Classic Audiobook Collection - The Charwomans Shadow by Lord Dunsany ~ Full Audiobook [fantasy]

Starting point is 00:00:00 Chapter 1 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Dunsainey, first published in 1926. Chapter 1 The Lord of the Tower finds a career for his son. Picture a summer evening, sombre and sweet over Spain, the glittering sheen of leaves fading to soberer colors, the sky in the west all soft and mysterious as low music, and in the east like a frown. Picture the golden age past its wonderful zenith and westering now towards its setting. In such a time of day and time of year, and in such a time of history,

Starting point is 00:00:43 a young man was travelling on foot on a Spanish road, from a village well-nigh unknown, towards the gloom and grandeur of the mountains. And as he travelled, a wind rising up with the fall of day flapped his cloak hugely about him. The strength of the wind grew Until little strange cries were in it The slope steepened, the daylight waned, And the man and his cloak And the evening so merged into one darkness

Starting point is 00:01:10 That even in imagination I can but dimly see him now Let us therefore turn to such questions As who he was And how he came to be faring at such an hour Towards a region so rocky and lonely As that which loomed before him while the latest stragglers among other men were nearing their houses among the sheltered fields.

Starting point is 00:01:35 His name was Ramon Alonzo, Matthew Mark, Luke John of the Tower and Rocky Forest. And his father had lately called to him as he played at ball with his sister, beating it back and forth to each other over a deep yew hedge, and the ball had a row of feathers fixed all round it to make it fly gently and fairly, and the ewe hedge ended at the white balustrade, and beyond that lay the wild rocks and the frown of the forest. His father called to him, and he entered the house out of the mellow evening, praying his sister to wait, but he talked with his father till all the light was gone, and they played at ball no more. And in such a manner as this spoke the Lord of the Tower and the Rocky Forest to his son,

Starting point is 00:02:21 when they were seated before the logs in the room where the boar spears hung. whether to hunt the boar or the stag be sweeter i know not methinks the boar but only the blessed saints know which is truly the sweeter and yet there are other considerations besides these and the world were happier were it not so yet it is ever thus and the boy nodded his head for he knew what it was of which his father would speak that it was of lucre which hath much to do with world affairs, and the good fathers had warned him of it, and indeed of this very thing his father told. For however vile and drost-like, he said, gold be in itself, and I do not ask you to doubt the ill repute you have learned of it in the school on the high hill. Yet is it necessary in curious ways to many things that are good, as certain foulness nourish the roots of the vine? For Emmanuel and mark are of such a kind that they will have their regular payment year in and year out for such work as they do with the horses nor is peter any better in the garden and it is indeed the same in the dairy and then there was the teaching that you received from the good fathers on their high hill much of this dross went also there though the work itself was a blessed one

Starting point is 00:03:50 And now it is necessary to put yet more of this gold in a box, and to have it ready against some day when a dowry will be needed for your sister, for she is already past fifteen. And the rocky structure of our soil being unsuited to husbandry, gold is not easily wrung from it, and there is little of a worldly nature to be one from the forest, and to me it seems that as sin increases on earth, the need for gold grows greater. for myself if the getting of gold be an art as some have said i am past the time for learning a new art and if it be a sin my sins are over yet you my son may happily gather this great necessity for us or this evil whatever it be and if it be a sin what is one more sin to youth not much i fear and a youth crossed himself and follow not the way of the sword continued his father in no whit diverted from his discourse for the lawyers ever defeated with their pens as hath been said of old but follow the art and you shall deal in a matter at whose mention lawyers pale

Starting point is 00:05:08 the black art exclaimed rome alonzo there is but one art said his father and it shall all the more advantage you to follow it in the black art exclaimed rome alonzo there is but one art said his father and it shall all the more advantage you to follow it in that there hath been of late but little magic in Spain. And even in this forest there are not, but on rarest evenings. Such mysteries nor such menace as I myself can remember, and no dragon hath been seen since my grandfather's days. The black art? said Ramon Alonzo. But how shall I tell of this to Father Joseph? And his father rubbed his chin a while before he spoke again.

Starting point is 00:05:47 To our heart indeed. he said, to tell so good a man. Yet are we in sore need of gold, and God forbid in his mercy that one of us should ever follow a trade. Amen, said his son, and the fervor with which the boy had said, amen, heartened his father to hope he would do his bidding, and cheered him on the way with his discourse which he continued as follows. There is dwelling in the mountains, a days walk beyond Arragona, whose spires we see a magician known to my father for once my father hunting a stag in his youth went far into the mountains as goodly a stag as ever rejoiced a hunter though once i killed one as good but never better i killed mine in the year of the great snowfall the year before you were born it had come down from the mountains but my father hunted his up from the valley where it had been feeding all night at the edges of the of gardens. It went home to the mountains, and in dense woods on the slope, my father killed it at evening. And then the most curious man he had ever known came down the rocks, walking gently,

Starting point is 00:07:03 wearing a black silk cloak, to where he was skinning the stag with his tired hounds sitting around him, and asked my father if he studied magic. And my father said that hunting the stag and the boar were the only studies he knew. And well indeed he studied them, and he taught me, but not all he knew, for no man can learn so much. And then he told a magician something of how to hunt boars, and the magician was pleased, for men shunned him much, and seldom spoke from their hearts of the things they loved, before his portentous cloak and his strange wise eye. and my father warmed to the tales as he told of the thing he had studied, and the stars came twinkling out above the magician,

Starting point is 00:07:52 and the gloom was enormous in the ominous wood, and still my father told of the ways of the bores, for there was never fear in my father. And the magician asked my father if there was any favor he would have of him, and my father said, Yes, for he had ever wondered at the art of writing, and he asked the magician if he would write for him. And this the magician did, withdrawing a cork from a horn that hung from his girdle, and that was filled with ink,

Starting point is 00:08:26 and taking a goose quill and writing there in the wood upon the little scroll that he took from a satchel. And they parted in the wood, and my father remembered that day all his years, as much for what he had seen the magician do as for the splendid horns he had won that day. And when the writing came to be read, it was seen that it was a letter of friendship or welcome to my father or to whomever he should send with that scroll to the house in the wood. Now my father cared only to hunt the boar and the stag and had no need of magic, and I have had nothing to do with parchments nor writing. but i can find the scroll at this moment among the tusks of boors that my father laid by and you shall have the scroll and go to the wood and say to that magician i am the grandson of him that taught you of the taking of boars nigh eighty years agone

Starting point is 00:09:29 but will he yet live asked ramon he were no magician else replied his father and the boy sat silent then regretting the thoughtlessness that his hasty words had revealed with the mystery of writing which you will doubtless study there i have myself some acquaintance having sufficiently studied the matter some while since to be able to practise it should the occasion ever arise but of all the mysteries that he hath the skill to teach you the one to study most diligently is that one which concerns the making of gold yes yes he said silencing with a wave or two of his hand some hasty youthful objection that he saw on the boy's lips i wot well the sin that is inherent in gold yet methinks there is some primal curse upon it put there by satan before it was laid in earth which may not cling to the gold that philosophers make and youth and haste again urged another question but can philosophers make gold blurted out Ramon Alonzo? Ill-formed lad, said his father. Have you heard of

Starting point is 00:10:44 no philosophers during the last ten centuries, seeking for gold with their stone? Yes, answered Ramon Alonzo, but I heard of none that found it. And his father shook his head with tolerant smiles and answered nothing at once, not hastening

Starting point is 00:11:00 to reprove the lad's ill-founded opinion, for the wisdom of age expects these light conclusions from youth. And then he instructed his son in simple words, telling him that the value of gold lies not in any especial power in the metal, but purely in its rarity, and explaining so that a child could have understood, that had these most learned of men who gave their lives to alchemy, acquainted the vulgar with the fruits of their study, as soon as their art had taught them

Starting point is 00:11:29 the way of transmuting-based metal, they would have undone in one garrulous moment, the advantage that they had earned by nights of toil, working in lonely towers while all the world had rest. And more simple arguments, he added, sufficient to correct the hasty error of youth, but too obvious and trite to offer to the attention of my reader. Having then explained that the philosopher's stone must have been often found and put to the use for which it was intended,

Starting point is 00:12:00 he recommended the study of it once more to his son. and the young man weighed the advantages of gold with all that he had learned in its disfavor, and there and then decided to follow that study. Gladly then, the Lord of the Tower and Rocky Forest went to his rummage room where strange things lay, and none interfered with the spider. And in that dim place where one scarce could have hoped to find anything, amongst heaps of old fishing nets that had become solid with dust, where worn-out boar-spears lay on the floor,

Starting point is 00:12:35 and rusted bandaleros that had once pricked famous bulls, blunt knives and broken tent-pegs, and things too old for one to be able to name them at all, unless one washed them and brought them out in the light. Grooping amongst all these, the lord of the tower, found a pale heap of boar tusks, and the scroll amongst them, as he had told his son. Then he left the place to the spider.

Starting point is 00:13:01 And returning with the scroll to his son, he brought also a coffer out of another room, a small stout box of oak and massive silver, well guarded by a great lock, all lined within with satin. And he took a great key and carefully unlocked it and showed it to Ramon Alonzo as he gave him the scroll of the magician. He held the coffer open with the light blue satin showing and said never a word. The young man knew it was for the coffer of his sister's dowry and saw that it was empty. And by the time his father had closed the box again, and carefully locked it and placed the key in safety, the boy's young thoughts had roamed away to beyond Arragona to the man with the black silk cloak and his house in the wood, where base metals would have to suffer wonderful changes before a good thick pieces of dross should chink deep on that satin lining.

Starting point is 00:13:58 and where young thoughts have roamed, there soon follow lads or maidens. And then they talked of the way beyond Aragona and the path that led to the wood, and the father leaned in his chair in comfort and ease, for it wearied him to speak of things that are hard to understand, and especially the getting of money, and he had thought of this matter for days

Starting point is 00:14:19 before he had spoken of it, and it had never seemed sure to him that the money would come at all, but now it seemed clear and he rested. and leaning back in his chair he told the way to his son which was easy as far as the wood and after that he could ask the way of such men as he met and if he met none he was likely near to the house for men avoided it much a while they talked of things of little moment small matters pleasant to both till the father remembered that more than this was seemly and reminded his son of all such things as he himself knew that concerned the decorum and gravity of the study of magic indeed he knew little of this ancient study but had once seen a conjurer produce a rabbit alive from under an empty sombrero years ago outside a village in which he had sought to purchase a cow and it was this that he meant when he spoke of the slight acquaintance he had himself had with magic.

Starting point is 00:15:18 For the rest he spoke of the horror traditions of magic, which were as antique then as now, for then as now they went back past the first gates of history, and ran far on the wide plains of legend and into the dimness of time. To such traditions, he said, a grave decorum were fitting. And the young man nodded his head, his face full of a little of a little. fitting decorum, and the father remembered his own youth and wondered. They parted then, the lord of the tower and rocky forest, going to find his lady, the young man still in his chair before the fire, pondering his journey and his future calling.

Starting point is 00:16:01 These thoughts were too swift to follow. Pursuing instead the slow steps of his father, we find him come to a room, in which already discernible shadows were cast by a one, of gold. With its ancient sentinel chairs that seemed posted there to check lounging, and its treasure of tapestries hung to hide ruined panels, or wherever the drafts blew most from unintended ratt holes, that threatened room would scarce convey to our minds, could we see it across the centuries, any hint of impending need. And yet those shadows were there, moving softly as in slow dances with the solemn folds of the tapestry, or rising to welcome drafts in their secret

Starting point is 00:16:45 manner, or lurking by the huge carved feet of the chairs, and always knowing with shadow knowledge and whispering with shadow talk, and hinting and prophesying and fearing, that a need was nearing the tower to trouble its years. And here the Lord of the Tower found his lady, whose hair was whitening above a face unperturbed by the passing of time, or anything that time brings. If great passions had shaken her mind or wandering imaginations often troubled it, they had passed across that plump and placid face with no more traces than the storms and the ships leave on the yellow sand of a sunny cove. And he said to her, I have spoken with Ramon Alonzo and have arranged everything with him. He is to leave us soon to work with a learned man that

Starting point is 00:17:34 lives beyond Aragona, and will win for us the goal that we require, and afterwards some more for himself. More than this, he did not say upon the matter, for it was not his way, nor was it then the custom in Spain to speak of business to ladies. And the lady rejoiced at this, for she had long tried to make her husband see that need that was sending its shadows to creep through the tower, telling every nook of its coming, but the boers had to be hunted, and the ha'ers had to be hunted, and the hounds had to be fed, and a hundred things demanded his attention, so that she feared he might never have leisure to give his mind to this matter. But now it was all settled. Will Ramon Alonzo start soon? she said. Not for some days, said he, there is no haste.

Starting point is 00:18:23 But Ramon Alonzo's swifter thoughts had outpaced all this. He was speaking now with his sister, telling her that he was to start next morning for that old house in the mountains of which they had often heard tales, and bidding her tend his great boar-hound. They were in the garden, though the gloaming was fading away, the garden that met the lawn on which they had lately played, a little lower down the slope where the tower stood, and shut from the untamed earth and the rocks that were there before man by the same balustrade of marble that guarded the lawn. The hawk-moths appeared out of the darkening air from their deep homes in the forest, and hovered by heavy blooms. It was in the midst of the days that are poised between spring and summer.

Starting point is 00:19:09 Here, Ramon and Mirandala said farewell in the little paths along which they often played in years that appeared remote to them, under Spanish shrubs that were like tall fountains of flowers. And whatever the lady of the tower guessed, neither her lord nor Ramon Alonzo, had any knowledge that there was a glittering flash in the eyes of the slender girl that might laugh away demands for any dowry, and be deadlier and sweeter than gold, and might mock the men that sought it, and bring their plans to derision, and overturn their illusions, and fill their dreams with its ashes. Ramon Alonzo was troubled by no such fancy as this, as he spoke earnestly of his boar-hound, and as they spoke of his needs of combing and feeding

Starting point is 00:19:55 and dryness, they walked back to the tower, and the gloaming was not yet gone, but it was midnight in Miranda's hair. And so it was that on the following day, at evening, beyond Arragona, a young man was to be seen by such eyes as could peer so far, in his cloak on a rocky road with his back to the sheltered fields, bound for the mountain upon which frowned the woods, and night and a moaning wind were rising all round about him. End of Chapter 1 The Lord of the Tower

Starting point is 00:20:32 Finds a Career for His Son Chapter 2 Of the Charo Woman's Shadow By Lord Dunsainey This liver-vox recording is in the public domain Read by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana Chapter 2 Ramon Alonzo comes to the house in the wood

Starting point is 00:20:54 Ramon Alonzo had traveled all day and was twenty-five miles from his home, and now alone amongst darkness and storm and rocks, he saw yet no sign of the house he sought or any shelter at all. He had come past the sentinel oaks to the gloom of the wood, and neither saw light of window anywhere, nor heard any of those sounds such as rise from the houses of men. He was in that mood that most attracts despair to come to men and tempt them, and indeed it would soon have come, loring him to forsake illusion and give up ambition and hope, but that just in that perilous moment he met a ragged man coming down through the wood. He came with strides, cloak, and rags all flapping together, and would have passed the young traveller and hastened on towards the fields in the haunts of men, but Ramon Alonzo hailed him, demanding of him,

Starting point is 00:21:51 Where is the house in the wood? Oh, not there, young master, not there, said the ragged stranger, waving his hands against something upon his left, and up the slope a little behind him. Not there, young master, he implored again and shuddered as he spoke. And no despair came near Ramon Alonzo then to tempt all his aspirations down to their dooms, for he saw by the stranger's unmistakable tale,

Starting point is 00:22:17 terror he had only to keep on upward and a little more to his right to come very soon to the sight of the house in the wood. I have business with the magician, replied Ramon Alonzo. May all such blessed spirits defend us as can, said the stranger. He wrapped his cloak round him with a trembling hand and went shuddering down the slope, driveling terrified prayer. A fair night to you, signor, called out Ramon Alonzo. clearly not far he added thinking aloud and once more he heard struggling feebly against the eerie voice of the wind those plaintive words imploring not there young master not there and pressing on in the direction against which those feeble hands had waved so earnestly he had gone some while against wind and slope and branches when a feeling came dankly upon him as though exuded from the deep moss all around him that he came to no nearer to the house in the wood. He halted then and called out loud in the darkness, If there be any magician in this wood, let him appear. He waited, and the wind sang on triumphantly,

Starting point is 00:23:30 singing of spaces unconcerned with man, blue fields of the winds roving, dark gardens amongst the stars. He waited there, and no magician came. So he sat on a boulder that was all deep with moss, and leaned back on it and looked into the wood and saw nothing there but blackness and outlines of oak bowls. There he pondered how to come to his journey's end. And then it came to him that this was no common journey to be guided by the rules of ordinary wayfairing, but having a magician as its destination and in an ominous wood, it were better guided by spell or magic or omen, and he meditated upon how he should come by a spell. and as he thought of spells he remembered the scroll he bore with the ink of the magician upon it written eighty years agone now romanozzo's studies had not extended so far as the art of writing the good fathers in their school on the high hill near his home had taught him orally all that is needful to know and much more he had learned for himself but not by reading script therefore in black ink upon a

Starting point is 00:24:44 scroll was in itself wonderful to him, and knowing it to have been penned by a magician, he reasonably regarded it as a spell. Arising then from his seat, he waved the scroll high in the night, and knowing the liking that secret folk often show for the number three, he waved it thrice, and there before him was the house in the wood. It seemed to have slid down quietly from the high places of night, or it quietly appeared out of darkness that had hidden it hitherto, but the silence that cloaked its appearance almost instantly glided away, giving place to Arabian music that haunted the air overhead,

Starting point is 00:25:27 and plaintive Hindu love chants that yearned in the dark. Then windows flashed into light, and there, just in front of the mossy stone that the young man had made his seat, was an old green door all studded with old green knobs, The door was ajar. Ramon Alonzo stepped forward and pushed the green door open, and the magician came to his door with that alacrity with which the spider descends to the spot in his web

Starting point is 00:25:55 that is shaken by some lost winged traveller's arrival. He was in the great black silk cloak that the young man's grandfather knew, but he wore great spectacles now, for he was older than he had been 80 years ago, in spite of his magic art. romano alonzo bowed and the master smiled though whether he smiled for welcome or at a doom that hung over the strangers who troubled his door there was no way for unlearned men to know then quickly though still without fear, Ramon Alonzo thrust out the scroll that he bore, with the magician's own writing upon it all in black ink, saying, word for word, as his father had

Starting point is 00:26:38 bade him say, I am the grandson of him that taught you the taking of boars, nigh eighty years ago. The magician received it, and as he read his smile changed its nature, and appeared to Ramon Alonzo somewhat more wholesome, having something, in common with smiles of unlearned men that they smile at what is pleasant in earthly affairs. With a tact that well became him, the Master of Magic made no inquiry after the young man's grandfather, for as the rich do not speak of poverty to the poor or the learned discourse on ignorance to the unlearned, this sage that had mastered the way of surviving the years spoke seldom with common men on the matter of death.

Starting point is 00:27:26 but he bowed a welcome as though Ramon Alonzo were not entirely a stranger, and the young man expressed the pleasure that he felt at meeting a master of arts. There is but one art, answered the master. It is the only one I would study, replied Ramon Alonzo. Ah, said the magician, and with an air now grown grave, as though somewhat pondering, he raised his arm and summoned up a draft which closed his green door. When the door was shut and the draft had run home, brushing by the loose silk sleeve of the magician to its haunt in the dark of the house, which Ramon Alonzo perceived to be full of crannies, the host led his guest to an adjacent room, whence the savour of meats arose as he opened the door, and there was a repast already cooked and spread, waiting for Ramon Alonzo. By what arts those meats were kept smoking upon that table, ready for any stranger that should come in from the wood, ready perhaps since the days of the young man's grandfather, I tell not to this age, for it is far too well acquainted already with the preservation of meat. With a bow and a wave of his arm, the magician appointed a chair to Ramon Alonzo, and not till his guest was seated before the meats did the magician speak again.

Starting point is 00:28:50 so you would study the art he said master the young man answered him i would no then the magician said that all those exercises that men call arts and all wisdom and all knowledge are but humble branches of that worthy study that is justly named the art nor is this to be revealed to all chance-come travellers that may imperil themselves by entering my house in the wood my gratitude to your grandfather however for some while now unpaid my trusty prospers renders me anxious to serve you for he taught me a branch of learning that he had studied well. It was moreover one of those studies that my researchers had not yet covered, the matter of the hunting of boars, and from this as from every science that learning knows, the art hath increase, and becomeeth a yet more powerful and reverend power whereby to astound the vulgar, and to punish error, not only in this wood, but finally to drive it out of all worldly affairs. And he spoke swiftly past his mention of Ramon Alonzo's grandfather,

Starting point is 00:30:11 lest his guests should have the embarrassment of admitting that his grandfather had shared with all the unlearned, the vulgar inability to withstand the flight of the years. For himself he kept on a shelf in an upper room, a bottle of that medicine philosophers use, which is named Eixirvite, wherein were sufficient doses to ensure his survival till the time when he knew that the world would begin to grow bad. He took one dose every generation.

