Feelings of depression were never permitted to stay
for a moment, and she looked away into the trees for comfort--but only a
deathly stillness and a sullen roll of distant thunder answered, and
left her uncomforted.
And then some force stronger than her will seemed to drive her back to
the house, and to the long gallery, and just at the very moment when she
had passed beyond her lover's sight it was as if something chased her,
so that she ran the last few yards, and paused not until she stood in
front of Aphrodite's shrine.
It would be difficult to carry the marble head with the other few things
she proposed to take, but none the less was the necessity imperative.
She could not be married without the presence of her beloved mother to
bless her.
As she lifted her goddess out, with her silken wrappings, the first
flash of the nearing storm lit up the dark room with lurid flame.
Halcyone shivered. It was the one aspect of Nature with which she was
out of harmony. When thunder rolled and lightning quivered, her vitality
seemed to desert her and she experienced what in her came nearest to
fear.
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