She had never before strayed further than their shadows’ length from the beeches: the low-banked trench, where the twins played ‘King of the Castle’ and the sheep huddled against the rain, had fenced off adventure. But today she and the wind had cleared it in a flying leap and had run out to the very edge of the wide level table-land that had bounded her view, and before her lay unknown valleys and ridges, valleys and ridges, rolling away to the sky-line like waves of the sea. And on the sky-line itself, trembling between earth and heaven as if it were a great diamond swinging on a silver chain, hung a glancing, shimmering translucency in the shape of a house—a castle—a king’s pavilion—with a central arch that glistered like a high priest’s breast-plate, and twin towers reflecting the sun in glints and rays and flashes of white and golden light. For a long minute Laura sat motionless, staring—staring. Then her heart began to beat so wildly that she felt the thud of it as a sharp pain, and her cold little fingers dug and clutched at the soft turf. She could hardly breathe: she was choking, drowning in the flood of joy that swirled over her like waters set free. She sat, white and sick with ecstasy, her eyes devouring the miracle, while in her ears remembered phrases pealed like wedding bells. _The Reflexion of the Sun upon the City._... ... _and the city was of pure gold, like unto pure glass._... ... _a bright and shining place, where there is no parting._... _Her light was like unto a stone most precious, as it were a jasper stone, clear as crystal._... The uncounted minutes tiptoed past. She spoke at last, in a little whispering voice— “I’ve found it,” said Laura. “It’s here. It was here all the time. And Mother——” She counted the easy ridges that seemed so clear and near, traced, with a finger that quivered, the merry white road playing bo-peep in and out of the woods. “They’re the _Delectable Mountains_,” said Laura. “Of course, the _Delectable Mountains_ and the _Cœlestial City_. And I can get there by tea-time. If I run—if I don’t stop once—oh, Mother, I can get to you by tea-time.” ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER V Though its anticipation and memory can fill a lifetime, the actual emotion must inevitably measure its intensity by its brevity. Ecstasy and despair, those hill-tops of human experience, can offer, in the nature of things, no abiding place for a pilgrim’s feet. With the return of the mere capacity for thought, Laura declined rapidly from her timeless bliss into a mood of active, bustling pleasure. A thousand devices and anticipations flitted through her mind as, in feverish excitement, she mapped out the day.