Starting point is 00:30:42 By certain turns in the tide of life, in those that he watched, a touch of gray over the ears, a broadening or a calming, he knew that the heyday of a generation was passed and the time had come for his dose. And then he would go one night by resounding stairs that were never troubled by the day, anything human but him, whatever the rats might dare, and so he would come with his ponderous golden key, for an iron one would have long since rested away, to the lock he turned only once every thirty years, and opening the heavy door at the top of the stairs, and entering that upper room, he would find his bottle grey with dust on its shelf, perhaps entirely hidden by little curtains that the spiders had drawn across it, and measuring his dose by moonlight,

Starting point is 00:31:30 he would drink it full in the rays as though he shared this secret alone with the moon then back he would go down those age-worn steps of oak with his old mind suddenly lightened of the cares of that generation free from its foibles untroubled by its problems neither cramped nor duped by its fashions unyoked by its causes undriven by its aims fresh and keen for the wisdom and folly of a new generation such a mind well stored with the wisdom of several ages and repeatedly refreshed with the nimble alertness of youth now crossed in brief conversation the young mind of rome alonzo like a terrible blade of toledo sharpened in ancient battles meeting a well-wrought rapier coming fresh to its first war my grandfather unfortunately came to his death said romeonzo alas said the master our family is well used to it said the youth with a certain pride for poverty has its pride as well as wealth and rimonelonzo would not be abashed by his forebears lack of years even though he should speak with an immortal is that so said the master i thank you said romeonzo for the noble sentiments you so graciously felt for my grandfather and shall greatly value such learning as you may have leisure to teach me for i would make gold out of the baser metals my family having great need of it there are secrets you shall not learn replied the magician for i may impart them to none but the making of gold is amongst the least of the craft that are used by those skilled in the art,

Starting point is 00:33:18 and were only a poor return for the learning I had from your grandfather concerning the hunting of boars. Beyond this wood, said Ramon Alonzo, we set much store by gold, and value it beyond the hunting of boars. Beyond this wood, replied the master, lies error to extirpate which is the object of my studies. For this my lamp is lit,

Starting point is 00:33:44 to the grief of the owls and often burns till lark-song. Of the things you shall learn here earliest, the prime is this, that the pursuit of the philosophers is well fair. To this gold often contributes, often it thwarts it, but it was plainly taught by your grandfather that the hunting of boers is amongst those things that brings pure joy to man. This study must therefore always be preferred to such as only brings us happiness incompletely, or that have been known to fail to bring it at all, as the hunting of boars never failed. So I learn from your grandfather.

Starting point is 00:34:26 I fear that my grandfather, said the young man deprecatingly, was but ill-equipped for discourse with a philosopher, having had insufficient leisure, as I have often been told, for learning. Your grandfather, answered the master, was a very great philosopher. Not only had he found the way to happiness, but of that way was a most constant explorer, till none may doubt that he knew its every turning, for he could track the boars to the forest all the way from the fields where they rooted, knowing what fields they would seek,

Starting point is 00:35:01 and the hour at which they would leave them, and could hearten his hounds while they hunted, even through watery places. And when scent was lost in all their cunning, was gone, he still could lead them on, and so he brought them upon many abhor, and slew his quarry with spear thrusts that he had practiced, and took its tusky head, which was his happiness, and rarely failed to achieve it, having so deeply studied the way. I also followed the pursuit of happiness, studying all those methods that are most in use amongst men, as well as some that are hidden from them, and most of these methods are vain, leaving few that are worthy of the investigation of one holding the rank that I now hold amongst wizards. Of these few that have stood the test of my

Starting point is 00:35:52 most laborious analysis is this one that I owe to the researchers of your grandfather, and which, seeing how few are the ways of attaining happiness, is certainly among the four great branches of learning. Who knows these four great studies? hath four different ways of approach to the goal of mankind, and hath that might that is to be got by complete wisdom alone. For this cause I give great honor to your grandfather, and extol his name, and bless it by means of spells, and in my estimation, place it high amongst the names of those whose learning has lightened the world. Alas, that his studies gave him no time for that last erudition which could have ensured his survival to these days and beyond them the young man was surprised at the value the master placed upon boer hunting for having as yet learned nothing about philosophy he vaguely and foolishly believed it to be concerned with mere intricate words and did not know in his youthful ignorance that its real concern was with happiness such folly is scarce becoming to young heroes yet having sought to lure my

Starting point is 00:37:06 interest towards him, I feel at my duty to tell the least of his weaknesses, without which my portrait of him would be a false one. And so I expose his ignorance to the eyes of a later age. He will not be abashed by it now. But seated beside the meat at that magic table, he felt the triviality of his schoolboy's scraps of learning before every particle that the magician chose to reveal from his lore. And with all the intensity that try to, rifles can summon up in youth. He regretted his disparagement of his grandfather, not on account of his own reverence for him, but because he now perceived him to have been one that the master held in honor. To cover his confusion, he poured himself out some wine from a beaker at his right hand,

Starting point is 00:37:56 partly bronze, partly glass, the bronze and glass being intermingled by magic, and having filled his cup a clear hollowed crystal, he hastily drank it before he spoke again. And the wine was a magic wine, with a taste of flowers, yet of flowers unknown to earth, and a flavor of spices, yet of spices ungathered in any isle Spain knew, and it had in it a memory and a music, and came to the blood like one that was closely kin, and yet of a kinship from ages and ages ago. and all of a sudden the young man saw his folly in deeming that philosophy prefers the way to the end and so for a moment he saw his grandfather's wisdom but that wonderful wine's inspiration died swiftly away and his thoughts were concerned again with the making of gold the magician had silently watched him drink that magic vintage it comes not from these vineyards he said

Starting point is 00:38:59 and he waved his arm so wide that he seemed to indicate no vineyard of Spain, nor the neighboring kingdom of Portugal, nor France, nor Africa, nor the German lands, Italy, Greece, nor the islands. Whence, asked Ramon Alonzo, leaning forward in earnest wonder. And the master extended his arm, pointing it higher. It seemed to point toward the evening star, that low and blue and large was blinking beyond the window. It is magic, said Ramon Alonzo.

Starting point is 00:39:34 All's magic here, said the master. End of chapter two. Ramon Alonzo comes to the house in the wood. Chapter 3 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Dunsainey. This Lieber Vox recording is in the public domain. Read by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 3 The Char Woman

Starting point is 00:40:06 Tells of Her Loss As Ramon Alonzo supped, that tall figure of magic stood opposite without moving and spoke no more so that the young man ate hastily and soon had finished. He rose from the table,

Starting point is 00:40:22 the other signed with his arm, and passed out of the room, Ramon Alonzo following. Soon they came to a lantern which the master of the art took down from its hook on the wall, he turned then away from his green door and led his visitor on to the deeps of his house. And it seemed to Ramona Alonzo, with the curious insight of youth, as he followed the black bulk of the master of the art looming above the wild shadows that ran

Starting point is 00:40:51 from the lantern, that here was the master of a band of shadows, leading them home into their native darkness. And so they came to an ancient stairway of stone that was lit by narrow windows opening on the stars, though to-night the master brought his lantern to light it in honor of his guest. And it was plain even to Ramon Alonzo from the commotion of the bats, though he had not the art to read the surprise in the eyes of the spiders, that the light of the lantern seldom came that way. They came to a door that no spell had guarded from time, the magician pushed it open and stood aside, and Ramon Alonzo entered. At first he only saw the huge bulk of the bed,

Starting point is 00:41:38 but as the lantern was lifted into the room, he saw the ruinous panels along the wall, and then the light fell on the bedclothes, and he could see that blankets and sheets moldered all in one heap together, and a cobweb covered them over. Some rush mats lay on the floor, but something seemed to have eaten most of the rushes. Over the window a draft flapped remnants of curtains, but the moth must have been in those curtains for ages and ages.

Starting point is 00:42:08 The master spoke with an air of explanation, almost perhaps of apology. Old age comes to all, he said. Then he withdrew. Left alone with the starlight, to which the work of the moth allowed an ample access, Ramon Alonzo considered his host. The room was ominous and a house enchanted, and there might well be spells in it more powerful than his sword, yet if his host were friendly, it seemed to him he was safe amongst his enchantments, unless some rebel spirit should trouble the knight who had revolted from the spells of the magician. He generously accepted the

Starting point is 00:42:47 master's explanation of the state of the room, shrewdly considering him to be a man so absorbed in the perpetuity of his art that he gave no attention to material things so trusting to his host's expressions of good-will and of gratitude to his grandfather he lay down on the bed to sleep untroubled by fear of spells or spirits of evil but he took off none of his clothes for against the risk of damp he felt there was none to guard him either he slept or was in that borderland where earth is dimmed by a haze from the land of sleep, and dreams cast shadows yet on the shores of earth before they glide afar, when he heard slow steps come up the stairway of stone, and presently there was a knock, to which he answered, and a crone appeared in the door, holding the lantern that the magician had lately carried. Age had withered her beyond pity, for whatever pity there be for sickness and hurts, Youth feels little pity for age, having never known it, and the aged have little pity to give to their fellows, because pity is withering in them with many another emotion, like the last of the flowers drooping all together as winter nears the garden.

Starting point is 00:44:05 She stood there feeble and wasted, an ancient hag. And before the young man spoke, she quavered to him, with an earnest intentness, the fervor of which not even her age could dim, stretching out a withered right hand to him as she spoke, the left hand holding the lantern. Young master, give him nothing, give him nothing, whatever he asks. His prices are too high, young master, too high, too high. I have little money to give, said Ramon Alonzo. Money, she guessed, for her vehemence set her panting. Money, that is not.

Starting point is 00:44:45 That's a toy. That's a mounstrap. Money, indeed. But his prices are too high. He asks more than money. More than money, said Ramon, Alonzo. What then? Look!

Starting point is 00:45:01 She cried lamentably and twirled the lantern around her. The young man saw first her face, and a look on it like the look on the face of one revealing a mortal wound. And then as she swung the lantern around, he suddenly saw that the woman had no shadow. "'What? No shadow?' he blurted out, sitting suddenly up on his heap of cobwebs and sheets. "'Never again,' she said. "'Never again. It lay over the fields once. It used to make the grass such a tender green.

Starting point is 00:45:33 "'It never dimmed the buttercups. It did no harm to anything. "'Butterflies may have been scared of it, and once a dragonfly, but it did them never a harm. I've known it protect anemones Awhile from the heat of the noonday sun Which had otherwise withered them sooner In the early morning it would stretch away Beyond the garden right out to the wild Poor innocent shadow that loved the grey dew

Starting point is 00:46:02 And in the evening it would grow bold and strong And run right down the slopes of hills Where I walked singing And would come to the edges of the bottom skittangled to places till a little more and its head would have been out of sight. I've known the fairies then dance out from their sheltered arbores in the deeps of briar and thorn and play with its curls. And for all its rovings and lurkings and love of mystery,

Starting point is 00:46:32 it never left me of its own accord, never. It was I that forsook it, poor shadow, poor shadow that followed me home, for I've been out with it when the evenings were eerie and all the valleys haunted, and my shadow must have met with such companions as were far more akin to it than my gross body could be, and nearer to it than my heels, folk that would give it news direct from the kingdom of shadows, and gossip of the dark side of the moon, and would whisper things that I could never have taught it. yet it always came home with me and at night by candlelight in our cottage in aragona it used to dance for me as i went to bed all over the walls and ceilings poor innocent shadow and if i left a low candle to burn away he never tired of dancing for me as long as i sat up and watched often he out-tired the candle for the more wearily the candle flickered the more nimbly he looked

Starting point is 00:47:39 And then he would lie and rest in any corner with the common shadows of humble, trivial things. But if I struck a light to rise before dawn, or even if I should light my candle at midnight, he was always there at once, erect on the wall, ready to follow me wherever I went, and to bear me that companionship as I went among men and women, which I value to last so little when I had it, and without which now I know, too late I have learned, there is no welcome for one, no pity, no sufferance amongst mankind. No pity? said Ramon Alonzo, moved deeply to pity himself by the old crone's sorrow, though unable to credit that her loss could matter so much as she said.

Starting point is 00:48:30 No pity, no sufferance, she said. The children run from me screaming, those that are large enough to throw stones at me, and their elders come out with sticks when they hear them scream. At evening they all grow angrier. They come out with their long, big, faithful shadows, if I dare go near the village, and stand just beyond the strip where my shadows should be,

Starting point is 00:48:56 and jeer at me and upbraid, and there is no pity. And all the while they jeer. There's not one that loves his shadow, as I love mine. They do not gaze at their shadows or even turn to look at them. Oh, how I should gaze at mine if it could come back, or shadow.

Starting point is 00:49:17 I should go to a quiet place, alone in the open country, and there I should sit on the moss with my back to the sun, and watch my shadow all day. I should not want to eat or drink or think, I should only watch my shadow. I should mark its gentle movement that it makes in time with the sun.

Starting point is 00:49:41 I should watch till I saw it grow, and then I would hold up my hand and move every finger and each joint of my arm and see the shadow answering, answering, answering. And I should nod to it and bow to it and courtesy, and I would dance to my shadow alone. and all this I would do again and again all day. I would watch the color that every flower took and each different kind of grass when my shadow touched them.

Starting point is 00:50:15 And this is not telling you one hundredth part of it. It is this to love one's shadow. And what do they know of shadows? What do they care whether their shadows lie on green grass or rock? What do they know what colors the flowers turn when their shadows go amongst them, and they won't let me live with them, speak with them, or pass them by,

Starting point is 00:50:39 because forsooth I have been unkind to my shadow. Ah, well, perhaps the days will come when they too will love something too late, and love something that is gone, as I love my shadow. Cold days and long days, those. How did you lose it? asked Ramon Alonzo, all wonder and pity.

Starting point is 00:51:05 He took it, she said. He took it away and put it in his box. What did I know of the need one has of a shadow? That they would not speak to me, would not let me live. They never told me they set such store in their shadows, nor do they, nor do they. The young man's generous feelings were moved by this wrong as though it had been his own. i will go there with my sword he exclaimed and they shall speak with you courteously for the first time that night the old woman smiled she knew that jealousy united with fear could not be made to forgive such a loss as hers she had not known at first that it was jealousy but had learnt it at length by her lonely ponderings the villagers saw that in some curious way she had stepped outside boundaries that narrowed them

Starting point is 00:52:01 and had escaped from one rule from which they had never a holiday they could never be rid of the hourly attendance of shadows but one that could should not triumph over them she knew and she smiled young master she said more than ever moved to help him by his outburst of generosity give him nothing but you he said did you give it to him fool fool that i was i did not know i needed it but for what did you give it for immortality of a sort and said so ruefully with a look that told so much more that the young man saw clearly enough it had been the gift of tithonius he gave you that that she said but why asked ronona lanzo he wanted a charwoman she said she said End of Chapter 3. The Char Woman tells of her losses. Chapter 4 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Dunsainey. This Leber Fox recording is in the public domain, read by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 4, Ramona Alonzo learns a mystery known to the reader.

Starting point is 00:53:28 When the Crone had revealed the mean and trivial purpose for which the master of the art had cast her helpless upon the ages, she voiced her regrets no more. But once more, warning the young man against the magician's prices, she turned about with her london and went shadowless out of the room. Ramon Alonzo had heard and disregarded tales of men that had paid their shadows as the price for certain dealings within the scope of the art. But he had never before considered the value of shadows. He saw now that to lose his shadow and to come to come to yearn for it when it were lost, and to lose the little greetings that one daily had from one's kind, and to hear no more tattle about trivial things, to see smiles no more,

Starting point is 00:54:16 or to hear one's name called friendly, but to have the companionship only of shadowless things, such as that old woman and wandering spirits and dreams, might well be to pay too much for the making of gold. And well-warned now, he decided that come what may, he would never part with his shadow. In his gratitude, he determined to ask the magician for some respite for the poor old woman from scrubbing his floors through the ages. And then his thoughts went back to his main purpose, to what metals were suited best for transmutation, and whether he could turn them into gold himself, if the magician's price were too high, other men had done it, why not he? And led towards absurdity by this delightful hope, his thoughts grew wilder and wilder till they were

Starting point is 00:55:08 dreams. The sun coming through the upper branches of trees fell on that spidery bed and woke Ramon Alonzo. He perceived then a great gathering of huge oaks, seemingly more ancient than the rest of the forest, and the house was in the midst of them. It was a secret spot. He saw now that there was in his room a second window, but the little twigs had so pressed their leaves against it, that no light entered there but a dim greenness. It was like hundreds of outturned hands, protesting against that house. By such light as came through the southeastern window, he tidied himself, brushing off with his hands such cobwebs as he could. He did not draw back the curtains, deeming that if he took hold of a portion of one, it would come away from the rest, nor did enough material remain to

Starting point is 00:56:02 obstruct much of the light that came in through the trees. Then, being dressed already, he opened his door, and descended the stairs of stone. Every narrow slit that lighted those dim stairs, continued to show vast gathering of oaks that pressed close on the house, so close that Ramona Lanzo saw now what he had faintly heard overnight and not understood, that here and there great branches had entered the tower and been shaped as steps amongst the steps of stone, making two or three hollower sounds amongst the tapping footsteps of such as used that stair. Upon stormy nights, the wooden steps swayed slightly. When Ramona Lanzo had descended those steps, he came to passages amongst the darkness of rafters, which were like such nooks

Starting point is 00:56:54 as children find under old stairs, only larger and stranger and dimmer, running this way and that, and guided by glimmers of light that shone faintly from a far window. He came at length to the hall, at whose other end was the old green door to the forest. And there, in his black silk cloak in the midst of the hall the magician awaited him he was standing motionless and as soon as the young man saw him the master of the art said i trust you slept in comfort for his studies allowed him leisure for courtesy such as these but were too profound to permit of such intercourse with common material things as lifting the cobwebs to see the state of the bedclothes that had mouldered so long upon his visitor's bed as for the charwoman she had sorrows enough, watching the ages beating upon her frame, to trouble what a mere 30 or 40 years might do to the sheets and blankets. I slept admirably, Signor, Ramon Alonzo said,

Starting point is 00:57:59 with a grace in his bow that is sometimes only learnt, just as the joints and muscles have grown too stiff to achieve it. I rejoice, said the magician. Master, said Ramon Alonzo, would you deign to show me some unconsidered fragment of your wisdom some saw having not to do with the deeper mysteries some trifle some trick of learning perhaps the mere making of gold out of other dross that i may learn to study now and so in time be wise for this said the magician pointing the way with a gesture let us go to the room that is sacred to the art its very dust is made of books i have studied and is indeed more redolent of lore than any dust in this wood, and if echoes die not at all, as some have taught, though others urge finality for all things. The spiders, in its corners, whose ears are attuned to sounds that are lost to ours. Here's still the echoes of my earlier musings, whereby I unraveled mysteries

Starting point is 00:59:04 that are not for the ears of man. There we will speak upon the graver matters. He led, and a young man followed, and again he was amongst beams of age-darkened oak and twisty corridors leading into the gloom, which the shape of the magician before him rendered unnaturally blacker. They came to a black door studded with wooden knobs upon which the magician wrapped and the door opened. They entered, and Ramon Alonzo perceived at once that it was a magician's workroom, not only by the ordinary appliances or instruments of magic, but by the several sheets of gloom that seemed to come down from the roof through the midst of the air across the natural dimness of the room.

Starting point is 00:59:52 The appliances of magic were there in abundance, stuffed crocodiles lying as thick as on lonely mud banks in Africa, dried herbs resembling plants that blossom in wanted fields, yet wearing a look that never was on any flowers of ours, great twinkling jewels out of the heads of toads, huge folios written by masters that had followed the art in China, small parchments with spells upon them in Persian, Indian or Arabic, the horn of a unicorn that had slain its master, rare spices, condiments, and the philosopher's stone. These Ramon Alonzo saw first as he came through the doorway, though what their purposes were, he scarcely wondered, and these were the things that always came to his memory,

Starting point is 01:00:43 whenever in after years he recalled that sinister room. As his eyes became accustomed to the dimness, more and more of the wares and tools of the magical art came looming out of the dusk, while the magician strode to a high-backed chair at a lectern, on which a great book lay open, showing columns of Chinese manuscript. In the high-backed chair, the magician seated him, himself before the Cathayan book and taking up a pen from an unknown wing, he looked at Ramon Alonzo. Now, he said, as though he came newly to the subject, or brought to it new acumen from having

Starting point is 01:01:22 sacked in that chair, what branch of the art do you desire to follow? The making of gold, responded Ramon Alonzo. The formula of all material things have been worked out, said the magician, and they have all been found. to be vanity. Amongst the first whose formula failed before these investigations, revealing mere vanity, was gold. Yet, should you wish to study the art from its rudiments, from the crude transmutation of mere material things, to the serious and weighty matter of transmigration, I am willing to give you certain instruction at first upon the frivolous topic of your choice, and it is not entirely without value, for by observing the changes in material things, we chance sometimes on indications that guide us

Starting point is 01:02:16 in the graver studies. But the whole of the way is long, even as the master's count time. Would you therefore begin from these earliest rudiments? I would, said Ramonle-A-Lonzo. No, then, said he, that my fees are never a material thing. but our dreams, hopes, and delusions, and whatever other great forces control the fortune of nations. Later, I will enumerate them, but while we study the mere transmutation of metals, I will ask no more than that which of all immaterial things

Starting point is 01:02:56 most nearly pertains to matter, at one point actually touching it. My shadow, cried Ramon Alonzo. the magician was irked by his guest's discovery of his fee though he was indeed about to tell him but he had a few more words to say first about the worthlessness of shadows and the sudden disclosure of the point was not in accordance with his plans for conducting a bargain and as many a man will do in such a case he denied that he was about to ask precisely that he soon however came round to it again saying and even so it were little a to ask for my fee which might well be larger were it not for my gratitude to your grandfather for a shadow of necessity shares the doom that overtakes matter and is commoner far than faith if all were known and is of the least account of all immaterial things yet i need it said ramon alonzo for what purpose asked the master of the art i shall need it when i go among the villages he answered or wherever i meet with men learn said the magician that aught that has value is to be treasured on that account and not for the opinion of the vulgar and that which has no value is foolishly desired if its purpose be but to minister to the fickleness of the idle popular eye is my shadow valueless asked romano

Starting point is 01:04:35 utterly said the master why then does your excellency demand it address me rather as your majesty said the magician to gain time rome alonzo apologized with due courtesy and conformed to the correct usage i need it said his majesty because there are those that serve me better when equipped with a shadow than when drifting vapidly in their native void they have no other connection with earth except these shadows i give them and for this purpose i have many shadows which i keep here in a box but you who were born on earth have no need at all of a shadow and lose none of our mundane privileges if you should give it away and for all the wisdom of the magician the young man remained less moved by his well-reasoned arguments than by the grief and garrility of the charwoman so he has had to his shadow and would not part with it, and the more the magician proved its uselessness, the more stubborn he became. And when the magician would not abate his fee, the young man determined to stay and study there, rather than to return home empty-handed, and to bide his time, perhaps to come one day on the secret of transmutation, perhaps to grow so learned through his studies, that he might work out his formula for himself. Therefore, he said,

Starting point is 01:06:05 Are there no other mysteries that I may learn for a different fee? The master answered, There are many mysteries. For what fees? asked Ramon Alonzo. These vary, said the magician, according to the mystery. Your faith, your hope, half your eyesight, some illusion of value. I have many fees, as indeed there are many illusions.

