And, as if possessed by a sudden access of frenzy, he brandished his pine-torch wildly above his head till it showered a rain of bright sparks above him, and exclaimed furiously--"Away, away, and trouble me not! The days are not yet fulfilled,--the time is not yet ripe. Why seek to hasten my end? Away, away, I tell you! Leave me in peace! I will die when Thelma bids me; but not till then!"
And he rushed down the long gallery and disappeared in the furthest chamber, where he gave vent to a sort of long, sobbing cry, which rang dolefully through the cavern and then subsided into utter silence.
Feeling as if he were in a chaotic dream, Errington pursued his interrupted course through the winding passages with a bewildered and wondering mind. What strange place had he inadvertently lighted on? and who were the still stranger beings in connection with it? First the beautiful girl herself; next the mysterious coffin, hidden in its fanciful shell temple; and now this deformed madman, with the pale face and fine eyes; whose utterances, though incoherent, savored somewhat of poesy and prophecy. And what spell was attached to that name of Thelma? The more he thought of his morning's adventure, the more puzzled he became. As a rule, he believed more in the commonplace than in the romantic--most people do. But truth to tell, romance is far more common than the commonplace. There are few who have not, at one time or other of their lives, had some strange or tragic episode woven into the tissue of their every-day existence; and it would be difficult to find one person even among humdrum individuals, who, from birth to death, has experienced nothing out of the common.
Errington generally dismissed all tales of adventure as mere exaggerations of heated fancy; and, had he read in some book, of a respectable nineteenth-century yachtsman having such an interview with a madman in a sea-cavern, he would have laughed at the affair as an utter improbability, though he could not have explained why he considered it improbable. But now it had occurred to himself, he was both surprised and amused at the whole circumstance; moreover, he was sufficiently interested and carious to be desirous of sifting the matter to its foundation.
It was, however, somewhat of a relief to him when he again readied the outer cavern. He replaced the lamp on the shelf where he had found it, and stepped once more into the brilliant light of the very early dawn, which then had all the splendor of full morning. There was a deliciously balmy wind, the blue sky was musical with a chorus of larks, and every breath of air that waved aside the long grass sent forth a thousand odors from hidden beds of wild thyme and bog-myrtle.