But as we sat there spellbound in the dark, feeling like men who had beheld the end of all things, there came on airy change to break the dreariness of our mood. From far, far away, apparently whole worlds away, issued a faint tinkling music, more like the song of elves than of any mortal being. It was half like the loveliness that one hears in dreams, and more than half like the remote ghostly melodies borne to one across the wind; but gradually it grew nearer, gradually louder and more distinct, although its ethereal and fairy-like quality still remained. At length I recognized that it proceeded from a chorus of voices, a wonderfully sweet womanly chorus whose members may have been human but who seemed little less than angelic. For it was with a divine exaltation that they sang, and their tones were the tones of immortal sweetness and hope, and they seemed to assure me that all was well with the world and with life, and that beauty and happiness must triumph. As the singing continued, the darkness was gradually dispersed; yet the great orb above did not resume the full brightness of the Atlantean day, but remained subdued to a rose-tinged twilight glow. And in that twilight a troop of shimmering-gowned dancing maidens appeared, swinging from side to side with superbly harmonious movements of arm and waist and ankle until they seemed not so much individual dancers as parts of the eternal rhythm of the universe. But whether the singing proceeded from them or from persons unseen was more than I could judge; for just then my eye was caught by the leader of the dancers, and my thoughts were as if paralyzed. As she glided from side to side with movements like music, she smiled a gloriously sweet smile; and that smile seemed to be bent full upon me, though here my imagination may have borne false reports. But with furiously thumping heart and a surging of something dangerously like tenderness, I realized that Aelios had kept her promise to see me at the pageant. * * * * * [Illustration: Then, while the clamor increased and the buildings heaved and wavered with the motion of tossing ships at sea, the ground beneath them gave a sharp lunge downward; and like toy castles, the towers all at once collapsed.... But scarcely had the thunder of the overthrown walls died down, when a new and more ominous roaring came to my ears, a tumult as of Niagara or of sea-waves splashing the cliffs...] * * * * * CHAPTER XVI An Official Summons