Starting point is 01:06:34 He would not give his faith, nor yet his hope, for that would be nearly as bad and he had ever clung somewhat tenaciously to his illusions as indeed we all do what mystery he asked do you impart for half my eyesight the mystery of reading answered the master now rome alonzo had such eyesight that he could count the points on a stag's head at five hundred paces and deemed half would well suffice him the magician moreover explained that it was not his custom to take that fee in advance, but that the length of his sight would diminish appreciably as he mastered the intricacies of the mystery. This well-suited Ramon Alonzo, for he had ever wondered how the thoughts of men could lie sleeping for ages and folios, and suddenly brighten new minds with the mirth of men's centuries dead, for the good fathers had not taught him this in their school, perhaps fearing,

Starting point is 01:07:37 that they would make their wisdom too common if they recklessly made the laity free of its source. And believing, as many do, that wisdom is only a matter of reading, he thought soon to be on the track of the lore of those philosophers who in former ages transmuted base medals to gold, and so come by what he sought without losing his shadow. Master, said Ramon Alonzo, I pray you teach me that mystery. The magician shut the book.

Starting point is 01:08:09 To read Chinese, he said, I do not teach for this fee, for the Chinese script hides secrets too grave to be learnt at so light a cost. For this fee I teach only to read in the Spanish language. Hereafter, for other fees, Master, the young man said, I am well content. And then, with sonorous voice and magnificent gestures, the magician began to expose, the secrets of reading. One by one he stripped mysteries, laying them bare to his pupil,

Starting point is 01:08:41 and all the while he taught in that grand manner that he had from the elder masters whose lore had been handed down. He taught the use of consonants, the reason of vowels, the way of the downstrokes, and the up, the time for capital letters, commas, and colones, and why the J is dotted, with many another mystery. The first lesson in the gloomy room were well worthy of faithful description, so that every detail of the mystery might be minutely handed down, but the thought comes to me that my reader is necessarily versed in this mystery, and for that reason alone I say no more on this magnificent theme. Suffice it that with all the pomp and dignity, due to this approach to the prime source of learning, the magician began to unfold the mystery of reading, the magician began to unfold the mystery of

Starting point is 01:09:32 reading to the odd and wondering eyes of Ramon Alonzo. And while they taught and learned, they heard outside in the passage the doleful sweeping of that shadowless woman that minded the awful house. End of chapter four. Ramon Alonzo learns a mystery known to the readers. Chapter 5 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Dunsaney. This Libre Vox recording is in the public domain. Read for you by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 5. Ramon Alonzo learns of the box. Before that day had passed, Ramon Alonzo had learned the alphabet. He did not master it in one lesson, yet when the magician ceased all in the midst of his wonders, in order that Ramon Alonzo should have the midday meal, he felt that the pathway was already open that led to

Starting point is 01:10:39 the boundless lands, made gay by the thoughts of the dead. And in those lands, what spells might he not unravel, and amongst them the formula for the making of gold? If the magician ate, he ate secretly, but Ramon Alonzo, going by his bidding to the room in which he had eaten and drunk overnight, found hot meals once more that awaited him. As he entered the room, he heard a small scurry of feet near the far door, but saw a little, nothing. He ate, then guided by an impulse of youth, which is always curious, until it is sure it knows everything, he began to roam through the darknesses of the house in order to find who it was that served those meals. And the further he went, the lower the corridors ran,

Starting point is 01:11:28 till he had to bend low to avoid huge dark beams above him. Sometimes he came on towering doors in the darkness and opened them and found great chambers, wanly lit by such daylight as came through the leaves of the forest, which everywhere were pressed against the windows. In these chambers were tapestried chairs set out for a great assemblage, with ancient glories carved upon their frames and dim magnificences, but the cobwebs went from chair to chair and covered all of them over, and descending in huge draperies from the roof,

Starting point is 01:12:06 cloaked and festooned the splendors that jutted out from the wall. He went from door to door, but found no kitchen, and all his quest was silent but for the sound of his own feet. At last, as he turned back by the wandering corridors, he heard in the distance before him the work of the charwoman. She had ceased her sweeping and was scrubbing on stone. He walked to the sound of the scrubbing, and so found her, the only living thing that he had met since he left the magician.

Starting point is 01:12:40 She was in a passage scrubbing at one stone, upon which, as Ramona Alonso could see, she had often worked before, for it was all worn with scrubbing. There was blood on the stone, but though years of scrubbing had hollowed it, the blood had gone deeper than hollowing, so deep that Ramon Alonzo asked her why she toiled at it. "'It was innocent blood,' she answered. "'The young man did not even ask for that story. "'The house was so full of wonder.

Starting point is 01:13:12 "'He asked instead what he had sought to find. "'Who serves the dinner?' "'Imps,' she said. "'Imps,' said Ramona Lanzo. "'Imps, he catches in the wood,' she said, "'looking up from her work on the floor. "'How does he catch them?' he asked. "'I know not.

Starting point is 01:13:32 she said with his spells like his knot he says they are no use in the wood and so he catches them are there imps in the wood asked romeo lanzo it is full of them she said turning to a more profitable matter he said i am learning a mystery from the master for what price she asked quickly what price only half my eyesight he told her oh your bright eyeside "'She sighed. "'I can see so far,' he said, "'that that is a little matter. "'One must needs pay something for learning. "'But she only looked wistfully at his eyes. "'When I have learned that mystery I can find others for myself,' "'he said cheerfully.

Starting point is 01:14:20 "'You know those jars of dust on his shelf "'with their names in writing upon them? "'I shall be able to read what dust they are.' "'And he would have told her many of the mysteries "'that seemed to lie open to, to him, but she interrupted him when he spoke of the jars, saying, I know nothing of that room. He has put a spell against me across the lintel so that I may not enter. Why, he asked, remembering the cobwebs and the great need of tidying.

Starting point is 01:14:49 He has my shadow, she said, in a box in that room. Your shadow? he said, perturbed by the grief in her voice. I, she said, and he'll have yours there. too. Not he, said Ramon Alonzo. And the light of your eyes, she said sorrowfully. But Ramon Alonzo, who already knew half the alphabet, was far more concerned with the unraveling of new wonders than he was with any price he should have to pay, and he turned from the charwoman's talk with a certain impatience to be once more engaged upon serious things. She sighed and went on with her work on the blood-stained stone.

Starting point is 01:15:34 When Ramon Alonzo returned to the room that no charwoman ever entered, he saw the magician awaiting him, standing beside a book that made light the secrets of reading. Once more the young man toiled at the mystery, and by evening the alphabet was clear to him. That which a day before held twenty-six secrets for him, and was as a barrier to roving thoughts, was now as an open path for them, leading he knew not whither. To him it seemed, as he finally mastered Z, that here was the first and chiefest of mysteries, since it opened away for the living to hear the thoughts of the dead, and enabled the living in their turn to talk to unborn generations. Yet he shrewdly foreboded that if the magicians should spread their power too widely, it might not be well

Starting point is 01:16:26 for the world. With evening, a natural darkness blending with the gloom of the room covered up all the mysteries, and the secrets of reading hid themselves. And with those secrets, the glories of former days withdrew themselves further off, and lurked in dim nooks that they had in the dark of the ages. Then the master of the art bowed, and with a wide sweep of his arm, which both opened the door and indicated the way to it, he showed Ramon Alonzo out and followed and closed the door as magically as he had opened it. They came then once more to the room where the baked meats waited, and once more Ramon Alonzo was seated alone. It seemed as though the master of the art would not permit himself to be seen, at least by Ramon Alonzo, engaged on any work so mundane as that of eating. The young man

Starting point is 01:17:23 expressed his great satisfaction at the wonders already revealed to him. It is but the dew, said the master, of any sprung from your grandfather. Yet the whole art of reading is not compared with the practice of boer-hunting, so I was once assured by that great philosopher. He then withdrew, leaving the young man all alone with his plans. But the more he planned to make gold, the more another plan came jutting into his mind, perpetually pushing away his original purpose. A plan fantastic enough, a sentimental, generous, youthful plan,

Starting point is 01:18:02 no less than a plan to find the magician's box, and open it and get the charwoman's shadow, and give it to her to dance once more at her heels or float away over the buttercups. Yet it was all too vague to be called a plan at all. He had not yet seen the box. He rose then and went out to call, her, but standing in the doorway

Starting point is 01:18:25 remembered he knew not her name. So he went to the blood-stained stone, and she was not there, but nearby he found her pale. A while he wondered, then he went to the pail and kicked it noisily, knowing that folks' fears for their own property are often a potent lure,

Starting point is 01:18:44 and deeming this to be well-nigh all the property the poor old woman had. Soon she came running. My pail! she said, clasping her hands. How shall I find your shadow to give it back to you? He said. My shadow.

Starting point is 01:19:01 It is in a box. And she uttered the word box as though boxes never opened and anything put in a box must remain forever. Where is the key? He asked. The key? She said, bewildered by such a question. It opens to no key.

Starting point is 01:19:20 She said this so decisively that Ramona-Lonzo felt he got no further here, but must bide his time till some opportunity should come to that dark house. Meanwhile, he must know her name, and asked her this. Docweed, she said. Docweed, he answered, did your godparents call you that? They were ill-disposed toward your parents. My god-parents, she cried. Poor innocent souls, they did not call me that. My godparents? No, they called me by a young and lovely name. They gave me one of the earliest names of spring. But that was long ago. I am Docweed now. Who calls you Docweed? he asked. He does, she said. But it is not your name. He is the master here.

Starting point is 01:20:13 But what is your own name, he asked. It was a young name, she said. I will call you by. it is no use now but what name did your godparents give you he asked again they called me anemone she said anemone he said i will get your shadow it is deep in a box she wailed shadowless then she walked away from the lantern that he had brought from its hook on the wall and left on the floor near her pale and he began to contact that it was easier to utter his gallant confident words than to overcome the secrets of that dark house. Then he made many plans, which one by one appeared to be unavailing, and he was driven again to await the coming of opportunity. As he made and discarded his plans, he ascended the ancient stairway of stone and branches, and so came to his room. Quint tidying was possible in such a room had been done.

Starting point is 01:21:18 The great cobweb had been taken away from the bed, and the bedclothes had been smoothed as far as was possible when sheets and blankets had mouldered into one. But the cobwebs amongst the curtains had not been touched, for if these had been torn away, the curtains would have come with them. The great rents, however, were partly filled with light flowers. More than this, the remnant of fabric could not have supported. He found a jug and basin of crockery with clear spring water, in the jug, and knew that Dockweed, who had once been anemone, had drawn it for him in the cool of the wood. He washed with such washing as was customary near the clothes of the golden age, then with loosened clothes lay down on the mouldering bed. He did not extinguish the lantern, because the candle in it

Starting point is 01:22:10 was down to its last half inch. Instead, he watched the shadows dancing with every draft, and making huge bold leaps when the wick fell down and the flame was fluttering over a pool of Greece. He watched their grace, their gaiety, and their freedom and thought of anemone's shadow, forlorn in the dark of the box. Surprisingly soon, the blackbirds called through the wood, and Ramona Lanzo saw that the night had passed. That day, as Ramona Lanzo sat at his work, his mind was full of his plans to rescue the shadow.

Starting point is 01:22:45 yet he worked hard nonetheless, for he thought it to be a better match for the powers of the magician when he knew at least one of his mysteries. He felt at first a momentary compunction at thus arming himself with one of his adversary's weapons, but considered that the master was getting his price. Indeed, the gloomy room seemed unmistakably lighter than it had been the day before, and the thought came to Ramon Alonzo that this slight brightness, if brightness it were, might be some of the light that was gone from his own eyes, with which the magician might be lighting his room. Yet not for this brightness could he see among the dim shapes on the floor, under cobwebs, behind the crocodiles, any sign of such a box as seemed likely to hold a shadow.

Starting point is 01:23:35 So he bided his time and learned the mystery all day, and the master taught him well. That day he sought out the charwoman again, who was scrote. scrubbing still at the stone. Anemone, he said, how shall I know the box in which he has hidden your shadow? It is long and thin, she said. Then she shook her head and went on with the scrubbing, for she despaired of him ever finding her shadow. He would not consult her despair, but went away to build plan after plan of his own.

Starting point is 01:24:09 And next day he discerned more closely, but even if the room were again a little brighter, he could not distinguish such a box, as she said, amongst the lumber that ran all around the wainscote. The gloom on the floor was still too thick, and there were too many crocodiles. He worked hard during those days, and soon was able to read the short words that had only one syllable, and still he worked on to unravel the whole of that mystery. The lesser wonders gradually became clear to him from things. things the magician said or from what he learned from anemone. He learned how his food was baked by imps at a fire in the wood, little creatures of two feet high that could gamble and jump

Starting point is 01:24:54 prodigiously, and he knew how the Hindu chants that haunted the air above the magician's house had been attracted from India, a wonder signifying little to us who can hear those chants in Europe at the very moment. Men sing them upon the Ganges. But curiously, at that time, even though it took many years to lure them from India. So that all the songs that Ramona Lanzo heard had been sung in youth by folk now with age, or by men and women long gathered to Indian tombs. He learned that the master's gratitude to his grandfather was genuine, and yet he thought he taught him the mystery of reading, not so much from gratitude as from a desire to lure him

Starting point is 01:25:40 to further studies, and so to further fees, luring him on and on till he got his shadow. And so the days went by, and now to read the words of only one syllable, needed no more than a glance, while the many-syllabled words gave up their mysteries after little more than a brief examination, till it seemed to Ramonelonzo that the past and the dead no longer held secrets from him. in such a mood he sought avidly for writing beyond the big black script in the master's book for he yearned to solve his own mysteries but book there was none in the house outside the gloomy room that was sacred to magic and then one day as he worked at some great four-syllabled word there came a timid knock on the door to the wood and the master passing out of his sacred room like a great black shadow driven along dim walls by a dr came with long strides to his door. And there was one Peter, who worked in the garden of the tower and rocky forest,

Starting point is 01:26:47 sweeping the leaves in autumn and trimming the hedge in spring, with a letter for Ramon Alonzo from his father. And with stammered apologies and even tears, for thus disturbing his door, he handed the parchment at arm's length to the magician. End of Chapter 5. Ramon Alonzo learns of the box Chapter 6 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Duncaney

Starting point is 01:27:19 This Librevox recording is in the public domain Read by Michelle Frye, Batonridge, Louisiana Chapter 6 There is Talk of Golveriz To the tower beside the forest Rumour came seldom, for it was the last house that stood in the open lands on the one side the forest cut it off entirely from converse with other folk, on the other only the

Starting point is 01:27:46 the strongest rumors that blew over the fields of men ever came so far as the tower. But many rumors from over the fields were reaching the tower now, and every one of them brought the name of Golvarez. Golvarez was a small squire of meager lands, twelve miles away from the tower, where he dwelt in a rude castle and kept two men at all. arms. They knew his name at the tower and knew that his pigs came sometimes to market at Arragona, and that their price was good for the pigs of Gulliveres were noted. But now they heard that the Duke of Shadow Valley, being upon a journey, would rest a night at his castle at

Starting point is 01:28:28 Gauverers. Nor did this rumor fade, as such often did that came so far over the fields, but others came to verify it. They told how the Duke had sent messengers to Gulliver praying him to receive him in ten days' time, when he would pass that way on his homeward journey. This was that very potent Magnifico, the second Duke of Shadow Valley, of whose illustrious father some tale was told in the Chronicles of Rodriguez. He ruled over all those leafy lands that of late were held by his father, and had amongst many honors the perpetual right to stop any bullfight in Spain, whilst he went to his seat if it should be his pleasure to arrive late and this he did by merely holding up his left hand after one of his men at arms had sounded a call upon a small trumpet so rare a privilege he exercised seldom but it was his undoubted right and that of his heirs after him forever the news that so serene a prince was to visit galvarez spread over the countryside as fast as gossips could tell it and came like the final ripple of a spent

Starting point is 01:29:41 flood, lapping at its last field, to the walls of the tower that stood by the rocky forest. Gonzalvo, said the lady of the tower, addressing her lord, it is surely time that Signor Gauveres married. Gauveres, he said. He is past thirty-five, she answered. But his castle is small and dark, said he, and much of it bare rock, who would live there with him. the duke of shadow valley she said is to stay with him on a visit and so said everyone who spoke of gulvarez and many spoke of him now who had thought little about him hitherto the lord of the tower and rocky forest reflected one silent moment but he is a greedy man he said and will demand a dowry such as a man cannot give it is not for us to punish his greed she said that is a greedy man he said that is not for us to punish his greed she said those who cannot pay his dowry must go without him but the coffer he explained that i have set apart for mirandala's dowry is empty i saw it only lately romano lanzo will fill it for us she answered with as much faith in her husband's scheme as he himself had had when it was new to him and her hopefulness set him pondering as to whether all was wholly well with his scheme and in the end of his pondering although he said nothing to her

Starting point is 01:31:08 he decided that the time was come to renew his exhortations to his son. For this purpose he sent Peter from the garden, with a message to a certain Father Joseph, who dwelt not far away, asking him to come to the tower. For he needed Father Joseph in order to write a letter to Ramon Alonzo, not deeming this to be a suitable occasion on which to employ his own skill with the pen, the art of which he had learned a long while ago. And before Father Joseph came, he called Miranda, and spoke with her in the same room as that in which he had had the long talk with his son, the room on the walls of which he hung his boar spears.

Starting point is 01:31:52 Mirandola, he said, You must surely one day marry, and are now well past fifteen. And it not seldom happens that those that marry not when they may come soon to a time when none will marry them, so that they are spinsters all their days. what now think you of our neighbor galvarez whom some have called handsome a look like one of those flashes from storms too far for thunder lit for one moment in mirandela's eyes then she smiled again "'Go Verrez,' she said to her father. "'Yes,' he said. "'He tends a little, perhaps, towards avarice, "'for he thought he had seen the look in his daughter's eyes. "'But there are many worse sins than that,

Starting point is 01:32:38 "'many worse, if it be a sin at all, "'which is by no means clear, "'but I will ask Father Joseph about that for you. "'I will ask him at once. "'For myself, I believe it to be no sin, but a fault. "'But we shall ask, we shall ask. as you will she said you like him then said her father he is not ill to look on two women not long since have called him handsome and he is a friend of the duke of shadow valley i like him not yet she said but happily if he come yes said he he shall come to visit us if he come with his friend said she we cannot ask that he said in gentle reproof he could not bring the duke to visit us

Starting point is 01:33:27 then he is not his friend said mirandela thus lightly was brushed away the claim of galvarez to the excited interest of all the neighbourhood the lord of the lord of the tower held up his hand to check her hasty utterance while he thought of appropriate words with which to reprove her error. And when he found no suitable words at all, with which to show his daughter she was mistaken, and yet felt the need to speak, he said that he would consult Golvarez on this, which he did not intend to say. And afterwards, conferring with his wife, they did not find between them a ready reason for refusing this curious whim of their dark-haired daughter, and in the end they decided to humor her, judging it best to do so at such a time, though both of them feared the arrival, if indeed he should ever come, of that dread magnifico and illustrious prince, the serene and potent Duke of Shadow Valley. then Father Joseph came. He had walked scarce a mile, but he had hurried to do the Lord of the Tower's bidding, and being now slender no longer, he panted heavily, and his tonsure shone warm and damp so that there was a

Starting point is 01:34:41 light about it. He held that before all else are the things of the Spirit, and in many ways he sought their triumph on earth, and for this purpose was ever swift to do the behests of the Lord of the Tower, who in that small neighborhood at the edge of the forest had such power as is permitted on earth, which Father Joseph hoped to turn towards heavenly uses. Therefore he came running. In what can I serve you? he said. The Lord of the Tower motioned him to a chair. Long ago, he said, I learned the art of writing in case that the occasion should ever arise, on which it should be needful to use the pen. It is, indeed a noble art, said Father Joseph, you did well to acquaint yourself with it.

