As the day drew towards evening, Morgan became more stiff and silent. Her eyes were bright as the jewels round her neck; they would flash and waver, or fall at times into long, sidelong stares. More than once Igraine caught the girl's face in hard thought, the pert lips straight and cruel, the eyes hungry and very shallow. It reminded her of Morgan's look in the morning, when she was in such stark fear of the heathen and of death. Yet while she watched her, smiles and glib vivacity would sweep back again as though there had been but a transient cloud of thought over the girl's face. With the shadows lengthening, they turned, all three of them, into the garden, and found ease on a grass bank beneath the black boughs of a great cedar. The arch of the dark foliage cut the sky into a semicircle of azure. All about them the grass seemed dusted with dim flowers--blue, white, and violet. A rich company of tiger lilies bowed to the west. Dense banks of laurels and cypresses stood like screens of blackest marble, for the sun was sinking. As they lay under the tree, they could look down upon the water, sheeny and glorious in the evening peace. Further still, the willows slept like a mist of green, with the fields Elysian and full of sweet stupors, the woods beyond standing solemn and still at the beck of night. Morgan, who had brought the lute with her, began to touch the strings, and to sing softly in a thin, elfin voice-- My heart is open at the hour of night When lilies swoon And roses kiss in bed. When all the dreams of sad-lipped passion rise From sleep's blue bowers To die in lover's eyes. Come flame, Come fire, A woman's bosom Is but life's desire. So, all my treasures are but held for love In scarlet silks And tapestries of snow. I long, white-bosomed like the stars that sigh A bed in heaven For love's ecstasy. Come flame, Come fire, A woman's bosom Is all man's desire. The birds were nestling and gossiping in the laurel bushes, taking lodging for the night. From the topmost pinnacle of the cedar, a thrush, a feathered muezzin, had called the world to prayer. From the mere came the cries of water-fowl; the eerie wail of the lapwing rose in the meadows. Presently, all was still and breathless; a vast hush seemed to hold the world. The west was fast dying. Under the cedar the light lurked dim and magic. Morgan's fingers were still hovering on the strings, and she was singing to herself in a whisper, as though she had care for nothing, save for that which was in her heart. Pelleas and Igraine were quite near each other in the shadow. They had looked into each other's eyes--one long, deep look. Each had turned away troubled, yet with a sudden glory of quick anguish in their hearts. The night seemed very subtle to them, and the whole world sweet. VII