The Romance of Golden Star ...Griffith, George Chetwynd
Science
The Romance of Golden Star ...
Griffith, George Chetwynd
Fantasy fiction
I hurried to Ullullo's house once more and brought him back with me,
telling him on the way what I wanted him to do for me. When we reached
the house again we saw Djama standing in the courtyard, and Ullullo,
doing as I had bid him, went in to him, and told him in Spanish, which I
could not speak, that if he would give him ten dollars he should learn
the secret of my goings and comings, and where I was to find the gold
with which to pay for the hacienda. Djama instantly promised him the
money, as I thought he would, and Ullullo told him to be at the end of
the street which is now called El Triunfo at eleven o'clock that night.
He was to come alone, for if anyone came with him he would learn
nothing. As you will soon see, I had two objects to serve in doing this.
When Ullullo came back and told me that Djama would be there, I bade
him wait for me at the same place and hour, and then I went away alone
out of the city and up a path which led towards the mountains to the
north. There, alone and in silence, I communed with my own soul, at
first in sorrow, yet slowly becoming more and more peaceful in heart,
even as one who is told that he is to die on a certain day first rages
against his doom and then learns to contemplate with calmness that which
there is no hope of escaping. The words of the professor and Francis
Hartness had shown me that in the world to which I had returned my
sister Golden Star could now never be my wife and queen, and the more I
pondered on what they had said, the more plainly it appeared to me that
this was the truth, however bitter it might seem.
Yet there was something else in my heart, although at that time I did
not dare even to let my inmost thoughts dwell upon it, which in some way
dulled the pain of the blow that had fallen upon me, and reconciled me
to the parting which in one sense must now be eternal. The longer I
pondered the more deeply did that look of horror which I had seen in the
eyes of Joyful Star burn into my soul, and the more clearly did the
words that she had spoken ring in my ears. She had said that it was
horrible and that it was impossible, and she was to me as one of those
bright angels who, according to our ancient faith, awaited the heroes
and sages of our race in the Mansions of the Sun--a being so far above
me that I could look upon her only as a mortal might look from afar upon
a daughter of the Celestials.
Thus, musing in silence and solitude on the wild mountain-side, now
looking back into my distant past, and now hazarding a glance into the
fast-approaching future, the hours slipped by quickly for me, and I
heard the bells of the churches--bells which they had told me had been
cast out of the copper and gold and silver that our conquerors had taken
from our temples and palaces--chiming the half-hour before eleven.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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