Starting point is 01:35:29 The occasion, however, said the other, did not arise. My pen hath therefore had but little practice, save for such strokes as I may have sometimes made, in idleness, to see the ink run. In short, for want of this practice, my manner of writing is slow, while you, putting your pen daily to many sacred uses, have a speed with it that is no doubt swift as thought. tis but a poor pen and an aged hand said father joseph but such as it is now i have need of a letter to be written in haste continued the lord of the tower for which i deemed your pen to be suited beyond the pins of any and if you will write what i shall say the work will be speedily accomplished gladly will i answered father joseph his breath already beginning to come more easily from the rest he had had in the chair gladly will i answered father joseph his breath already beginning to come more easily from the rest he had had in the chair gladly will I, and he brought forward an ink-horn that hung at his girdle, and drew from under his robe a roll of parchment that was curled round a plume, for he had all these things upon him, and as soon as the

Starting point is 01:36:36 lord of the tower had lent him a knife, he had shaped the end of the quill for a pen in a moment, and pared it, and all was ready. These things he took to a table and dipped the pen, and was readier to write than Gonzalvo was to think. For there was this difficulty about the letter that he desired to send to his son. He wished to exhort him to continue his studies with a redoubled vigor, such a message as Father Joseph would smile to hear, glowing for some while after with an inner satisfaction. But then again those studies were nothing less than the black art, and the produce of them no ordinary lucre, but a dross that might well seem to Father Joseph to come hot from the hands of Satan.

Starting point is 01:37:23 How was he to ask that some of this dross should be sent full soon for the righteous purpose of settling his daughter comfortably in the holy bonds of wedlock, without shocking the good man by too open a reference to the method of its manufacture? It caused him some moments of thought, and nigh puzzled him altogether. Then he began, thus, and a pen of Father Joseph scurried behind his words. My dear son, I trust that you apply yourself

Starting point is 01:37:54 diligently to your tasks, and that you are already well advanced in your studies, and in especial in that study which I most commended to you. That coffer which I showed you the day before you left is in no better state than it was then.

Starting point is 01:38:10 We urgently require somewhat that will cover the satin lining, which is in such ill repair. Your studies will have acquainted you with what material is best suited for this purpose, and you will be able to acquire some of it more easily than we, and to send us sufficient. We have a neighbor shortly coming to visit us, and he will doubtless see the coffer, and should he see the satin lining in its present state of ill repair, it would shame us and Mirandala. Hasten, therefore, to send us some of that material that will best cover it,

Starting point is 01:38:45 and the covering will need to be thick for this neighbor has shrewd eyes your mother sends her love and mirandala your loving father gonsalvo of the tower and rocky forest what studies does your worthy son pursue said father joseph he is studying to take his proper place said gonsalvo learning to be a man he is being taught such things as concern his sphere in life fitting himself for such resists responsibilities as will fall on him, learning to take an interest in the proper things, studying to concern himself with the things that matter. I apprehend, said Father Joseph. But still the Lord of the Tower felt that more phrases were required of him, and he poured out all those he knew, which, although having no meaning, could yet be introduced into conversation. There were far fewer of them then than there are now, so that he soon came to an end of them. But then he quoted proverbs and popular sayings and such circumlocution as had come down to him

Starting point is 01:39:52 after serving various needs in former ages. I apprehend, said Father Joseph. Then the Lord of the Tower took the parchment and sealed it up with his seal, and Father Joseph sat there rubicund, affable, blinking, a study for anything rather than thought. yet years of familiarity with incomplete confessions had given him a knack with the loose ends of parts of stories that enabled him to unravel them almost without thinking this he had done already with the story now before him but he desired to be sure for he was a careful man i have myself he said some material that might line a coffer a very antique leather or some damask that no no said the Lord of the Tower, I should not think of depriving you of these fair things. And Father Joseph knew from his haste to refuse this offer,

Starting point is 01:40:51 and his eagerness to send the letter quickly, that he had indeed unraveled the story of Ramon Alonzo. Behind that beneficent smile that lingered after his speaking, he pondered somewhat thus, so far as thoughts may be overtaken by words. The black art, an evil matter. the earning of gold by dark means, perhaps even the making of it. Let us see to it that it be put to righteous uses, so that it be not entirely evil, both end and origin. And he began to plan

Starting point is 01:41:25 uses for some of the gold that Ramona Lanzo should so sinfully earn, blessed and holy uses, so that not all should be evil about this wicked work, but that good should manifestly arise from it, like the flower blooming in April above the dark of the thorn, and the powers of darkness should see and be brought to shameful conclusion. End of Chapter 6. There is Talk of Galvarez. Chapter 7 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Duncini. This Librevox recording is in the public domain, read for you by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Starting point is 01:42:10 Chapter 7 Ramon Alonzo follows the art So fast the magician came striding back to his room with the letter he had from Peter that Ramon Alonzo's eye had scarce time to rove and had not found the long thin box for which it began to seek. One thought alone to rescue the charwoman's shadow

Starting point is 01:42:33 was filling his generous young mind when the magician gave him the letter that came from his father. The letter he read, alone, though the magician proffered his aid, but Ramon Alonzo was eager to use his new learning. The magician, therefore, watched his face as he read, and learned thereby as much of the letter as Father Joseph had guessed of its purpose, for the thoughts of men were much the concern of them both. When Ramon Alonzo had read the letter, he sighed. Farewell, he thought, to his shadow.

Starting point is 01:43:07 He began to think of it as he had never thought before. a mood came on him such as comes on us sometimes at sunset when shadows are many and long yet we never think of shadows as he then thought of his wistful pictures of the slender intangible thing were brooding in his mind he too was learning how one may love one's shadow such fancies as we may sometimes have for swallows when we see them gathering to leave us such feelings as men may have for far-off cliffs of a native land they are losing. Such longings as schoolboys have for home on the last day of holidays. All these Ramona Lonzo felt for the first time for his shadow. And then he thought of his sword and reflected that it could not be for him as it was for that poor old woman. Men had not the need, as women had, for the protection of common things that the vulgar set store by. If any would not speak to him because he had lost his

Starting point is 01:44:10 shadow, the matter could be argued courteously with the sword, and as for stones, he esteemed that none would dare to throw them, nor he care if they threw. So he looked up at the magician, and with some echo of sorrow, touching his tones, he said, Master, I fain would learn the making of gold. The master glanced at the magic book for a moment refreshing his memory. The fee is your shadow, he said. and once more Ramon Alonzo thought of the grace of his shadow and the years they had been together and he remembered its lightness, its pranks, its patient followings. He thought of long journeys together, returning at close of day, he growing rearier at every step, and the shadows stronger and stronger. He hesitated, and the magician saw him. Then to close his finger and thumb upon that young shadow, and add it to the band,

Starting point is 01:45:10 of which he was master the master of the art made a sudden concession and so closed the bargain out of the gratitude i bared to your grandfather he said i will give you a false one to wear at your heels in its place one shadow were as good as another thought rome alonzo unless it had any evil or sinister shape will it even be as mine said he i will shape it exactly so as artists make their pictures. It was enough. Who would not have made such a bargain? How could he have guessed the truth of that duplicate shadow? Before I received my fee, said the magician, I will make the copy.

Starting point is 01:45:56 Stand now in the light of the window that a copy may be exact. And Ramon Alonzo stood where he was told. Then the master, with eyes intent on the young man's shadow, cut a copy from out of the gloom that hung in the air, using a blade that he held between finger and thumb, too tiny for earthly uses, while with his left hand, by tense signs and beckonings, he held Ramona Lanzo rigid so that his shadow might make no stir. Then he cut from the gloom a shadow so like to the human one that when he carefully laid it out on the floor, side by side with the true one,

Starting point is 01:46:35 none could have guessed which was which, except that the new one's heels, as yet, were attached to nothing mortal. A space of light, like the shape of Ramona Lanzo, hung for a while in the dark of the air, from which the shadow was cut. Then the gloom fell gradually in on it. "'See,' said the magician, pointing to the two shadows, and the young man turned his head, certainly no one that wished to part with his shadow could have desired a better copy. The likeness, said Ramon Alonzo, is admirable. Then the magician went to the young man's heels and severed his shadow, with the same curious instrument with which he had cut the other out of the gloom,

Starting point is 01:47:18 and holding it tight in one hand, he picked up the copy in the other and placed it nearer, and as soon as the false shadow came near Ramonzo's heels, it ran to them. He moved from his place and the false shadow moved with him. There was no appreciable change. And yet he had paid his fee to the magician and was about to receive that learning that had been the goal of so many philosophers. And now the magician, still holding the shadow tight, leaned over a crocodile and after a moment's rummaging, picked up a long thin box from the dark of the cobwebs. by its great length and narrowness and lightness for the magician lifted it easily with one hand Ramona Lanzo knew it for the shadow box. It was padlocked, but in the padlock was no keyhole. He watched the master go to his lectern and put down the box and turn over several pages of the great Cathayan book.

Starting point is 01:48:17 He saw upon which page his eye rested, a page with one spell upon it in three black Cathayan characters. then the master closed the book and set a spell to the padlock, but in so low a voice that Ramona Lanzo heard never a word. The padlock opened, the master raised the lid, and in went his shadow. For a moment the young man saw in the box a mass of wriggling grayness, then the lid shut down and the keyless padlock snapped. Then the master took down from a shelf the philosopher's stone,

Starting point is 01:48:51 an object no larger than a small bird, and of texture and color similar to what we call fireclay, but of a slightly yellower tint. Its shape resembled the shape of the lumps of pumice we use. This he took to his lectern and put down beside the book, but before lecturing upon its use, he explained to Ramona Lanzo that many had sought it as the world knew, and many had found it as the world knew not. With this, the first, the first, philosophers made gold by touching certain metals, upon which he would afterward discourse in a certain manner which he would later explain. And when they had done with the gold, they usually buried it in the extremes of Africa, or in the continent that there was to the south, or in other

Starting point is 01:49:40 places beyond the possessions of Spain, so that the object of their experiments should not corrupt men. Then he discoursed on the power of gold to corrupt the unlearned, but this Ramon Alonzo had already studied in the school of the good fathers, so he let his thoughts roam far from the gloomy house, whither his body had not gone, since he first had entered it so many days ago. He thought of the village of Aragona, its flowers, its merry houses, the trees with their deep-leaved branches, bending over its happy lanes, and its simple, mortal people following their earthly callings, so that soon he had planned to see the world again, with its sunlight, movement, and voices, of which he had only known for some days now, through the black letters of books.

Starting point is 01:50:30 As the magician ended his lecture on the corrupting power of gold, the young man, through force of habit, murmured amen. The magician stepped sideways, and made swift as a parry, a sign to guard himself that was not the sign of the cross. And then Ramona Lanzo felt again that confusion that had troubled him once when he inadvertently swore, while the bishop of Salmonica rode near on his mule. The bishop had not heard him, and all had been well. The brief silence was broken by the master of the art, who said, Tomorrow, I will discourse on those metals, whose structure most nearly resembling the structure of gold,

Starting point is 01:51:13 are therefore most adaptable to the changes of transmutation. master said rome alonzo i pray you give me a half a holiday for what purpose to see the world said romeonzo as far as aragona there is nothing replied the magician to be learned in the world that is not taught in this house moreover there is no error in this wood but fare beyond it and you shall meet much error to the confusion of true learning all error that i meet beyond the wood i hope to correct by your teaching said romeonzo the ancient mind of the magician perpetually refreshed through the ages and stored with wisdom that few have time to acquire perceived the ring of mere flattery in this statement and yet he was not immune from this earthly seduction he let rimonelanzo go go in the morning he said and be back before the sun is west restoring. Ramon Alonzo rejoiced, but the magician only cared that he had got the young man's shadow, for his power was chiefly overshadowy things, and he lusted for shadows, as others lust for the substance, having learned by ages of learning the utter vanity of substantial

Starting point is 01:52:35 things, and he counted the secret of gold well yielded up in exchange for a shadow, for he knew how men set their hearts and hopes on gold, and how it failed. them, and what well that these hopes could not be built on a shadow. And Ramon Alonzo went, light of heart, to find the charwoman to let her see how little, as he supposed, he had lost by giving away his shadow. The magician returned to his box and took all his shadows out, and enjoyed amongst them a while that absolute power that ancient monarchs had, who had no laws to control them or hostile neighbors to fear.

Starting point is 01:53:14 and while the magician was reveling in his power in the quiet and gloom of his room, Ramona Lanzo, guided by his more human sympathies, was telling the charwoman that he had seen the shadow box and knew where it lay in the cobwebs behind a crocodile and hoped somehow to coax it open and rescue her shadow. While she sighed and shook her head, he walked often up and down before a window so that she saw the shadow and could see she never suspected the price he had paid for the sight he had had of the shadow box. And he, as he saw that perfect copy running so nimbly behind him, believed with the blindness of youth that he had paid nothing. End of Chapter 7, Ramona Lonzo follows the art.

Starting point is 01:54:10 Chapter 8 of the Charo Woman's Shadow by Lord Dunsaney. This Labor Fox recording is in the public domain, Read by Michelle Fry, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 8, Ramona Lanzo shares the idleness of the maidens of Arragona. Next morning, Ramon Alonzo descended blithely the steps of timber and stone, and soon he was listening to the magician's lecture with his thoughts away in the village of Arragona. The magician explained that there was but one element, of which all material things were composed, but that the fragments of this element that made all matter were variously and diversely knit together.

Starting point is 01:54:54 When these elemental fragments were closely associated, he explained that their bulk was heavy and often smooth, when more loosely knit, the material they formed was lighter and of a rougher surface. To change, therefore, the mere arrangement of its fragments was to change one metal to another, at least in the estimation of the vulgar, who knew not that there was but one element, and that no true change was possible, all matter being only the varying aspects of an element eternally unchangeable. Even water was made of it, and even air. Hence, said the master of the art, we see the superiority of spiritual things, which are of a vast multiplicity, while matter is but one. Moreover, spirits have much control over matter, while matter has neither the will

Starting point is 01:55:47 nor knowledge nor power to affect one spirit, even though it may chance upon a journey, to come close to a whole world. And the magician continued his theme so that never was the cause of the spirit so ably pleaded, nor matter so humbled, nor all its pretensions more completely exposed. But Ramonzo's daydreams were in arborers of Aragona,

Starting point is 01:56:12 and they did not return thence, until the magician looking out carefully at the height of the sun said, Now you may go down to the haunts of error until the sun is westering. And now this lesson concludes. Be sure that you have learned a greater wisdom in learning the oneness of matter than is to be found in the changing of its manifestation out of its leaden form to that form which is held in greater esteem by the vulgar. once he warned the young man against lateness who then sped blithely away passing out through the old green door through which he had come only once and seeming to see in his shadow a sprightly merriiness that was as eager as he to be out in the summer morning away from the gloom of the house the young man and the still younger shadow went laughing and leaping together down the slope and soon between trunks of the trees came glimpses of aragona

Starting point is 01:57:12 a village sunning itself in the merry glint of the golden Spanish air. Blyth in that glittering air as they came from the wood, the shadow revelled over the flowers and grass, and felt the soft touch of small leaves that it had not known before. It was in the afternoon that they came to Aragona, but a little before the hour at which the master had made the shadow, it was nearly one day old. Ramona Lanzo turned then and looked at it,

Starting point is 01:57:42 carefully, to see if it had paled in 23 hours, it was as strong a gray as ever. Untroubled then by any lingering anxiety, he strode manfully into the village, and his shadow strode beside him. He glanced at once or twice to see that it was still there, until finally reassured, he forgot it entirely. And soon he saw a gathering of maidens who had come out to be married together, lest there should be a hush in the little street while all the men were working in the fields. They laughed when they saw him come by the way from the wood, for so few came that way. He halted a little way from them, and doffed his hat, and the blue plume floated from it, large and long, and they all laughed again.

Starting point is 01:58:29 "'Who are you?' said one, and laughed to hear herself speak out thus to a stranger. Don Ramon Alonzo of the Tower and Rocky Forest, he answered simply. That's over there, said one, but you come from the wood. I am studying there with a learned man, he said. The saints defend us, cried another. There's no learned man in the wood. You know the wood, signorita? he asked. The saints forbid, she said.

Starting point is 01:58:59 None goes to the wood. There may be aught there, but there's no learned man. and at a look of alarm that he saw on their faces he added his house is beyond the wood upon the other side and the fear went from their faces and they were merry again long after he confessed to father joseph that he had made this statement that fell short of the truth or to be exact went over it and father joseph put the matter away with a wave of the hand and the words a geographical error he had heavy work to do that day giving absolution for traffic with the black art. And then one or two called out to him, What do you study? The different branches of learning, said Ramonelonzo.

Starting point is 01:59:45 And then they all cried out such questions as, What is three times 27? What is nine times 90? Can you divide 180 by seven? That is arithmetic, answered Ramon Alonzo. And they were a little awed by his learning, though they did not cease to laugh. then he sought to make some remark that would be pleasing to them and many a happy phrase came fast to his mind and yet he said none of them for there were so many maidens and if they should all laugh together he feared for his tender phrases which were such as should have been said softly at evening when all voices were low and laughter has all been hushed by the rise of a huge moon instead he asked them some question as to what they did without even wishing to

Starting point is 02:00:33 an answer. We're watching for strangers, said the tallest. Why? he asked, for she stood there waiting for him to speak. For our amusement, she said. There was no evading their laughter. But when they had laughed enough, they turned again to their former occupation, which had been to watch a beetle that crawled on the road, leaving tracks on the thick white dust, and they let Ramon Alonzo watch it with them, for during the ordeal of laughter, not one of those frivolous eyes but had been watching him shrewdly, and now he was judged and favorably. Had they been less frivolous, even very learned, had they worn robes and wigs, had they called evidence and employed counsel, and taken days a week's instead of moments, that judgment would not have been wiser.

Starting point is 02:01:23 Bells were heard now and then, high over them, their echoes lingering drowsily. Hawks rested on the heavy summer air, bright insects shone in it, the idleness that charmed those southern lands and blessed the golden age, was theirs to tar with, and they let the young man share it. When the novelty of the beetle and his tracks was lost, they turned to other interests, and when they wearied of these they changed again, following novelty yet. And so the afternoon wore on, and the sun went slanting over their happy idleness,

Starting point is 02:01:58 when Ramona Lanzo suddenly saw that it soon would be westering, and all at once remembered the warning of the magician. So he made swift farewells, meeting laughing words with words as light as them, and strode away towards the wood. A glance at his shadow seemed to show that it was not so late as he feared, and then he came into the shade of the trees. To find the house in the wood was not easy, even though he knew the way. the closer he got the harder it seemed to become.

Starting point is 02:02:30 And when he knew that he was within a few paces of it, he could see no sign of any house at all. Then he stepped round the trunk of an oak tree, and there it was. The green door opened to him, and, walking into the house, he soon saw the darker form of the magician standing amongst the dimness.

Starting point is 02:02:50 You are late, said the master of the art. Ramon Alonzo made courteous apologies. Did anything happen? asked the magician. No, said the young man wonderingly. It is well, said the magician. To what had the master referred? He pondered Ramon Alonzo. What should have happened?

Starting point is 02:03:11 Throughout his supper he wondered. Then he drank of that magical wine which so illumined the mind in the brief while of its power, but the wine only filled him with fear of the strange new shadow. When the fear faded, it rapidly did, he had one more matter to ponder, for he had promised that band of maidens that he would join them again in two days' time, for some purpose that they had named, too trivial for record. He was pondering some way of asking his majesty for leave to go once more to the frivolous fields

Starting point is 02:03:45 that lay beyond the wood, and looking for reasons for his request that might not appear too flippant when exposed to the scrutiny of the magical wisdom that the master of the art had gleaned from the ages. And, as he pondered, night came down on the wood, and the unnatural gloom of the house grew naturally deeper. He would have found the charwoman then to gladden her with the talk of his gay outing and tales of the frivolous fields and news of her, Aragona, but he knew not where she was. Whatever room she frequented lay beyond his explorations. Then it was bedtime for him, and soon he was asleep in his spidery room, dreaming of Aragona, and in all dreamland he saw not that band of maidens with whom he had toyed in the golden afternoon, but always only a face far fairer than theirs,

Starting point is 02:04:38 which he had never seen before, and yet knew with the knowledge of dreams to be the face of the charwoman. End of Chapter 8. Ramona Lanzo shares the idleness of the maidens of Aragona. Chapter 9 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Danceny. This Librevox recording is in the public domain, read for you by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 9, The Technique of Alchemy In the Glittering Morning that came even to that wood through layers and layers of leafiness, Ramona Lanzo arose, and first he found the charwoman at work where she

Starting point is 02:05:27 mostly worked, on that deep-stained stone. Anemonee, he said, I have been to Aragona. Ah, Arragona, she answered wistfully, was it very fair? And he spoke of its beauty, resting amongst the lanes and arbers and the wide plains dreaming around it, lit with a myriad flowers, and its spires rising above the trees and the houses, taking the sunlight direct from the face of the sun, like planets out in ether. He spoke of the gladdening voices of its bells, like merriment amongst the band of grave old men, wandering through summer air. It was not hard to praise Aragona's beauty. And then he told her such names as he had heard. of the folk that dwelt in the village and little tales of some of the older ones that he had got from the maiden's prattle but to all this she shook her head mournfully and would hear no more of the lanes and the arborers

Starting point is 02:06:28 so he told of these and the pomegranate groves but even then there often came over her that mournful look again and she drooped her head and murmured changed all changed only when he spoke of the hills far off and of the tiny valley of the stream that tinkled through aragona did content descend on her like an old priest's blessing given without stretched hands on some serene evening as she listened beside her pale overful of a car calm joy. And when he saw her face as she knelt beside her work, sitting back on her heels, arms limp, hands lightly folded, listening with quiet rapture to every word that he told of the old Aragona that lived in her ancient memories, he determined that she should go to her village again and should take a shadow to show in the face of all men. So he said, I will get you a shadow, the master shall make you a false one he had youth's confidence that the magician would do this for him as soon as he asked it and if not he should do it because of his grandfather who taught him boer hunting but she cried out a false shadow that is of no avail a mere piece of darkness he has my own good shadow of what use are his strips of gloom and all the while his own shadow lay full on the floor beside her as good a shadow as any man

Starting point is 02:07:54 He smiled quietly and said nothing. Then the young man hastened away to the room that was sacred to magic, for he knew the magician awaited him. And the first thing he said when he reached it and saw the blacker mass of the magician out-darkening the gloom of the room was, Master, will you make me a shadow for me to give to the charwoman? What should she do with a shadow? he asked.

