His first emotion on making this new mental rediscovery was, as it had been before in the King's audience-hall, one of absolute TERROR, ... feverish, mad terror which for a few moments possessed him so utterly that, turning away, he buried his aching head among the cushion where he reclined, in order to hide from his companion's eyes any outward sign that might betray his desperate misery. Clenching his hands convulsively, he silently, and with all his strength, combated the awful horror of himself that grew up spectrally within him,--the dreadful, distracting uncertainty of his own identity that again confused his brain and paralyzed his reason.
At last, he thought wildly, at last he knew the meaning of Hell! ... the frightful spiritual torment of a baffled intelligence set adrift among the wrecks and shadows of things that had formerly been its pride and glory! What was any physical suffering compared to such a frenzy of mind-agony? Nothing! ... less than nothing! This was the everlasting thirst and fire spoken of so vaguely by prophets and preachers,--the thirst and fire of the Soul's unquenchable longing to unravel the dismal tangle of its own bygone deeds, . . the striving forever in vain to steadfastly establish the wavering mystery of its own existence!
"O God! ... God!--what hast Thou made of me!" he groaned inwardly, as he endeavored to calm the tempest of his unutterable despair,-- "Who am I? ... Who WAS I in that far Past which, like the pale spirit of a murdered friend, haunts me so indistinctly yet so threateningly! Surely the gift of Poesy was mine! ... surely I too could weave the harmony of words and thoughts into a sweet and fitting music, . . how comes it then that all Sah-luma's work is but the reflex of my own? O woeful, strange, and bitter enigma! ... when shall it be unraveled? 'Nourhalma!' 'Twas the name of what I deemed my masterpiece! ... O silly masterpiece, if it prove thus easy of imitation! ... Yet stay.. let me be patient! ... titles are often copied unconsciously by different authors in different lands, . . and it may chance that Sah-luma's poem is after all his own,--not mine. Not mine, as were the ballads and the love-ode he chanted to the King last night! ... O Destiny! ... inscrutable, pitiless Destiny! ... rescue my tortured soul from chaos! ... declare unto me who,--WHO is the plagiarist and thief of Song.. MYSELF or SAH-LUMA?"
The more he perplexed his mind with such questions, the deeper grew the darkness of the inexplicable dilemma, to which a fresh obscurity was now added in his suddenly distinct and distressful remembrance of the "Pass of Dariel." Where was this place, he wondered wearily?--When had he seen it? whom had he met there?-- and how had he come to Al-Kyris from thence? No answer could his vexed brain shape to these demands, . . he recollected the "Pass of Dariel" just as he recollected the "Field of Ardath"--without the least idea as to what connection existed between them and his own personal adventures. Presently controlling himself, he raised his head and ventured to look up,--Sah-luma stood beside him, his fine face expressive of an amiable solicitude.