There was a short silence, during which Villiers eyed his friend wistfully.
"What was that 'adventure' you spoke about in your letter from the Monastery on the Pass of Dariel?" he asked after a while--"You said you were on the search for a new sensation-did you experience it?"
Alwyn smiled. "I certainly DID!"
"Did it arise from a contemplation of the site of the Ruins of Babylon?"
"Not exactly. Babylon,--or rather the earth-mounds which are now called Babylon,--had very little to do with it."
"Don't you want to tell me about it?" demanded Tilliers abruptly.
"Not just yet"--answered Alwyn, with good-humored frankness,--"Not to-night, at any rate! But I WILL tell you, never fear! For the present we've talked enough, . . don't you think bed suggests itself as a fitting conclusion to our converse?"
Villiers laughed and acquiesced, and after pressing his friend to partake of something in the way of supper, which refreshment was declined, he preceded him to a small, pleasantly cosy room,--his "guest-chamber" as he called it, but which was really almost exclusively set apart for Alwyn's use alone, and was always in readiness for him whenever he chose to occupy it. Turning on the pretty electric lamp that lit the whole apartment with a soft and shaded lustre, Villiers shook hands heartily with his old school- fellow and favorite comrade, and bidding him a brief but cordial good-night left him to repose.
As soon as he was alone Alwyn took out from his breast pocket a small velvet letter-case, from which he gently drew forth a slightly pressed but unfaded white flower. Setting this in a glass of water he placed it near his bed, and watched it for a moment. Delicately and gradually its pressed petals expanded, . . its golden corolla brightened in hue, . . a subtle, sweet odor permeated the air, . . and soon the angelic "immortelle" of the Field of Ardath shone wondrously as a white star in the quiet room. And when the lamp was extinguished and the poet slept, that strange, fair blossom seemed to watch him like a soft, luminous eye in the darkness,--a symbol of things divine and lasting,--a token of far and brilliant worlds where even flowers cannot fade!