Starting point is 02:08:20 I know not, said Ramon Alonzo, but I would give her one. Idleness comes of such gifts, the magician replied. She will go to the villages with it, and flaunt it there amongst common mundane things. It will lead her towards all that is earthly, for what is commoner and more vain than a shadow. The young man knew not how to answer this.

Starting point is 02:08:45 I would give her a present, he said, of some such trifle. Broaches and earthly gods are for these uses, replied the master, but the wisdom I have drawn from so many ages is not for such as her. I pray you give it to me, said Ramon Alonzo, for the sake of what my grandfather taught you of boar-hunting. The teaching that I had from that great philosopher,

Starting point is 02:09:10 said the magician, is not to be mentioned beside the vanity of the charwoman's shadow. Yet, since you have invoked that potent, honored name, I will make the shadow you seek. bid her therefore come and stand before my door that i may copy her shadow even as artists do at once romano lanzo left the room that was sacred to magic to bring the good news to the charwoman and found her still at that stone he will make you a shadow he cried a fine new shadow but none of his eagerness found any reflection in her wan-worn face and she only repeated with sorrowful scorn a piece of a piece of her of common darkness. I know his strips of gloom. Then said Ramon Alonzo, is my shadow common darkness? Is my shadow mere gloom? And he pointed

Starting point is 02:10:04 towards it lying beside her pale. Yours? She cried. No, yours is a proper shadow. A fine, lithe shadow, beautiful, glossy and young. A good, sleek shadow. A joy to the wild grasses. "'I, that is a shadow. God blesses there are shadows still in the world.' And he laughed to hear her. "'Then this shadow of mine,' he said gaily, "'is no more than what you shall have. "'He made it.' "'He made it!' she cried out, all with a sudden gasp.

Starting point is 02:10:38 "'Yes, he laughed. He made it two days ago. "'And you've seen it many times and never knew till I told you.' "'Oh, your shadow!' she wound, and I warn you. Your sweet young shadow in his detestable box. Oh, your gray slender shadow. And I warned you. I warned you.

Starting point is 02:11:05 Oh, why did you do it? I warned you. So proper a shadow. And now it drifts about beyond the world. Or wherever he sends it when he takes it out of his box. doing his heathen errands and hobnobbing with demons. But this shadow, he said, pointing to the one that lay now at his heels, a little pale in that house, but gray enough, as he knew, in the sunlight and on the grasses.

Starting point is 02:11:36 Is not this shadow slender and gray enough? You have just said so. I did not know. I did not know. She wailed. Is any shadow better? he asked. But she was weeping, all bent up by her pale. He waited, and still she wept. Come, he said, the master will make you a shadow. But she only shook her head and continued weeping. And when he saw that, for whatever reason, she was weeping over his shadow, and that nothing he said could solace her, he left at last with the shadow that only made her weep. As he entered the room again that was sacred to magic,

Starting point is 02:12:17 he saw the magician standing all in the midst of the gloom. She will not come, said the young man, and somewhat hastily the master of the art passed from that topic. We will then examine, he said, the differences in the kinship of various metals with gold in order that we may choose those that with least disturbance can be transmuted to that arrangement of the element, which forms the rarer metal.

Starting point is 02:12:45 and this, as all men know, is accomplished by means of the philosopher's stone, in the proper handling of which I will instruct you tomorrow, together with all spells that pertain to it, for there is a special dictology or study of spells belonging only to the use of this stone. He then lay on his lectern in view of Ramon Alonzo several angular pieces of metals of different kinds of a convenience size for handling. About these, he lectured with all that volume of knowledge that in his long time on Earth, he had learned concerning the rocks that compose our planet. The arrangement of the

Starting point is 02:13:28 element, he said, is most near in lead to that which it takes in forming the structure of gold. And this arrangement, the fitting together of particle into particle, is easy to be expounded, were it not for one thing. And, but for one thing, led or transmuted to gold with facility. This one thing is color. For in the final arrangement of the particles, when all else is understood, there is a certain aspect of them which produceth color,

Starting point is 02:14:01 that of all mundane things is the least to be comprehended. Color, said Ramon Alonzo, his roving, youthful fancy, called back to that gloomy room by hearing the master attribute a wonder to color, with which he had been familiar all the years of his life. I, said the master, the outward manifestation of all material things that come to our knowledge, and yet the nature of it has baffled

Starting point is 02:14:31 and is still baffling the studies of the most learned amongst mankind. For this reason alone, there are those that have discarded the study of matter, caring little to struggle with the difficulty in so trivial a business as to seek for the meaning and use of material things to other branches of study whatever they are difficulty we are lured by the chance of prizes beyond estimation these however concern you not having chosen the humble study whose lore we now consider color then depends upon the arrangement of the element in the its most subtle form. Were there only one color, we should esteem that it was the natural manner in which light affected surfaces, yet are there four, and these must therefore depend on a variation of surface profoundly intricate. Now, it is the nature of gold that wherever and however it be cut or powdered or melted or broken, the surface presented is yellow. And the delicate

Starting point is 02:15:41 arrangement of particles that in other metals presents other colors than this needs to be overcome. For without this, transmutation is not accomplished. And but for this color, the changing of lead into gold were amongst the easiest of all the trafficking men have with material things. And if the vulgar would accept as gold, what is truly gold in its essence, although it be black, the business were easy enough. But if, has been ascertained that in regard to this they are stubborn. Then taking up a piece of iron pyrites, he explained how by mingling various metals together

Starting point is 02:16:23 the student could acquire the color of one, the hardness or softness of another, and so blend them that the weight of the whole mass should be what was desired, and it should be in all respects most suited to undergo these changes that were to be caused by the use of the philosopher's stone. the lecture that he delivered that day with all the medals before him upon the preparations for transmutation has probably seldom been surpassed for he had for the material of his discourse the wisdom of those ages that had preceded him while a few centuries later the study of the philosopher's stone fell much into detitude yet who shall estimate the relative excellence of lectures on transmutation seeing that they have ever been given in gloom and secrecy to classes of ones and twos. And Ramona Lanzo listened docile, not as might have been thought, because to learn

Starting point is 02:17:21 transmutation was the object of his sojourn in that dim house, but because he awaited a favorable opportunity, an amiable mood in the magician, when he might ask for leave once more to return to the fields of frivolity. And not till evening came, and the magician banished him from his sacred room in order that as Ramon Alonzo knew he might play some secret game with his captive shadows, did the young man learn with shrewd intuitions of youth that he cared far more for the fee that he had in his box than for any learning he might impart as his part of the bargain? He did not look for anemone that evening, for he saw that the sight of his shadow troubled her, believing her overwrought by the loss of her own, and deciding to renew the magician's

Starting point is 02:18:09 offer in a few days when she was calmer. That she should have a shadow again, he was determined, and walk without hurt or taunt in her Aragona. As he went to his room that night up the stairway of stone, with a candle all blobs of tallow and ragged wick spluttering within the lantern, he had an idea for a moment on one of the steps that there was something wrong with his shadow, but he looked again, holding the lantern steadier, and the idea or the fear passed. End of Chapter 9. The Technique of Alchemy to the Exposure of the False. Chapter 10 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Dunseney. This Librevox recording is in the public domain, read by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Starting point is 02:19:07 Chapter 10, The Exposure of the False Shadow. The work of the morning was to learn the correct application of the smooth, philosopher's stone to the surfaces of metals that had already been so blended that they approached in texture and color to the texture and color of gold, and were thus already prepared to receive the changes to be given their element by the touch of the stone. Without this preparation, the magician warned his pupil, the change to the element is too violent, and has in former times not merely erect but entirely transmuted the houses of certain philosophers, whereby the world has lost such store of learning as may in no wise be estimated. Nor is it well to attempt the change of the

Starting point is 02:19:56 element in too great a bulk at one time, as men have done when too greatly drawn by the lure of material things, seeking to change whole mountains, which far from bringing them gold has been the cause of volcanoes. Now, the application of the philosopher's stone is made in this manner. Having chosen suitable metals to avoid too enormous a change in such bulk as will cause no calamity, pass this stone over the surface with the exact rhythm that there is in the spell you use.

Starting point is 02:20:32 There are many spells, as there are many metals, and he brought from a box in two handfuls, a bundle of small scrolls. Ramona Lanzo, who had believed that he was about to be shown the secret, saw then, as the magician slowly sorted the scrolls, that there was still much to be taught. He had been patient all day before, but now the light that shone through the volume of leaves,

Starting point is 02:20:57 coming down cliffs of greenness, called to his inner being with so imperious a call that it almost seemed as though Spain and the musical summer and the mighty son himself and the blue spaces of ether all longed for Ramona Lanzo to wander to Arragona to toy with the idle maidens through empty hours of merriment and a bird called out of the wood and Ramona Lanzo felt that he must go master he said may i go once more to the fields of error i have some business there not worthy for your attention yet to myself it is pressing The magician made a certain show of reluctance, to conceal the truth that he cared for little

Starting point is 02:21:40 but his fee of the young man's shadow, and meant soon to send him away, content with the vain acquirements of transmutation, for so it seemed to the magician. And then he gave him leave, but with an earnestness far more real and of vehemence that seemed genuine, he warned his people again to be back before evening, and swift as dust on drafts, sometimes moaned in those chambers and gay and light as the leaves away went rimon alonzo and once more the golden morning was before him as he came down from the wood and aragona twinkled in the distance and partly his heart was full of the frivolous laughter and partly a wistful feeling all grave and strange for the spires of aragona moved even youth to solemnity and none knew how this was for the spires were were bright and glad. He gave one glance at his shadow to see that all was well with it, then strode over glittering grass with the shadows striding beside him, and so he came, untired, to the edge of the village, and saw there the band of maidens where they had promised to be. Blythe on the idle air

Starting point is 02:22:54 came the merriment of their welcome. And not a levity that blew their way all in the azure morning, and not a vanity that reached their thoughts, going from mine to mind, but they welcomed and toyed with, and acclaimed as new. So they passed the morning, and when the heat of the day began to increase, they loitered to a lane that had one long, leafy roof, and there they sat in the shade and ate fruit that they had in baskets, and listened while each, in turn, recounted their idyllous tales, and the mead of every tale that pleased was laughter, and not a learned conceit nor studious fancy was allowed to intrude, In any tale they told.

Starting point is 02:23:37 After the wisdom that burdened the house in the wood and the learning with which its very gloom was laden, its ancient store of saws and sayings and formula, Ramona Lanzah rejoiced at every quip that they uttered and every peal of laughter that followed each quip as the traveler over Sahara welcomes the pools in the mountains and bands of butterflies that gather about them. In the heavy leafy shade they laughed or tariffed,

Starting point is 02:24:03 they laughed or talked continually while all around them Spain slept through the middle hours of the day. And many a tale they told of surpassing lightness, too light to cross the ages and reach this day, even if they were worthy, but lost with all the little things that founder in the long reaches of time, to be cast on the coasts of oblivion, amongst unrecorded times and children's dreams and sceptors of unsuptors of unscest. successful emperors. But when shafts of sunlight slanted, and voices from beyond their lane, showed that Spain was awakening, and the grandeur of the sun was passed, and he grew genial again, then they loitered out into the light, straying towards the hills.

Starting point is 02:24:52 And as they wandered there, other young men joined them, leaving their work till the morrow, for morrows they said would be many, young, dark-skinned men with scarlet sashes flashing around their wastes. Then the party drifted asunder as shallow streams in sunny, sandy spaces, when the water takes many ways, all of them gold and light-laden. And a tall, dark maiden, drifted with Ramon Alonzo, and one more slender than she, and the first was named Ariona, and the second Lolon. And sometimes fair fancies came to Ariona, by which that band of maidens was often guided, because they were strange and new. But the slender form of Loulogne was driven by any fancy

Starting point is 02:25:38 in whatever mind it arose, a song would guide her or any merriment lead her, as though she had less weight than these invisible things, as the thistledown has less weight than the south wind. And as they drifted slowly towards the low western hills, Ramona Lanzo saw that the sun was westering and remembered the warning of the magician. I must go, he said.

Starting point is 02:26:04 Go, said the two maidens, as though to leave that low sunlight to go alone through the wood, was some monstrous imagination. I must return to the learned man with whom I study beyond the wood, he said. He desires me to be back with him this evening. Oh, said Leloon, she was shocked to hear of such a demand. He wishes to investigate with me one of the branches of learning. then the two girls laughter on the mellow air rang out against learning and trills of it floated as far as the hills and echoes came back to the fields and went wandering fainter and further and in all the ways that heard them there was no thought of learning and romeonzo's plans were left away as in later days the armada was broken by storm and so he forsook his intention to return to the house in the wood he long remembered the

Starting point is 02:27:01 those thrills of merry laughter, for not for long was he free of care again. Driven then by those gusts of laughter, as small ships are by light breezes, he came with the girls to the hills when the sun was low, and drifting all aimless on, they went up the slope, prattling and laughing and stray, led by whatever fancy led Ariona, and her fancy was to see the willowy lands that lay beyond the hill, with their trees and the she was, and the shadowed grass looking strange in the evening. At such a place and at such a time she felt whatever there was a fairy in our world would show clear hints for any girl to guess. And the further they got, the eagerer grew laloon to find whatever it was for which

Starting point is 02:27:49 Eliona was searching. And these impulses holding fair, Ramona Lanzo still went on before them. And so they came to the ridge of the hill and saw, the willowy lands. The low sun glittered in their faces, no longer a flashing center of power avoided by human eyes, but a mystery, an enchantment, almost to be shared by man, and wholly shared by solitary trees and bands of shrubs, far off on the wild plain, which now drew a mystery about them, as men in the tended fields began to draw their cloaks. They gazed some while in silence at those strange lands, which none saw from any window in Aragona, seeking their mystery which was almost clear and was coming nearer and nearer, and finding it, but for the tiniest shrubs and

Starting point is 02:28:42 shadows, amongst which it hid, though barely its secret enchantment. And as they looked at that strangeness, part spell and part blessing, descending on all those acres out of the evening, not a ripple of laughter shook the calm of their wonder. and then a cold wind blew for only a moment, rising up from its sleep in nowhere and moving to distant sails, and they stirred as the wind went by and their search was ended. They turned round then to look back at Aragona, with the late light on its spires and its windows flashing, and saw men drawing toward it home from the fields. They stood there, wondering to see how far they had come, waiting in idleness for the next week.

Starting point is 02:29:30 him to guide them, a little band of three with the young man in the middle. The slope they had just climbed lay golden below them. Then Ariona screamed. Again she screamed before Lilloon had followed the gaze of her terrified eyes. Then scream after scream went up from Lilloon also. Ramon Alonzo stood silent in sheer amazement between them. Then they sprang away from him making the sign of the cross, but just as they sprang away, Ramon Alonzo saw for a moment amidst the shining grass his shadow between their shadows. Their's lying so far along the golden slope that they ran a little way out to the level fields. His only five feet long. End of chapter 10, the exposure of the false shadow. Chapter 11 of the charwoman's shadow by Lord Duncani. This

Starting point is 02:30:34 Liebervox recording is in the public domain, read by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 11, The Chill of Space So it does not grow, said Ramon Alonzo bitterly. He was all alone on the hill, and the girls had fled, alone with a mere strip of gloom, a thing refused by the charwoman. So this was the shadow he had received so confidently, believing he had obtained from magic something without payment, a mere patch of darkness that neither dwindled nor grew.

Starting point is 02:31:12 In a flash his memory went back to the suspicion he had suddenly had on the stair and recalled how the shade of the trees in the heat of the day had hidden the evil secret a little longer. He remembered how two evenings ago it had seemed not so late as it was, that was his lying shadow. but he no longer thought of it as a shadow at all. It was mere art, and the black art at that. It counterfeited what his own shadow had been in the middle of that fatal afternoon

Starting point is 02:31:43 and could no more grow than shadows in pictures grow. What should he do? A chill came into the evening, depressing all his thoughts, and his fancy roamed to the long, thin, magical box, in which his young shadow lay. He pictured it, locked in. in the gloom with other lost shadows, fallen, a slave to magic. He thought of its blithness at dawn on dewy hills and spring, and then he looked at the sinister thing beside him, an outcast amongst the

Starting point is 02:32:15 shadows, as he was now an outcast amongst men. At that moment he would sooner have been shadowless like the charwoman than to have the mockery there looking ludicrous in the landscape and seeming to taunt him with the folly he had committed after warning enough. He turned his back on it, and his eye fell then on the willowy lands a little bit to the left of the sun, and he saw the great trees far off with a new jealousy. Almost silvery, their great shadows looked, slipping over the grass in the evening, and he saw the beauty of shadows as he had not seen them before, and saw with envy. It had come to this already that the man was jealous of trees.

Starting point is 02:33:01 From the grand substantial forms of the distant trees and those dark comrades that vouched for them as being material things, he bitterly turned away and looked once more to the spires of Aragona, with his gaze held high to avoid the mockery at his feet. But not by lifting his gaze could he escape the thought of his folly, for now he saw Laloon and Ariona, hastening home over the fields, and he knew he had lost his part in material things. Some slight regret, some reluctance, Lilloon showed as she went,

Starting point is 02:33:36 which Ramona Lanzah was not able to see. He only felt all tangible things were against him. Must we leave him, said Lalloon, after they had run for a while? He is not earthly, cried Eliana. We might stay for only a little, said Lilloon. it were sin said the other though for only a moment must we never sin sighed laloon sin yes said ariona where there is absolution but this and she shuddered this whispered the loon half terror half curiosity he has had traffic with what we may not name and as ariona said this the last of the sun's huge rim disappeared from the hill and a chill came into the air, and their doubts all turned to fears in the hour of bats.

Starting point is 02:34:31 So they hurried on and did not stop to rest, and came all weary into Arragona, and there the news spread quicker than their tired feet could carry it, that Ramona Alonzo had trafficked in the gaudy wares of damnation. And he, with that pitiable where he had got, that tardy piece of gloom, stood all alone on the hill in the deepening gloomy, making helpless human plans that he hoped to set against magic. There was his sword that he had never used yet on any serious business. He would confront the magician with its slender point

Starting point is 02:35:08 and make him open the shadow box. Its purpose was to rescue the oppressed, then why not those hapless shadows that lay with his own in the box? And then there was the spell he had seen in the book, with which the master opened the lock of his shadow box. but he could not read the spell which was in chinese and did not know with what art from his stores of magic the master would meet the passes of his merely terrestrial sword vain plans that melted away as fast as he formed them then the sun set and in the sudden loss of gladness that all things felt the faint melancholy that tinged wild grasses and tended gardens romano lozzo had comfort for a little while he seemed to have lost nothing that all nature had not lost he did not know that the word had gone out the man is shadowless and that he would have to travel far and faster than that rumor to find any kindly human welcome again and now it was for a man is shadowless and that he would have to travel far and faster than that rumor to find any kindly human welcome again and now it

Starting point is 02:36:11 was the hour when all things sought their homes and romano lanzo turned towards the wood he came to the wood before the gloaming faded but amongst those oaks it was as dark as night once more he pried for the house once more its dark door was before him all of a sudden as he picked his way round a tree it stood ajar as though tempting whatever was lost in the wood to enter that sombre house and be robbed at least of its shadow again as romano lanzo went in through that door he saw the magician's presence increasing the gloom of the hall you are late said the magician i am late said romeo lonso and strode on to pass the magician his left hand resting lightly on his sword-hilt when the master of the arts saw romeonzo's humor he lost some of his ease and stood there pondering answers to what his guests should say for he saw that the great defect in his artificial shadow had by now been detected and was ever anxious that nothing mortal should guess aught of his dealings with shadows but maron alonzo said nothing he walked on silently into the deeps of the house and presently the magician turned away and went somberly back to the room that was sacred to magic and unpadlocked his shadow-box and soon in a riot of power exerted on the helpless shades he forgot all the irk that he had felt at having one of his crooked dealings discovered. But the young man called anemone through the house, and she heard him and came from the nook in which she was resting, and met him in one of those dark passages, and led him back to the nook.

Starting point is 02:37:58 It was a space beneath a wooden stair that ran whither she knew not, once in every generation she would hear the steps of the magician resounding above her head, going gravely up the stair upon which she was not permitted, and coming blithely down. One side of the space was open to the passage, but in the part that was sheltered by the stair she had a heap of straw to lie on, and all her pans and pales. Old brooms against the wall seemed to add to the darkness. She led him silently there before they spoke,

Starting point is 02:38:32 seeing his attitude full of trouble if it was too dark for her to see his face, and there they sat on the floor on patches of straw, and she began to light a candle, a thing she had saved up out of old pieces of tallow. I have found out about his shadow, he said. Ah, yes, she said. A mere piece of gloom. She knew he must have discovered it when she saw how late he was out.

