“That you may travel the more quickly, along a woman-haunted way, in your journeying toward your appointed goal,” this stranger began, “I have fetched a horse for you to ride upon.”
Yet the speaker was not wholly a stranger. So Gerald now said, “Oh, so it is you!” As a student of magic, Gerald had held earlier dealings with this red-haired Horvendile, who was Lord of the Marches of Antan.
And Gerald went on, gratefully: “Come now, but this is kind! Even as a courtesy between fellow artists, this is generous!”
“The amenities of fellow artists,” returned Horvendile, “are by ordinary two-edged. And this one may cut deeper than you foreknow.”
“Meanwhile you have brought me this huge shining horse, which cannot be other than Pegasus—”
“Whether or not this divine steed be that Pegasus which bears romantics even to the ultimate goal of their dreams, depends upon the horseman. It has been prophesied, however, that the Redeemer of Antan and the monarch who shall reign, after the overthrow of the Master Philologist, in the place beyond good and evil, will come riding upon the silver stallion that is called, not Pegasus, but Kalki—”
“Oh! oh!” said Gerald: and for an instant he considered this surprising turn of affairs. To reign in Antan had, very certainly, been no part of his modest plans; but he saw at once how much more becoming it would be, and how much better suited to his real merits, to enter into Antan as its heir apparent, resistless upon the silver stallion famous in old prophecies, rather than to come as a suppliant begging for a few words.
“Prophecies,” said Gerald, then, “ought to be respected by all well brought up persons. Only, does this horse happened to be Kalki? Because, you see, Horvendile, that appears to be the whole point of the prophecy.”
Rather oddly, Horvendile said, “Whether or not this divine steed be that Kalki which bears romantics even to the ultimate goal of all the gods, depends upon the horseman.”
Gerald considered this saying. Gerald smiled, and Gerald remarked:
“Oh, but now I comprehend you! The rider and the owner of any horse is, quite naturally, entitled to call the animal whatsoever he prefers. Very well, then! I shall christen this riding-horse Kalki. Yes, Horvendile, upon mature deliberation, I will accept the throne of Antan, without considering my personal preferences and my dislike of publicity and ostentation, in order that the prophecy may be fulfilled, because that is always a good thing for prophecies.”
“Since that is your decision, Gerald, you have but, after you have paid homage here, to mount intrepidly. And the divine steed will carry you upon no common road, but, since he is divine, along that way which the gods and the great myths pursue in their journeying toward Antan.”
“It is appropriate, of course, that I should travel on the road patronized by the best classes. Nevertheless, it would, I think, be a rather beautiful idea—”
“Nevertheless, also,” said Horvendile, “and all the while that you waste in talking about beautiful ideas, there is a man’s homage to be paid here; and moreover, at the first gap of the Doonham, the Princess awaits you with some impatience. It would not be going too far to say, indeed, that she hungers for your coming.”
“Come now, but the things you tell me steadily become more palatable!” remarked Gerald, as he approached the huge stallion. “Now that I have accepted the responsibilities of a throne and of all the great and best words of the Master Philologist, it would be most unbecoming for a princess to be ignored by anyone who already is virtually a reigning monarch. There are amenities to be preserved between royal houses. Very terrible wars have sprung from the omission of such amenities. So do you lead me forthwith to this impatient princess; but do you first tell me the adorable name of her highness!”
Horvendile answered, “The princess who just now awaits you is Evasherah, the Lady of the First Water-Gap of Doonham.”
“I admit that the information, now I have it, means very little. Nevertheless, my dear fellow, do you direct me to the water-gap of this princess!”
“Yet, I repeat, it would be wise for you, before departing from this place, to render a man’s homage to the ruler of it.”
“Well, Horvendile, the name of this tropical, damp, and this rather curious smelling country is no doubt better known to you than, I confess, it stays to me!”
“This place has not any name in the reputable speech of men. It is the realm of Koleos Koleros.”
At that name Gerald bowed his head; and, as became a student of magic, he courteously made the appropriate sign.
And Gerald said: “Very dreadful is the name of Koleos Koleros! Yet, quite apart from the fact that I am a member of the Protestant Episcopal church, I owe this Koleos Koleros no homage. And I, very certainly, shall not linger to pay any, with a princess waiting for me! Rather, do I elect to pass hastily through this land of quags and underbrush, and to leave this somewhat unsanitarily odored neighborhood, in which, I perceive, misguided persons yet live—”
For these two young men were no longer alone in this ambiguous valley. Through the twilight Gerald now saw many women passing furtively toward a dark laurel grove; and from out of that grove came a queer music.
Then Horvendile spoke of these women.
6. Evadne of the Dusk
NOW all the while that Horvendile talked it was to the accompaniment of that remote queer music: and Gerald was troubled. He came, at least, as near to being troubled as Gerald ever permitted himself to do. For Gerald did not really enjoy trouble of any kind, and said frankly that he found it uncongenial.
“But these,” said Gerald, by and by, “all these, my dear fellow, I had thought to have perished a long while ago.”
“You travel, Gerald, on the road of the greater myths. Such myths do not perish speedily. And, besides, nothing is true anywhere in the Marches of Antan. All is a seeming and an echo: and through this superficies men come to know the untruth which makes them free. It follows, in my logic, that to-day these women are the flute-players of Koleos Koleros. They serve to-day, forever unsatiated, that most insatiable divinity who is shaggy and evil-odored, and who can taste no pleasure until after bloodshed—”
“I have read, also,” Gerald broke in, with the slight smile of one who is not unpleased to display his learning, “that this Koleos Koleros is a somewhat contradictory goddess, producing the less the more constantly that she is cultivated and stirred up—”
“Oho, but a most potent goddess is this Koleos Koleros!” continued Horvendile. “She is wrinkled and flabby in appearance, yet the most stout of heroes falls at last before her. Infants perish nightly her gloomy vaults, and plagues and diseases in harbor there—”
But again Gerald had interrupted him, saying: “Yet I have read, moreover, that this modest and retired Koleos Koleros, alone of eternal beings, is ever ardent to quench the ardor of her servitors; and that—still to praise merit where merit appears,—in her untiring warfare with all men that rise up to oppose her, she displays the magnanimity to favor, and to embrace lovingly, the adversary that attacks her most often and most deeply.”
Horvendile thereupon held out his hand. He showed thus the tip of his forefinger touching the tip of his thumb so that they formed a circle. And Horvendile said:
“She varies even as the moon varies. Yet equally is this divine small monster the bestower of life and of all joy; she charms in defiance of reason: and whensoever Koleos Koleros appears, red and inflamed and hideous among her tousled tresses, a man is moved willy-nilly to place in her his chief delight.”