up here have named you King. Did you swell much

with dignity? Or did you remember that there was a pretty Empress



left that would still be Empress so long as there was an Atlantis

to govern? Come, sir, find your tongue. By my face! you must have



hungered for me very madly these years we have been parted, if

new-grown ruggedness of feature is an evidence."



"Have your gibe. I do not gibe back at a woman who presently

will die."



"Bah! Deucalion, you will live behind the times. Have they

not told you that I know the Great Secret and am indeed a Goddess



now? My arts can make life run on eternally."

"Then the waters will presently test them hard," I said, but



there the talk was taken into other lips. Zaemon went forward to

the front of the litter with the Symbol of our Lord the Sun glowing



in his hand, and burst into a flow of cursing. It was hard for me

to hear his words. The roar of the waters which poured up over the



land, and beat in vast waves against the Sacred Mountain itself,

grew nearer and more loud. But the old man had his say.



Phorenice gave orders to her guards for his killing; yes,

tried even to rise from the litter and do the work herself; but



Zaemon held the Symbol to his front, and its power in that supreme

moment mastered all the arts that could be brought against it. The



majesty of the most High Gods was vindicated, and that splendid

Empress knew it and lay back sullenlyamongst the cushions of her



litter, a beaten woman.

Only one person in that rigid knot of people found power to leave



the rest, and that was Ylga. She came out to the side of the

Ark, and leaned up, and cried me a farewell through the gathering



roar of the flood.

"I would I might save you and take you with us," I said.



"As for that," she said, with a gesture, "I would not come if

you asked me. I am not a woman that will take anything less than



all. But I shall meet what comes presently with the memory that

you will have me always somewhere in your recollection. I know



somewhat of men, even men of your stamp, Deucalion, and you will

never forget that you came very near to loving me once."



I think, too, she said something further, concerning Nais, but

the bellowing rush of the waters drowned all other words. A great



mist made from the stream sent up by the swamped burning mountains

stopped all accurate view, though the blaze from the fires lit it



like gold. But I had a last sight of a horde of soldiery rushing

up the slopes of the Mountain, with a scum of surge billowing at



their heels, and licking many of them back in its clutch. And then

my eye fell on old Zaemon waving to me with the Symbol to shut down



the door in the roof of the Ark.

I obeyed his last command, and went down the stair, and closed



all ingress behind me. There were bolts placed ready, and I shot

these into their sockets, and there were Nais and I alone, and cut



off from all the rest of our world that remained.

I went to the place where she lay, and put my arms tightly



around her. Without, we heard men beatingdesperately on the Ark

with their weapons, and some even climbed by the battens to the top



and wrenched to try and move the door from its fastenings. The end

was coming very nearly to them now, and the great crowd of them



were mad with terror.

I would have given much to have known how Phorenice fared in



that final tumult, and how she faced it. I could see her, with her

lovely face, and her wondrous eyes, and her ruddy hair curling



about her neck, and by all the Gods! I thought more of her at that

last moment than of the poor land she had conquered, and



misgoverned, and brought to this horriddestruction. There is no

denying the fascination which Phorenice carried with her.



But the end did not dally long with its coming. There was a

little surge that lifted the Ark a hand's breadth or so in its






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