Starting point is 02:38:59 It will not grow, he said. Never an inch, she answered. You warned me, said Ramona Lanzo. She only sighed. She had known that. the magician was after his shadow but knew not all his tricks had she dreamed that he would have dared to offer one of his wretched pieces of darkness even in part exchange for a good human shadow she would have warned romano lanzo of the specious imitation and now she regretted she had not and as she sighed a sudden tremor shook her and shook the wretched candle she had just lighted and convulsed her again and again to the straw upon which she sat rustled all with her tremblings. And Ramon Alonzo suddenly trembled, too, as he had trembled once before in that

Starting point is 02:39:48 strange house, and previously he had put his tremors down to the draughts in the damp, but now they were more violent. It is our shadows, said the charwoman, leaning towards Romano Lanzo and speaking with chattering teeth. Our shadows? said he. They are out on dreadful journeys, she replied. "'Whether?' said he. "'Who knows?' said she. "'And we are feeling their terror. "'Has he that power?' he gasped. "'I,' she said,

Starting point is 02:40:23 "'he is sitting there now over his shadow box, "'taking them out and driving them off "'by the dreadful spells he uses "'to carry messages for him, "'to spirits far from here. and their misery and terror touches us, for so it is with shadows. Ramona Lanzo was shivering now with a fear that was strange to him. The charred woman watched him a moment.

Starting point is 02:40:54 Yes, yes, she said. He has our shadows out. Are they far from the house? He asked between chattering deep. Beyond earth, she answered. this he could scarcely believe but now august of more dreadful shivering shook her and he too felt the touch of a sudden chill they are beyond the paths to the planets now she said i know that cold it is the chill of space yes that's space sure enough it's little warmth enough that they get from the planets, just a little from some of the larger ones. And that's something, but this is space. I know it. They're right out there now.

Starting point is 02:41:56 She huddled her hands almost into the flame of the candle, but that did no good, for the shutters that come from lost shadows go deeper than skin or bones. They chill not merely the blood, but the very spirit. And the chill and the awe of space gripped also Ramon Alonzo. Why does he send them there? He whispered to her, for his voice had sunk to this. Ah, we don't know that, she said. He's too deep and sly.

Starting point is 02:42:31 But he has friends out there, and he's likely sending them poor shadows. to one of them, to bow before one of them and give it a message and dance to it and then come back to the shadow box. He'll bring it back, asked Ramon Alonzo quickly. Oh, yes, she said. He always brings them back. He won't part with his shadows. What spirits are they?

Starting point is 02:43:06 He asked. evil spirits she answered and then they sat silent a while trembling and when while their nerves were numbed by an unearthly cold and if the charwoman's aged frame were more easily shaken by tremblings yet the young heart of romano lanzo seemed to feel more vividly his shadow's distress often the spirits pass close to earth on a journey and he sends his shadow a little way out to greet them. But they are right beyond that now. Poor shadows, she said. Why does he send them so far? He asked.

Starting point is 02:43:51 Lust of power, she said, cruel, savagery. I know his peaks and his ways. He doesn't like your finding out the trick that he played you. I've known him to make the shadows dance for hours Because I haven't worked hard enough for him And I've been all tired after that Worned out and years older

Starting point is 02:44:20 Somehow her courage in speaking at all When wrapped by those terrible tremors And in speaking against the grim man To whose tyranny they were subject Brought a warmth to Ramon Alonzo and soon she said they're turning homeward now then they sat silent both waiting and now the terror had gone and gradually some slight thawing too faint to be called a glow touched the unearthly cold that had gripped them so sorely whether it was some warmth that the shadows got from jupiter or from the sun itself neither romano lanzo nor the wise old char-wold woman knew, and at last the charmed woman leaned back against the wall, with a certain content again on her worn old face. They're back in the box, she said. And suddenly he stood up, his left hand

Starting point is 02:45:20 dropping upon his sword-hilt, a fine figure there in his cloak, even in that dim light. I will take your shadow, he said, and he shall torment it no more. My own must stay in the because of the bargain I made with him and the need that I have for gold, but I will bring back yours to you, and he shall torment it no more. He had said the same before, and she had smiled it away, but he was so vehement now that if resolution could have accomplished it, she saw the thing had been done, and yet she shook her head. I have my sword, he said, but she looked at it pityingly.

Starting point is 02:46:01 He has more terrible thing. she answered sadly. And at that he realized that in that dark house more store must be set by immaterial things than by those that men can handle. And he thought of the spell. Then I will open the box while he is away, he said, and you shall have back your shadow,

Starting point is 02:46:23 and mine will stay in the box. And again she warned him that the shadow box opened to no key. I have seen the spell in his book, he said, unto which the padlock opens. Can you utter it? She said. No, it is in Chinese. Now there was at that time no Chinaman in all the lands of Spain,

Starting point is 02:46:46 and the ships of Spain had no traffic with Chinese lands. Yet Ramona Lanzo pondered this most faint hope, and leaving the pails and brooms, went thoughtfully thins. End of Chapter 11, The Chill of Space. Chapter 12 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Dunsainey. This Liebervox recording is in the public domain, read by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 12. Mirandala demands a love potion.

Starting point is 02:47:28 When Ramon Alonzo appeared next day in the room that was sacred to magic, the magician was there before him. You have a fine, strong shadow, said the magician. certainly it lay black and bold on the floor and since it was then as many hours before noon as the making of the shadow had been after it it was just as long as the shadows of other men but not a word did rome alonzo answer he went instead to his seat and there sat waiting to receive more of the learning for which he had paid so much the gold must needs be got for his sister's dowry even at the cost of those tremors and terror against which fortitude that endured the ills of the body seemed of so little avail. And after that, if other plans failed, he might become so wealthy with the gold he should make that he would buy back his shadow. Or if the magician paid no heed to gold, he might find those who did, and arm them and go against the house in the wood, and capture the spells and the shadow-box.

Starting point is 02:48:34 But his head was too full of plans for any one to ripen, and then the voice, of the magician came breaking across them suddenly when by blending the metals he said till their texture is nearest to the texture of gold we have made the preparation that is meet the philosophers choose from amongst such scrolls as these a spell that is best suited to the material to be dealt with and having read it aloud in its own language whatever language it be for the these spells are ever written in the tongue of whatever sage has been first to compose them and the persians have for long been adept at this as well as some few of those that adore vishnu at which name he paused and bowed and as he bowed one knocked on the door to the forest and the echoes went roaming uncertainly as though lost through the house at the sound of the knock the magician swept out of the room once more reminding the young man of a spider when some lost thing touches his web. And left alone in the room that was sacred to magic, Ramona Lanzo again considered his dark master, whom he regarded henceforth as his opponent, from whom the charwoman's shadow must yet be won. The master was keeping to his bargain, thought Ramon Alonzo, and it was a hard bargain, and in the matter of the

Starting point is 02:50:05 false shadow, a sly one, and the master knew that he had found this out. Suddenly his eye fell on the great book, and he left his speculations, which, considering the depths to which the magician's character ran, had gone but a little way. And he rose up, led by a more practical thought, and turned the Cathayan pages, and came again to the three great syllables of the spell that opened the box, alas, that they were in Chinese. A swift idea came to him. The padlock knew Chinese, for he, had seen it open. He seized the book and carried it to the shadow box, and, leaning over the crocodile, showed the open page to the padlock, holding it still before it, and the padlock never

Starting point is 02:50:52 stirred. He rose up then from the dust and gloom, and replaced the book on the lectern, and only just in time, but the steps of the magician came resounding back to the door, and he came again to his room that was sacred to magic. He gave one scornful glance at the book, and the book on the lectern, knowing it had been moved, and in the scorn of that look, Ramona Lanzo's disappointment grew, for he saw not only that he had failed, but that the attempt had been hopeless. A yokel is at the door of the forest, he said. He has a message for you that the oath will give only to you. Ramon Alonzo went in silence, still heavy with failure, and came to the door to the wood, and there outside was Peter, who,

Starting point is 02:51:39 had knocked on the old green door and had then run back a little way into the wood. Since he had spoken with the magician. And now to the door that he dreaded, for his fears expected anything that they were able to guess, there came his young master. Young master, cried Peter. Young master, I have brought you a letter from Donna Mirandarandla. And does he treat you well? Does he feed you well?

Starting point is 02:52:05 You'll be very learned now, master. The big boorhound is in. eating well. Is he strong? asked Ramona Lanzo. As strong as ever, said Peter. Now the saints be praised, said Ramonelonzo, reverting to an old way of speech that he did not use in that house. Here is the letter, Master, said Peter, drawing it out from his cloak. But Master, there is a word with blots upon it. That word should be love potion, and not the word that is writ under the blots. Love potion, repeated Ramona Alonzo. I, master, and not the word under the blots, Donna Miranda Miranda, Randela bid me say it. That is well, said Ramon Alonzo. The letter was written in

Starting point is 02:52:52 the same clear hand as the one that had come from his father, and was short, as the young man saw with joy, for he wished to read not too slowly before Peter, and fast he could not go. It said, to Don Ramon Alonzo, do not send gold, but send me a prayer book, your loving sister, Mirandala. Over the word prayer book were the marks of small fingers that had been dipped in ink. Say, I will send the prayer book, said Ramon Alonzo. I, master, said Peter, and is there any more? Feed the big boar-hound well, said Ramonelonzo. Aye, indeed, master.

Starting point is 02:53:34 farewell. Farewell, young master, farewell. Please, God, we'll hunt boars in the winter. And Peter turned slowly away and walked a few paces slowly, then faster and faster till he got away from the wood. Ramon Alonzo pondered bitterly. He had sold his shadow for gold, and now gold was not needed.

Starting point is 02:53:56 Ah! He had not yet learned the whole art of transmutation. Would the magician give back his shadow? and Miranda must have her love potion and the charwoman have her shadow out of the box. He had much to do if his plans were to come to fruition. Back he went to the gloomy room that was sacred to magic. I'll have no need of gold, he said. It is a worthless metal, replied the magician.

Starting point is 02:54:24 The philosophers sought it for the interest they took in rearranging the element, but the stuff itself was not to them. They buried it where I have said, and have often warned man of its worthlessness, in testimony whereof their writings remain to this day. I would learn no more of it, said Ramon Alonzo. No, said the magician. I pray, therefore, give me back my shadow, he said. But it is my fee. I would learn other things, said the young man, for other fees, but this fee, I pray you return.

Starting point is 02:55:01 Alas, said the magician, you have learned much already. Of this matter, nothing, said Ramon Alonzo. Alas, yes, replied the magician, for you have learned the oneness of matter, and that there is but one element, and this is a great secret to the vulgar who believe there are four, and doubtless they will, in their error, discover even more than these four, before ever they come to learn that there is but one, which you have learned already. And this is my fee for it. And he stooped and wrapped the shadow box somewhat sharply. You gave me a shadow to wear in its place, said the young man. I will make you a longer one, replied the magician. Ramona Lanzo saw that words would not do it, and that whatever he said

Starting point is 02:55:54 would be verbally parried with skill. Then give me a love potion, he said. I do not dispensed these things, said the magician haughtily. Then teach me how they are made, and not the making of gold. The magician pondered a moment. It was all one to him. He had his fee safe in the shadow-box. He despised equally gold and love, and cared not which he taught. Some etiquette he had learned from some older magician seemed to prompt him to give something for his fee. Gladly, he answered briefly. Then, Mona Lonzo sat down without a word, thinking of Miranda. He had never inquired the reason of anything that she asked for.

Starting point is 02:56:39 It was Miranda with eyes like a stormy evening. Thoughts passed behind those eyes such as never visited him. Miranda knew. It is hard to say how the flash of those eyes swayed him. He never sought to know and never questioned Miranda's demands. By the admixture of crocodile's tears with the slime of snails came the voice of the master. The basis of all love potions is constructed. Unto this is to be added a powder obtained by pounding the burnt plumage of nightingales,

Starting point is 02:57:17 flavor with attar of roses, add a pinch of the dust of a man that has been a king, and of a woman that has been fair, two pinches. and mix with common dew. Do this by light only of glowworms and saying suitable spells. Ramona Lanzo, following the gestures that the master made as he spoke, saw on the shelves the ingredients that he mentioned. He saw a jar holding at her of roses beside one named Dust of Helen.

Starting point is 02:57:49 He saw two jars side by side called Dust of Pharaoh and Dust of Usmandius, one of them probably remissus he saw a vile labelled crocodile's tears all that he needed seemed there outside in the wood the glow-worms burned and there were plenty of snails the lesson went on drearily the magician intoning various spells that the young man learned by heart or believed he learned and naming alternative ingredients that had of old been used in moratorid lands of the ingredients Ramona Alonzo was so sure that no mistake was possible. If ever he erred at all, it was with the spells. End of Chapter 12. Miranda demands a love potion. Chapter 13 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Duncany.

Starting point is 02:58:51 This Lieber Fox recording is in the public domain, read by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 13, Ramona Lanzo, compounds the potion. Next morning, Ramon Alonzo rose full early, all impatience, to do Miranda-less errand, all eagerness

Starting point is 02:59:11 to exercise his new skill. That day, the magician was to teach him more spells and alternative ingredients, doubtless with quips at the expense of matter, scoffs at the vanity of the ambitions of man, quotations from ancient philosophers, and lore of his own seeking. An opportunity not given to

Starting point is 02:59:31 every young man, for this master had gathered and stored with his own hands the fruits of many ages, besides the lore he was heir to from former philosophers. When Ramon Alonzo entered the room that was sacred to magic, he saw with a sudden joy that this opportunity was not yet to be his. For he had come down the spiral stair of timber and stone by the palest earliest light, and the magician was not yet about. But with his new learning, blowing bright and fresh in his mind, he ran a sure eye over the master's shelves and saw the ingredients he needed. Then he took from a jar some dust of osmandis and mixed it in bright proportions with some of the dust of Helen. His shrewd young mind guessed well the aphorisms that

Starting point is 03:00:20 the master would have uttered over the pinches of dust, for secure with his doses of relaxure viquet, he neglected few chances to mock the illusions of man. Atar of roses and crocodile tears were close by in their vials, and the dried skin of the nightingale hung on a nail near. He procured a flame and burned some of the feathers and pounded them into powder and mixed it up with the rest. Then he hastened toward the wood, anxious to gain the door before the magician came, and to do the work unaided, for he knew that the agent had often ideas of their own, setting undue store by ritual and unlawful. profitable quotations and hindering eager work that the young would do in a hurry. He came to the door to the wood and listened a moment acutely.

Starting point is 03:01:12 Not a sound came from the corridors. The magician was not yet afoot. The dew was yet in the wood, and of this he got a small cupful, gathering it drop by drop from the bent blades of grass, and here he found large snails and, after a while, a glow-worm. and these he carried into a hollow oak where the darkness was deep enough to be lit by the glow-worm, and in the light of that he put all his mixture together, saying the while a spell that had great repute in Persia. The viscid substance he poured into a vial out of the common mortar in which he had compounded it,

Starting point is 03:01:50 and carefully corked the vial and turned back toward the house in the wood, and, attracted by the croon of the curious Persian spell, or else by the scent of the love potion, small things of the wood were lured to follow him. He heard the pattering of their feet behind him, but if he turned they were away on the other side of the oak holes, and if he went back to a tree behind which one hid and walked around to the other side, he heard small fingernails, scratching, always on the far side of him, and knew the small creature had gone up the tree and slipped round it whenever he moved, so as to keep the trunk between it and anything human.

Starting point is 03:02:32 They were only imps, light creatures composed of the idleness and mystery of the wood, and led now by curiosity, which was their principal motive. Soon the pattering of footsteps ceased, for they dared come no nearer to the magician's house, but sat down behind their trees uttering little cries of wonder. When Ramona Alonzo returned to the house in the wood, he sought at once for the charwoman and found her in her nook amongst all her pails. Anemone, he said, I am going back to my home, for my sister has need of a love potion.

Starting point is 03:03:08 For what purpose needs she that? said the charlwoman. I know not, said Ramon Alonzo, but she desired one. Is she not young? said the charlwoman. I, said Ramonelanzo, but perhaps she wished to make sure. aye they are sure these potions said the charwoman for she knew much of magic having minded that house for so long only let him see her first after he hath drunk of the potion or even be nearest to her at that time and he hath no escape after that from magical love you have the potion there for romeonelonzo had the vial in his hand ay he said i made it myself in the wood he taught you how yes said romeo and for that you gave your shadow she said sorrowfully and he would have explained to her that he had learned more than this but she would not heed him only sitting on the straw with dejected head and mourning to herself over his shadow then seeing her sorrowful face and the gloom of that dark nook and the sombre melancholy of all things around her he sought to persuade her to flee from the house in the wood and he would escort her into aragona but she only said the world is harder than this house

Starting point is 03:04:36 he reasoned with her saying suave things of the world but she only answered there is no place for me there and then he said I will come back for you, and when I come, I will get back your shadow. And she shook her head sorrowfully, as she always shook it whenever he spoke of that. But I have a plan, he said. And when she only shook her head again, he told her what his plan was. I saw the spell, he said, when he opened the shadow box, and I have seen it again since. It is in Chinese, and I cannot speak it, but now I remember it well. each syllable, and I will learn the art of the pen, and then I will make the likeness of one of those

Starting point is 03:05:20 syllables upon parchment. There are three syllables, but I will make the likeness of only one at first, and with it I shall write words of my own imagining, making them square and outlandish, and I shall say to him, Master, I was given this writing by a heathen man that I met. I pray you read it for me. She listened at first, but when he spoke of writing, words of his own imagining, she turned again to her melancholy. But Harkin, he said, and his eagerness gained her attention. Often as he reads, he mutters, and if the room be dark and the script small, then he will mutter surely, and I hear the words that he mutters.

Starting point is 03:06:02 Now when all this script is strange to him but one word, he will surely mutter that one and then stop and ponder, and I shall hear that word and remember. and then some days must go by and many days and then one day I will bring him another script with the second syllable and long afterwards the third and then I shall have the spell

Starting point is 03:06:25 she was listening now with a look on her face that seemed to be like hope but hope had been absent from her face so long that if it now shone in her eyes its image there was too faint for Ramon Alonzo to be quite sure what it was and after a while she said Learn not the art of the pen from him

Starting point is 03:06:46 There are good men that can teach that art And not only he Why? said Ramona Lonzo Because if he deems that you have not the art He will not suspect you wrote it And then Ramona Alonzo knew that she hoped For she had taken a part in his plan And for a long while they talked of it

Starting point is 03:07:09 and all the while the faint hope of the charlwoman grew, and her eyes shone now with a bright unwanted light in the haggard-withered face. One thing she warned him, which Ramon Alonzo remembered, and that was to give up his false shadow to the magician before he opened the shadow box, if ever he should be able to open it. For the magician could cut off the false shadow, having the necessary tools,

Starting point is 03:07:35 but if this were not done, he would never be able to rid himself of it, and would always have two shadows, a true and a false. Thus they plotted together again. But Ramon Alonzo thought nothing of his own shadow, planning only to rescue hers, with his thoughts as they roved to the future, fixed on nothing but the picture of her old face, lit up by some feeble smile from a wan happiness

Starting point is 03:08:01 when she should have her old shadow again. And now the morning was wearing on to the hour when the magician would be astir, and Ramona Lanzo desired to be gone before he appeared. For he had acquired a lore in his youth which taught him ever to avoid the aged when merry plans were afoot. For the aged would come with their wisdom and slowness of thought, and other plans would be made, and there would be at least delay. So he was impatient to go, and yet he dallied, reluctant that any word should be the last, reluctant to leave the new plan that they had made, between them, and reluctant to leave the old woman, who somehow held his sympathy in such a way as

Starting point is 03:08:43 he had not been taught that it could be held by the aged. Then they spoke of trifles, as folk often do that are at a moment of parting. He told of the imps in the wood that he had never seen them, but whose feet he had heard following, and she told him how to see an imp, which was easy, for a man can see three sides of a tree, and whatever comes the imp will go to the fourth side, and there he will wait till he is sure of being able to peep around without being seen. But throw your hat past the right side of the tree, she said, and he will climb around at once onto the left side, and you will see the imp. Of such trifles, they spoke, but fearing now to see at any moment the dark form of the master

Starting point is 03:09:32 or to hear his stride along the booming corridors, Ramona Lanzo made his farewells, and one last message of good cheer he gave her, before striding away with his cloak and his sword to the wood. When I have rescued your shadow, he said, I will take you away from this house, and you shall be charwoman at my father's tower, and the work will be light there,

Starting point is 03:09:55 and you may do it slowly, and none shall molest you, and you may rest when you will, and you shall have long, to sleep. Some glance of gratitude he looked for, but a smile so strange lit her face and haunted her eyes that he went from the somber house and into the wood and all the way to the open lands, still wondering. End of Chapter 13. Ramon Alonzo compounds the potion. Chapter 14 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Dunsainey. This Lieber-Vox recording is in the

Starting point is 03:10:38 public domain, read by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 14. The Folk of Aragona Strike for the Faith When Ramonelo came out of the wood, he saw that the shadows were already shortening. He saw then that he had delayed too long with the charwoman and should have started while shadows were long, and so gone through the dark of the wood while his own was unnatural, and come to frequented ways while it was as other men's. And he felt ashamed of his dalliance, for had he been delayed by some radiant girl,

Starting point is 03:11:16 her beauty would have so dazzled him that he could not have seen his folly. But to come under the fascination of a most aged charwoman seemed a thing so unworthy of his knightly ambitions that he hung his head as he thought of it, and yet all the while remained true to his chivalrous plan to rescue the poor old shadow.

Starting point is 03:11:36 A little way he went, but soon seeing men in the distance in the fields, he thought it better not to go beyond the last of the oaks that stood outside the wood, until other men's shadows should be a little longer, and so avoid the ill-informed foolish pother that folks seemed to make when all shadows were not exactly evenly matched. Already he had come to feel a vigorous scorn for the absurd importance that others attached to shadows. For youth argues rapidly, and in a way clearly,

Starting point is 03:12:08 from whatever premises it has not often tarrying to inquire if more premises are needed these were some of the premises from which romano lanzo argued a shadow is of no possible value to any one nor does anyone ever suppose that it is and if it were the poor old woman that lost hers should have been pitied and he himself actually possessed a shadow and if it were too short their own shadows had all been just as short an hour or two ago and the same folk that called it too short in the evening would doubtless call it too long at noon there is indeed a great deal of futility amongst the human race which we do not commonly see for it all forms part of our illusion but let a man be much annoyed by something that others do so that he is separated from them and has to leave them and looks back at what they are doing and he will see at once all manner of whimsical absurdities that he had not noticed before and rimonelonzo in the shade of his oak waiting for the noon to go by grew very contemptuous of the attitude that the world took up towards shadows nobody passed him and if any saw him far off they only saw him keeping a most honored observance of spain which is the siesta or pause for the heat of the day to go by and when shadows had grown again he left the shade that had sheltered him against the heat of the sun and persecution of men and walked boldly down the road protected by as good a shadow as was to be found in attendance on any man he had little thought to set such store by so light a protection or to consider at all the attendance of a thing so slight and vain but he was learning now the value that the world attaches to trifles and there were some the neglect of which had no more intoleration than sacrilege and then before he had come to every

Starting point is 03:14:07 a glance at the landscape showed that the hour had come when shadows were longer than material things it was not by any measurement that he saw this but by a certain eerie look that there is over all things when shadows have become greater than their masters so that the shadowy thing seemed to influence earthly affairs instead of good solid matter this eerie hour he had known of old and often felt the influence of it yet never before had his content thoughts noted it or told him as they did now that this was the turn of shadow-tide when each shadow surpassed the stature of its master so much do our own affairs sharpen our observation had he gone on perhaps none would have noticed but there was growing fast in him the outcast's feeling and however much he scorned the importance folks attached so vainly to shadows he not only felt his defect but intensely exaggerated it until impulses came to him to slink and to hide, and he began to know the natural avoidances that are part of the habits of the forsaken and hunted. Therefore, he went no nearer to Aragona than where he saw a small azalea growing a little way ahead, and there he sat down, protected by its shadow, which was only just enough to conceal his deficiency. If any noticed

Starting point is 03:15:33 him, he pretended to be eating, though he had forgotten to bring any food, with him. At times, small clouds passed over the face of the sun, but they did not stay long enough to take him through Aragona, so he stayed in the protection of that humble growth that had what he lacked, and wished he had never to do with magic. Something was making the evening passed very slowly, and making it very cold, and Ramona Lanzo did not know it was hunger. And at last the sun drew near to the horizon, and all the shadows stretched out dark and long, and Ramona Alonzo, more than ever conscious of his own wretched strip of gray darkness, felt amongst these unbridled shadows, much as he might have felt on some gala evening,

Starting point is 03:16:19 had he gone to a glittering fete, where men and women were dressed in all the silks of festival, and had moved amongst them himself in tardy oldest clothes. And then the sun set and his buoyant spirits arose, and feeling himself the equal of any material thing, he left the humble protection of the azalea and strode on towards Aragona. No sooner had he come to the fields and gardens that lay about the village, then idlers saw him and stood up at once and called aloud to one village folk, as though their idleness had been a perpetual guard,

Starting point is 03:16:56 whose purpose was triumphantly fulfilled. The man with the bad shadow, they all cried out, and he saw that his story had been noised about, and that this was become his name. Answering voices called from the little streets and out of small high windows, and there was a noise of feet running. And then some ran to the tower, where the ropes hung down from the belfry, to ring the bells that they rang against magic or thunder,

Starting point is 03:17:25 and those mellow musical voices went over the fields to protest against Ramona Lanzo. They seemed to be flooding all the gloaming with memories, as they carried to Ramon Alonzo there in his loneliness, vision on vision of times and occupations from which he was now cut off and debarred by a shadow. He felt the wistful love for their golden voices, calling out to him from this land he had lost, where dwelt the happy men that had not touched magic,

Starting point is 03:17:56 but when the bells rang on and on and on, a fury came on him at the narrow folly of the folk that made all this fussed out a shadow, and he flung his arm impatiently to his sword-hilt. But when he saw amongst the crowd that was hastening together against him, women and even children, and the protestation of the bell still filled the air without cry, he perceived that there was an adieu that it was beyond his sword to settle. So he turned back along the way he had come, and soon his shape was dim on the darkening hillside, to the eager,

Starting point is 03:18:33 crowd that watched and talked in the village, and soon their excited voices reached him no more, and he heard no sound but the bells, warning all the lands against him. For a while he paced the hillside in the chill, full of all such thoughts as arise from hunger, and that thrive in the cold and fatigue that hunger brings, doubts, fears, and despairs. What was he himself, he wondered? now that his shadow had left him. Was he any longer a material thing? And he helplessly cast his mind over all known forms of matter. Were any of them without shadows? Even water and even clouds? And what of this sinister thing with which he was associated, the magician's piece of gloom? How much was he a fellow conspirator with it?

Starting point is 03:19:28 How much was it damned? And his thoughts turned thence to the doom's. of the last day. How much was a shadow necessary to salvation? Would the blessed saints care for so light and insubstantial a thing? But at once came the thought that they themselves had renounced material things, and were themselves a material and spiritual, and might set more store by a shadow than he could ever know. And all the while, as he was walking on the darkening hillside, doubts asked him questions and despair's hinted replies which might neither of them ever have spoken at all had he thought to bring some food with him in a satchel and all the while the blue of the sky grew deeper and moths passed over the grass with a flight unlike the flight of whatever flies by day and little queer cries were heard that the daylight knows not and then like a queen slipping silently into her throne room through a secret panel of oak, bright over-lingering twilight, the first star appeared.

Starting point is 03:20:35 It was the hour when Earth has most reverence, the hour when her mystery reaches out and touches the hearts of her children. At such a time, if at all, one might guess her strange old story, such a time she might choose at which to show herself, in the splendor that decked her then to passing comet or spirit, or whatever stranger should travel across the paths of the planets. Ramona Alonzo, cold and lonely while star after star appeared, not only drew no happiness

Starting point is 03:21:06 from all that mellow glow, but saw in it a new horror. For looking closely with downcast eyes on the moss and grass of the hill, he noticed now that the piece of gloom that the magician had given him was a little darker than the

Starting point is 03:21:22 natural darkness of that early starry hour, so that he alone, of all things, in the night had a shadow creeping beside him. And again he brooded bitterly, trying to guess the end of it. Must he share the obvious doom of this false shape? Must he lose salvation because he had lost his shadow? And as he mournfully pondered, the night darkened,

Starting point is 03:21:50 and soon was darker than that piece of gloom. When Ramon Alonzo saw that it had gone and that he was for the moment like all other men and things, shadowless in the night, he soon forgot the future and turned again towards the village of Aragona, thinking to pass through its streets like any other traveler. When he reached the village, it was full night and all the stars were shining, not only those that had stolen into sight one by one were no eye watched,

Starting point is 03:22:20 but the whole Milky Way. The bells long since had ceased, and the hush held all the village as Ramona Lanzo struck. through. But it was a hush of whisperings, the strained hush of watchers. All the upper windows were open. Men were gathered in darkened rooms. Women peered behind curtains. Even in lofts, there were watchers. And for all their eagerness they did not see Ramonelonzo till he was well within the village. Perhaps they expected some more stealthy approach than his honest, confident stride. perhaps they whispered too earnestly amongst themselves most likely they thought that not just at that moment would the event for which they waited occur but when one sharp angry cry was heard from an upper window all the watchers saw him at once then the hush broke into a tumble of feet descending wooden staircases and a clatter of scabbards and a noise of doors flung open and sudden voices and the sound of feet in the street

Starting point is 03:23:26 for the faith they cried for the faith where is he behind him romano lanzo heard many voices before him he saw four men one of whom carried a lantern a few paces more and he was half-way through the village and these few paces brought him close to the four men behind him a confusion in the voices showed that they were not certain where he was ahead of him there seemed no more than these four he went quickly up to them and they no less eagerly and even gladly hastened towards him his sword was out and theirs for the faith they cried one at a time signors said romeon alonzo with a sweep of his hat for they were all coming on him together and at these words one hung back a little but another turned to him it is for the faith he said then they all came on together three upon Ramona Lanzo while the fourth stood beside them with drawn sword holding the lantern high. That for St. Michael, cried the first to cross with Ramonelonzo, but the stroke was well parried. That for the archangels! The same swordsman cried, making another blow at Ramonelonzo. But he had taken off his cloak and folded it on his left arm, and the cloak took that blow.

Starting point is 03:24:52 With his sword he parried a thrust from one of the others. But one man cannot fight against three for long, and the stationary lantern and the clear sound of steel had told the crowd in the street where the young man was, the man with the bad shadow, as they called him, and they were pouring that way. Ramon Alonzo therefore pushed past his antagonist, muffling his sword's point with his cloak, and so passing him that he was for a moment between himself and the other two swordsmen. then he passed round and attacked the man with the lantern. The four men had their plan, and it was evidently planned that the man with the lantern should not join in the attack, but should like the others. This they had probably long talked over and settled while they waited for Ramona Lanzo. And the man with the lantern would surely have been the least skillful swordsman. But that Ramona Lanzo should attack him, they none of them, had considered.

Starting point is 03:25:53 As Ramon Alonzo passed round behind the backs of the three, each of them turned and stood on guard for a moment, for it is well known to be dangerous to have an armed man behind you in the dark. In that moment, Ramon Alonzo launched himself upon the man with the lantern. There was no more than a pass and a parry, and then again a thrust. That for the mother of St. Anne, said the man with the lantern, aiming his last stroke, and then Ramona Lanzo's point entered his ribs. The strange magical shadow spun weirdly about as Ramona Lanzo grabbed the fallen lantern,

Starting point is 03:26:31 and holding it with the arm that had the cloak, his own eyes were protected by a fold of the cloth from the light that somewhat dazzled the eyes of the three. But it was not only the three, they were twenty or thirty more pouring up the street, only now a few paces away. With a flourish of cloak and the cloak, and lantern in their faces, and an always watchful sword point, he now disengaged from the three

Starting point is 03:26:56 and turn and ran as the crowd came pouring up. He had suddenly gained a few paces, but the light of the lantern is easy to follow at night, and keeping to the road he was soon approached by the swiftest of the runners. For a while they raced, but when Ramonelanzo saw that in the end he would be overtaken, he stopped and put down the lantern in the road. The other came up, not one of those three with whom he had already crossed swords. Ramon Alonzo flung his whole cloak at his head and picked up the lantern and ran on. Time enough to fight him later, he thought, if he overtook him again. But the cloak had completely covered the man's head and his sword had gone through it,

Starting point is 03:27:39 and the crowd came up with him before he was able to start after the lantern again. And Ramon Alonzo at once ran lighter without his cloak, and sped on with a certain pleasure such as comes to athletes in youth. The crowd now cursed the lantern that they saw babbling on before them, confusing it with lights of hellish origin, and forgetful or ignorant that it was the respectable lantern of the good kitchen grocer of their own village. Ramon Alonzo, they objured to stop,

Starting point is 03:28:11 calling him by the names of certain famous devils, but he no more heeded them than would these devils have done. only he noticed that though they fought or pursued as their cries indicated for the faith for st michael or for st joseph for st judas not a scarlet for all the saints for the king they none of them cried for a shadow and yet that was all that the fuss was about he reflected irritably there are always two views even over a trifle he had been gaining a little ever since he dropped his cloak but now he had been gaining a little ever since he dropped his cloak but now he had been a little but now he had been a few views he had been a few views even over a trifle he had been now one runner seemed to be ahead of the crowd again. He heard his feet above the sound of their shouts and their running. On his left ran a little lane among deep hedges, joining the wider road, and now was come the time to put the lantern to the purpose for which he carried it. He ran down the lane till he found a gap in the hedge on his right, and then he put the lantern high up on the

Starting point is 03:29:11 hedge on his left and stuck it there still alight. He then crawled through the gap on his right and ran softly towards the road he had left over a corner of a wild field. They soon came to the lantern. They did not hear him run softly over the field, but gathered round the lantern and pulled it down, and finding he was not there, they pursued in every direction, some of them going across the field to the road and following Ramon Alonzo. But they had wasted too many moments, but moments and could no longer hear him running. Following that lantern had been too easy, and now that it guided them no longer, they did not immediately use their wits or their ears. For some while, Ramon Alonzo heard voices behind him, then they dropped off and mingled with the far noises of the night.

Starting point is 03:30:01 He ran leisurely on, and presently the various parties turned back from their roads and lanes, and gathered again in the village, and there was talk till a late hour. of what they had done for the faith and many a guess there was of whence he had come and many of where he had gone and many a tale there was of the same thing differently seen and these tales were checked by the wisdom of elder men who had not been there but could make some shrewd guesses and when all was compared it was seen there had been more magic than one could easily credit if it had not actually happened and a wise old man who had not spoken as yet was seen to be shaking his head and when all were listening he spoke well it is gone he said the saints be praised ay it is gone said they all so they went to bed End of Chapter 14. The Folk of Arragona Strike for the Faith. Chapter 15 of The Char Women's Shadow by Lord Duncani.

Starting point is 03:31:16 This Liber Fox recording is in the public domain, read by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 15. Ramona Alonzo talks of technique and muddles his father. Ramon Alonzo ran on in the night, then dropped. to a walk, and soon he no more than sauntered along the road, whose grayness before him seemed the only light on earth. Above him, the whiteness of the Milky Way seemed to suggest other roads, and his thoughts rambled a while through the maze of this idea, until they were quite lost in it, then they came back bitterly to earth. The charwoman had been right. All this ridiculous fuss about a trifle, and not a trifle that they even set any store by themselves. For who prizes his shadow,

Starting point is 03:32:09 who compares it with that of others, who shows it, who boasts of it, a trifle that they knew to be a trifle, the least useful thing on earth, a thing that nobody sold in a meanest shop, and that nobody would if they could, and that nobody would buy, a thing without even a sentimental value, soundless and weightless and useless. far more than this romano lanzo thought and believed he had definitely proved to the detriment of shadows no doubt he exaggerated a shadow's worthlessness and yet the folk of that village that had turned out sword in hand had by their action exaggerated the other side of the argument and extremes are made by extremes nor was Ramon Alonzo in any way checked in his furious exposure of shadows by any wistful yearning that he had often felt for his own since the day that he lost it and was often to feel again. Logic indeed had been flouted upon either side in this business, and it is for just such situations as these that swords are made. Ramona Alonzo had used his well

Starting point is 03:33:22 and he wiped it now on a handful of leaves and returned it to the scabbard how late it was he did not know but it was full time for sleep so he lay down by the road but without his cloak he found it too cold even in the summer night so he rose and sauntered on

Starting point is 03:33:41 on the way he met a stream and drank from it and noticed the vivifying effect of water perhaps for the first time. Neither his lonely walk nor his lonely thoughts are worth recording until a faint color from the coming dawn began to brighten his journey, and the approach of another day turned his thoughts to the future, and a memory that he had the vile that his sister needed came to brighten his mind. And then the false shadow appeared again on the ground. Scarce noticeable had he not chanced to see it the evening before at a time when his eyes were downcast, less noticeable than the faintest of

Starting point is 03:34:22 earthly shadows that will sometimes fall from a small, unsuspected light, but enough to warn Ramon Alonzo that he must hide and slink and follow the ways of outlaws. Not far from him now was the forest that sheltered his home, and above the dark edge of it he could see the gable upon his father's house beginning to gleam in the morning. yet not now could he seek his home he must wait till the long shadows that were about to roam the fields had shrunk to a length that was somewhat less than man's he hastened on to reach the nearest part of the forest before the sunrise should expose his deficiency to whomever might be abroad in the clear morning so he left the road and took his way to the forest the sun rose before he gained the shade of the trees but no man was yet abroad and only a dog from a sleeping cottager's house saw the man with the short shadow hurrying over the grass upon which no other shadow was less than its master among shadows more enormous than the sound solid rocks the dog came up with him its suspicions well aroused probably by the queer unearthly appearance that the short shadow gave romano lanzo

Starting point is 03:35:41 rather than by any exact observation that his shadow was not the right length but this we cannot know for neither the wisdom of dogs nor the wisdom of men is as yet entirely understood by the other though great advances have already been made one has only to mention such names as arnold wilkinton sir murray jenkins rover fido and tauser the dog followed at first sniffing then he can't up close and took one long sniff at Ramona Lanzo's left leg and stopped and sat down satisfied. Presently he thought to bark and gave four or five short barks as a matter of duty, but that human scent that he got had been enough, and he showed none of the fury or suspicion and anger that men had shown in the village of Aragona. Ramona Lanzo was enormously heartened by this, for he saw that whatever magic there had been and although he was able to cast no natural shadow, yet his body was still human.

Starting point is 03:36:47 He trusted the dog for that. And then the dog, feeling that he had not perhaps quite given warning enough against this stranger that strolled by his master's house so early, barked three or four times again. But this in no way checked Ramona Lanzo's newly found cheerfulness, for the dog might have howled. The young man went on and came to the shade of the forest, while the dog got up and walked slowly back to his barrel, whence he had first been attracted by the curiously spiritual figure that Ramona Lanzo cut in the landscape at that hour, which had not seemed at first sight satisfactory. Through the forest,

Starting point is 03:37:29 Ramona Lanzo hastened towards his home, and yet haste was of no use to him, for he came as near to the garden's edge as it was safe to come long before he did show himself hungry though watching the windows of his own home in hiding even from his own parents and sister he lay on some moss in the forest near the end of the white balustrade waiting for the hour in which all human shadows would be a little bit shorter than men and as he waited he saw mirandula coming into the garden he saw her walk by path since shrubs that they both knew so well, and passed small lawns on which they had played, as it seemed to him almost forever. He longed to call to her to come to the forest, and yet he would not, for he knew not what to say, and would not let her know the price he had paid to obtain the vial she needed. And he durst not come to her, so he stayed where he was,

Starting point is 03:38:30 and the slow shadows shortened. Not enough light reached him in the forest, by which to judge the length of other shadows, so he tried to watch the length of Miranda's, still walking in the garden. But when Miranda came to the end of the garden that was nearest the edge of the forest, he could not raise his head to look without causing dried things in the thicket to crackle

Starting point is 03:38:54 so that she might have heard him, and when she turned back in her walk, he was soon unable to see her shadow clearly, even when he stood up. So he watched a small statue that there was on the lawn in marble of a nymph, such as haunted the break no longer, as men were beginning to say, and he saw its shadow dwindle. And when the time was very nearly come that the shadows of all things else would be as his,

Starting point is 03:39:22 and already the difference was not to be easily noticed, Ramona Lanzo walked from the wood. Mirandola saw him at once, coming over the open between the balustrade and the dark of the forest, and ran down one of the paths of the garden towards him. But all things are not shaped towards perfect moments, and as they ran to meet, their father and mother appeared, coming toward that part of the garden. I have the potion, said Ramon Alonzo,

Starting point is 03:39:52 and without a word, Marandala took the vial and secreted it, so swiftly passed her hand from his to her dress that he scarcely saw her take it, and looked to her face, where all human acts are recorded to see her recognition of his gift, but there was nothing there to show that she had just received anything. Then she smiled in her beauty and turned round to her parents. Ramon Alonzo is home, she said.

Starting point is 03:40:21 Then there were greetings and questions to Ramonzo, which he did not need to answer, for there were so many that he could not have answered one without interrupting the next, and when there began to be fewer and the time, was come for answers he was able to choose the questions to which answers were easiest made and he thought that mirandala sometimes helped him when difficult questions were asked of the making of gold certainly her own questions were sometimes frivolous though whether they came of her frivolity or her wisdom he was not quite sure his mother asked him is magic difficult his father said have you yet made much gold and Mirandala asked, Can you bring up a rabbit from under an empty sombrero? But there were too many questions for record,

Starting point is 03:41:13 and most of them were but a form of affectionate greeting and did not look for answers. Soon, however, the Lord of the Tower and Rocky Forest sought to detach his son from the rest of the little group in order to talk with him precisely upon the matter of business. And this he achieved, though not easily, because of Mirandula. And even then,

Starting point is 03:41:36 Marandala chanced within hearing so that at last he had to say to her, Miranda, we speak of business. And to definite questions of the making of gold, Ramona Lanzo found it difficult to reply now that his sister was no longer nigh to help him. He trusted her bright perception

Starting point is 03:41:57 so much that he well believed the love potion she had sought would better avail her than the gold that their father demanded, but he could not reveal her secret, and so found it difficult, without a sound training in business to give exact accounts of gold that was not actually in existence. Chiefly, he sheltered behind the technique of magic, withholding no information from his father on the matter of transmutation, on the contrary giving him much, yet shrewdly perceiving that these learned technicalities confused the matter in hand and led as surely away from it as the paths in a maze that run in the right

Starting point is 03:42:39 direction soon lead their followers wrong for some while this talk continued and though romano lanzo had no skill to write a prospectus he nonetheless evaded the absence of gold and protected his sister's secret and as they spoke they drew toward the house and it was not long before they entered the little banquet chamber, and there, while Ramona Lanzo ate to his heart's content, the Lord of the Tower told him of gold, Verrez. "'Sumwhat a greedy man, I fear,' he explained, "'and one that will bargain long and subtly "'in the matter of Miranda's dowry,

Starting point is 03:43:19 "'for which reason the gold is urgent.' "'Ramona Lanzo said nothing, thinking of the gross man whom he had once seen and of whom he had often heard yet if we refuse to close with him continued his father whom shall we find in these parts for mirandala will one come from the forest no and we are not such as can go to madrid the worst of Galvarez's demands will cost us less than that. And he laid his hand thoughtfully on the empty silver box that he now kept in the room with him, into which they had come from the scene of Ramona Alonzo's repast, the room where his bore spears hung.

Starting point is 03:44:07 Could we not wait a while? said Ramon Alonzo. No, no, said his father, smiling and shaking his head. it is too easy to wait a while in youth it is thus that the greatest opportunities pass even as you wait youth passes ah well well no more said ramonelonzo and his father fell to contemplating the future silently and with quiet contend and from this the day being warm he grew somewhat drowsy and scarcely noticed his son who thereupon went back again to the garden while the state of the shadows allowed him to walk abroad without yet attracting notice. There he spoke some while with his mother, unable to get away to Mirandala, and all the while the shadows were wasting. And at last his mother turned to the cool of the house,

Starting point is 03:45:03 and he made hasty farewells, pleading the urgency of work, promising to return soon, and leaving her before he had quite explained why he had come, while she warned him not to set too much store by magic beyond what would be required to please his father. Then he went to Mirandala in another part of the garden, and the shadows grew shorter and shorter. As he spoke with Mirandala, he hastened with her to the edge of the forest

Starting point is 03:45:34 to gain the protection of the oaks, whose mighty shadows he had come to envy. And as they went, he said to her, our father has arranged that you marry signor Gauvarez. He half, she said. Mirandola, he said, is he not a trifle gross, Signor Gauvarez?

Starting point is 03:45:54 Might he not, though pleasing at first, grow however slightly tedious when he grew older and become, though never irksome, yet of less charm, less elegance as the years went by? But Mirandala broke into soft peals of laughter, which long continued until they said farewell, and Ramona Lanzo walked alone through the forest. End of Chapter 15. Romona Lanzo talks of technique and muddles his father.

Starting point is 03:46:32 Chapter 16 of the Char Women's Shadow by Lord Duncany. This Librevox recording is in the public domain, read by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 16 The Work of Father Joseph Miranda came back from the edge of the forest wondering over wild heath to the garden. It had been her want to know what her brother did and even what he thought. But now he had some thought that she did not know, and it was at this that she wondered. She considered all the events that she thought might touch her brother, love first of all, and a while she thought this was his motive.

Starting point is 03:47:16 And then she thought it was something else, but she had not spoken with him long enough to guess that he went away so soon and so fast through the forest with a packet of meat in his satchel, because he had lost what all material things have in attendance upon them when they face the light, and that he durst not show while other shadows were shorter his miserable strip of five feet of gloom.

Starting point is 03:47:41 She had indeed heard tale, of men who had sold their shadows and knew that her brother had daily dealings with magic but she had not guessed the fee that the master took she had told him not to bring gold for what purpose then was his haste wondering she returned to the garden who could tell her only one only one amongst the few miranda knew was able to work out such puzzles and that was the good father joseph and just as she had thought of him she saw his plump shape come smiling across the garden. It was by a path through the garden he was wont to come from his house whenever he came to see the Lord of the Tower, and he came now to help make ready for that event, now near at hand, of which all the neighborhood talked, the visit of the serene and glorious Hidalgo, the Duke of Shadow Valley. And before he entered the house to take part in the preparations upon which the Lord of the Tower had long been occupied, except for the brief interruption of Ramon Alonzo's visit, Marandela greeted him and turned him aside to

Starting point is 03:48:50 another part of the garden, hoping to find from him the clue of her brother's sudden departure. That he would discern it, she had no doubt, that he might tell her, she hoped, for these two were good friends, almost, one might say, comrades in spiritual things. Marandala's confessions were the most complete of any that dwelt at the tower, perhaps the most complete the good father heard, and indeed they were a joy to him. Often from these confessions he gathered such knowledge, as it was right that he should have of the little earthly events that befell in the neighborhood, which might not otherwise have come his way. He came much to rely on them, and so it was that he and Mirandala had a certain comradeship in the wars that the just way. ever against sin. My brother came today, she said, as they walked.

Starting point is 03:49:46 He did, said Father Joseph, but he only stayed a short space and then went away. Oh, that is sad, said Father Joseph. He spoke with all of us and ate a dinner, and then he left at once. I trust he ate well, said the good man. Very well, answered Marandula. Very well, repeated Father Joseph. "'Yes, he ate a large dinner.

Starting point is 03:50:12 "'More than usual with him?' "'Yes.' "'Ah,' said the good man, "'then he had travelled fast.' "'I suppose so,' said Miranda. "'For what purpose did he come?' asked Father Joseph. "'Mirandola looked at him and smiled gently. "'He came to see us,' she said.

Starting point is 03:50:32 "'But Father Joseph had seen from that smile "'and from her eyes before she spoke "'that he would not get an answer, to that question. Very right, very proper, he said. But he would not stay, she said. Ah, he should have stayed a while, said Father Joseph. He went away very fast through the forest, she said. By what road did he come? He asked. Through the forest, she said. Ah, hiding, said Father Joseph. Not only was Father Joseph ready at all times with help for those that sought it, but one good turn deserved another, and he joyously used his wits for Miranda-la. He argued thus with himself. A man hides either from

Starting point is 03:51:17 enemies or from all. A man sometimes hid from the law, but the law came seldom to these parts, and in summer never, for LaGuarda slept much in the heat. From enemies then, or from all? now in all the confessions he had heard from men that had enemies he had noticed that none went back from their journeys by the same way by which they had come as romano lanzo had done did he then hide from all except from his family that would argue some change in him that he wished to conceal or even in his clothing for he had known young men as sensitive about their mere clothes as about the very form god had made or alas about even the safe of their souls but what change then it would not have escaped the eyes of mirandala i trust you as well he said yes she said he looks as he ever looks he asked oh yes quite the same as ever yes of course and he was dressed the same yes she said oh but his cloak ah his cloak was different said father joseph it was not there she said no he said and thought a while and now his thoughts ran deeper and stranger touching the ways of magic of which he knew much but as an enemy my child he said and he took her hand and patted it lest his words should alarm her had he a shadow she gave a little gasp yes his shadow was safe that was as near as father joseph came with his guesses. He thought much more but strayed further away from the truth, and then he

Starting point is 03:53:08 decided that more facts were needed, small things observed, short phrases overheard, which he knew so well how to weave, and determined to bide his time. That is all now, he said to soothe her, lest she should fear another question, probing such dreadful things. We shall find why he left. They turned back then to the house to take part in the preparation. there Father Joseph found all the old repose gone comfortable chairs that stood in quiet corners had been moved chairs that his body loved one a little wearied perhaps by spiritual work and the corners that had seemed so quiet now glared with a harsh light

Starting point is 03:53:51 with all their old cobwebs gone and stared with a strange emptiness because their chairs had been taken away to the banquet hall the quiet old boar spears that had seemed a very part of lost years no longer rested soberly on the wall but flashed and sparkled uneasily for they had been newly polished and seemed to have become all at once a part of the work-a-day present and to have lost with their rust all manner of moods and memories that they used to whisper faintly to father joseph whenever he saw them there and though the moods that the dimness and wreaths and rust of the old things brought him, were always edged with sadness, yet he gently lamented them now. But news had just come that the morrow was the day when Galvarez would bring the Duke of Shadow Valley with four chiefs of the Duke's bowmen and his own two men at arms. So Father Joseph was soon moving chairs with the rest, and though somewhat lethargic of body, yet his great weight

Starting point is 03:54:55 moved the chairs as the torrents swollen with snow move the small, and by the middle of the afternoon nothing seemed left of the mysterious harmony that is the essence of any home had penetes been set up there as in roman days they would not have recognized the rooms that they guarded but before the sun had set a sudden change came over the confusion and there was a new orderliness and a tidiness that the lord of the tower had quite despaired to see was all at once around him and peter who had come in from the garden to help attributed this to the aid of all the saints, and in particular to the aid of that fisherman from whom he had his name, but likely as not, it was but the result of mere steady work. Then Father Joseph sank into one of the chairs and rested. And then the Lord of the Tower and his lady began to discuss the reception of the Duke, where they should meet him, who should go with them,

Starting point is 03:55:58 and the hundred little points that make. an occasion. And here a nimble power came to their aid from where the large man in his chair rested heavily, for the mind of Father Joseph was bright and agile, and the making of plans never tired it as pushing chairs tired his body. He it was that suggested that the two maids from the dairy and the girl that minded the house should go with Miranda, and strew the road with flowers. and he planned, or they planned under his encouragement, that Peter and three men from the stables should take each abhor spear and stand to each side of the door like men at arms.

Starting point is 03:56:39 And it was Father Joseph's thought that another man should ride down the road till he saw the Duke arriving, and then spur back and tell them so that all should be ready. And the chamber that the Duke should have was prepared, and a room appointed to be ready. by the lady of the tower for each of his four bowmen, and last of all they thought of Gullverers. Lo, it was found that there was not room for him, but they thought of a long dark loft there was over the stables, where the sacks of corn were kept, longer than any room, and nearly as warm. This they set apart for Gauverres and his two men at arms.

Starting point is 03:57:19 End of Chapter 16, the work of Father Joseph Chapter 17 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Dunsainey. This Lieberbox recording is in the public domain, read by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 17, The Three Fair Fields The Day dawned splendidly, and air and fields glittered all the morning with sunlight, which wailed up over the world and was only stopped by the forest. Her mother called Miranda to the room, in which the drafts and the tapestries upheld their age-old antagonisms, and spoke with her of Galvarez. She spoke a while of his merits,

Starting point is 03:58:12 and often paused, for it was her intention to answer her daughter's objections, but Marondola made no objections at all. It was of these objections that the Lady of the Tower had been better prepared to speak than, oh, such merits, as might be attributed to Galvarez, and when there were no objections to answer, her pauses grew longer and longer, and soon she said no more at all, but sat and looked at her daughter. And that was a sight for which many would gladly have travelled far. Yet the Lady of the Tower was puzzled as she looked, seeing no doubts in her daughter's face, no hesitations, only a quiet acquiescence, and beyond that the trace of a smile that she could not fathom.

Starting point is 03:58:58 Then Marandola went from her mother's room, back to her own, with a quick glance as she went, through every window she passed that looked to the road, and she took the vial that she had had from her brother, from the place in which she had hidden it overnight, and once more placed it secretly in her dress. And as she passed through a corridor, leaving her room, she saw from a sunlit window the horsemen they all awaited, hurrying home. At once there was a stir of feet in the tower, the four men with the boar spears ran to the

Starting point is 03:59:31 door, and Father Joseph came out and blessed their gathering, and showed them where to stand and how to hold the spears, and all the while a certain flash in his eye showed them that blessing was not his only work. And the three maids ran to their baskets that were all full of wildflowers gathered by them in the dew, and Miranda came with them carrying a basket of rose-petals. As the maidens came through the door, Father Joseph blessed the baskets. Then they went slowly up the road, all four, strewing the way with flowers. Once more, Father Joseph had seen in Miranda's face a look of wonder and awe and joy, as though something had come to her that was new and strange. What should it be but love? And yet,

Starting point is 04:00:20 he deemed that this was something else, but knew not what it was. It was that she carried in the vial that her brother brought her a magical thing the first she had ever owned. As Father Joseph mused and failed to find an answer, they began to arrive the folk from neighboring cots, coming across the fields. They gathered a little way off from the door and began to talk of Galvarez. They were a folk, much as other folk are, and yet they were, as it were, as it were, maimed of half their neighborhood, for none dwelt in the forest. It may be because of this, they gossiped more eagerly of what neighbors they had. It may be that all gossip everywhere runs to its limit, and is nowhere more or less. They spoke of Gulliveres, who was so strangely honored,

Starting point is 04:01:10 and some said that the only cause of the visit was that his castle chanced to stand by the Duke's journey, while others say, nay, arguing that in his youth, there must have been some sprightly quality that Gullveress had had, some excellence of mind or limb, for the sake of which the Duke remembered him now. How else, they said, would this exquisite Hidalgo, the mirror of all that followed the chase, whether of wolf, stag, or boar, whose mind was brightly stored with the merriest songs of the happiest age Spain knew, whose form, when mounted on one of his own, surpassing horses was the form of a young centaur, how else would he tolerate the gross galvarez? Thus merrily flew the gossip, passing backward and forward lightly from mouth to mouth.

Starting point is 04:02:01 And suddenly, where a hump of the road appeared white against the blue sky, all saw two horsemen. At once Father Joseph called sharply to the improvised men at arms, in a voice unlike the one wherewith he was wont to bless. They stiffened under it, and became more like the guard they were meant to be. The lord of the tower and his lady came out and stood before their door. The girls went on strewing flowers, and then was seen the velvet cloak and cap of the Duke, and the great plume, and the clear, thin face, and his peerless chestnut horse aglow in the sun, and the plump figure and coarse whiskers of Galvarez. these two were seen and recognized by all before one of the chiefs of the bowmen had yet been discerned but two of these were nearer to the tower than anybody knew they slipped quietly from bush to bush and went carefully over horizons two were far before the duke and two close behind him it was the way of the bowman and then a little way behind the riders straggled gullveraz's two men at arms

Starting point is 04:03:12 at first they had marched in front but the horses of the duke and the gulvarez ambled rather than walked and the two men at arms in their green plush and cuirasses with the heat of the sun on the iron helmets they wore soon fell a little behind and now a bowman coming into sight hailed the group of gazers near the door of the tower and they saw two of those green bowmen that were so seldom seen and were so famous in fable and gossip A little thrill of wonder ran through the crowd, and presently these two halted one on each side of the road, and the Duke, beside Gulliveres, rode on between them, and came to where the girls were scattering flowers. As soon as Golvarez perceived Marandola, he buried his head and smiled at her. It was a huge grimace, Marandola courtesied to him. Perhaps she smiled, but it was not easy always to trace exactly every expression that passed over her face, and then she gravely continued strewing the rose-petals.

Starting point is 04:04:18 Then the Duke doffed his hat of dark blue velvet, and the great plume of a brighter blue, curved through the summer air, and a glance of the Duke's blue eyes met a flash from the darker ones of Mirandala. So passed the Duke and Galvarez by Mirandula, riding over the flowers and rose-petals, and not a word was said. She had seen the eyes of the Duke, duke and the teeth of galvarez and both men saw her beauty and so that instant passed there came a wavering cheer from the group of gazing neighbors a shot of anger from father joseph at some clumsiness of the improvised guard and the lord of the tower and his lady were welcoming the duke as he dismounted on flowers the neighbors clustering a little closer appraised the duke's great blue cloak the jewels in his sword-hill his easy seat upon that splendid horse, a certain indolence redeemed by grace, the strong gate of his walk, his face, his youth. Ay, they praised his youth, as though any man could deserve credit for that. But there was such a way with him, so pleasant a grace, that they gave praise out of their thoughtless hearts

Starting point is 04:05:35 to everything that formed it. Then the horses were led away by the men of Galvarez, and host and hostess and guests and Miranda all passed into the tower. The Lord of the Tower walked with the Duke, exchanging courtesies with him, his lady walked with Gauvarez after them, and Mirandala followed behind. And so they came through the hall, and towards the banquet chamber,

Starting point is 04:06:03 the host watching opportunity all the way, and not until they arrived where the banquet was ready, and the maids that had strewn the wildflower, had brought a silver bowl to wash the hands of the duke in scented water did the lord of the tower note and take his opportunity he went then to govarez past mirandela speaking low to her as he passed you shall see him presently he said to her yes presently said the lady of the tower just hearing or if not divining what her lord had said to his daughter both thought she smiled obediently and to Galvarez he said, I have a pretty tusk that I would show you before we banquet, a bore we took last season.

Starting point is 04:06:52 Galvarez well understood, for there had been a bargain not in clear words, and without seals or parchment, inscribed only upon those two men's understanding, that if he brought the Duke to visit the Lord of the Tower, the hand of Miranda should go to Galvarez. And the time was come to ratify it. gladly then galvarez went away with his host the bringing of the duke had been none of gunsalvo's bargain he had come to a time of life when events and occasions seemed but to disturb the placidity of the years it had been forced on him by some whim of mirandala

Starting point is 04:07:31 they came to the room that the host most often used in which there were indeed boers tusks to show but this both men soon forgot i have begun to think somewhat of late said the lord of the tower concerning my daughter's future indeed said gulvarez somewhat replied his host no more instance passed than are needed for a heavy mind to move and then gauvarez said i take then this opportunity to express my ready willingness to marry your daughter should this have your approval i trust that my castes may be an abode not unworthy of one of your honored house gladly then the lord of the tower expressed his approval in phrases not unfitted to that occasion many such phrases he uttered fair courteous and flowery and still invented more though the arts of perfect speech were some years behind him now but he feared the next words of golvarez and seemed to wish to delay them perhaps he blindly hoped to stave them off altogether you will doubtless said Galvarez give her a dowry in keeping with the luster of your name I shall indeed give her a dowry said Gonzalvo indeed the coffer that I set aside for this very purpose is here and he laid his hand on the coffer of oak and silver Galvarez lifted the box a few inches with one large hand that could span the box and hold it and put it down again the Lord of the tower waited for him to speak, but Galvarez said nothing. It seemed to the owner of the box that it would have been better, had Galvarez deprecated it, than that he should have thus waded

Starting point is 04:09:22 in silence, and as Golvarez did not speak, his host continued. It is not as if I had not the coffer, he said. It is here. I have set it aside. But it has not been convenient to plenish it lately, or indeed as yet to put anything in it at all. Still, Gauvarez said nothing. The coffer is there, said Gonsalvo. Gauveres nodded. I had intended to fill it later, Gonzalvo continued, if it should not be ready by the day of the wedding, and one day to send it after Mirandala. Gauvarez was slowly and heavily shaking his head. It seemed to the lord of the tower that the stubbly growth of Gulliveres's chestnut whiskers almost shone as he shook his head

Starting point is 04:10:11 as the skin of a horse when he is in good fettle. That would be too late, said Gonsalvo. Some what, replied Gauvarez. Gonzalvo sighed. It must then be three fair fields, the pastures that lay at evening under the shade of the forest. Perhaps two, but no, Gullverrez would ask for all three, and how could he find a husband for Miranda if he rejected Galvarez's demands.

Starting point is 04:10:41 Time was when he could have done so, for he had known somewhat of the world once, but the world had changed. My son, Ramona Lanzo, he said, is studying to learn a livelihood from which we have great hopes. Never a word from Galvarez helped him out, merely a look of interest that compelled him to go on. in case he should be delayed he continued in assisting me to set aside the dowry that i should wish to offer my fields my two fields should be given until the money was sent two fields said galvarez nay nay said his host all three ah said galvarez so we shall be agreed said gonsalvo how much money signor are you pleased to give on that day that it shall be convenient three hundred crowns of the golden age replied the lord of the tower golvarez smiled and shook his head as though in meditation five hundred said the lord of the tower my respect for your illustrious house said galvarez and my friendship for you signor that i deem myself honored to have holds me silent five hundred said the host with awe in his voice for it was a great sum

Starting point is 04:12:02 galvarez waved something away with his hand in the emptiness of the air let us speak no more signor he said our two hearts have agreed it is a great honor and i am dumb before it the lord of the tower sighed he had known whenever he thought that he should do no better than this and yet he had thought seldom but hoped instead now it was over and the three fields gone they never seemed fairer than now come he said we must return to mirandala so back they went and jauntily walked gulvarez though in no wise built or planned for walking jauntily but a spirit whether of greed or love or triumph was exalted within him and was lifting his steps once more as they returned to the banquet chambers his whiskers seemed to shine "'Hi-ho!' thought the Lord of the Tower, my three sweet fields. And there was Miranda, standing near her mother, her left hand to her dress, about the girdle as though armed, and a look was on her face that Father Joseph could not interpret, for he had come into the room and was watching her. It was as though she were about to enter a contest, and stood proud before an armed and doughty antagonist.

Starting point is 04:13:23 her mother and the duke were already seated the maids were pouring wine into chalices from a goblet that stood on a small table apart the host and gulvarez seated themselves and then father joseph then the four chiefs of the bowmen came in and took seats lower down the table father joseph said grace and still that look in the eyes of mirandula then mirandula went over to the maids that stood at the table apart and took from them one of the eyes of mirandala then mirandala went over to the maids that stood at the table apart and took from them one of the chalices and carried it to Gauvarez. Her father and mother smiled at her mistake, for she should have carried it to the Duke first, but their smiles broadened into smiles of merry understanding, as each caught the other's eye. Golvarez would have strutted had he been standing, had he been a peacock, he would have spread his tail feathers and rattled them. As it was, smirks and smiles expressed all this and more. He was about to speak, but Mirandala left him to fetch another chalice.

Starting point is 04:14:26 So far as Father Joseph was concerned, it was unnecessary for Gulliveres to say anything, for the priest knew every thought that passed through his mind, but he had not yet fathomed the mood of Mirandala. Then, returning, she offered a chalice to the Duke and went back and stood by her mother. Be seated, child, by Signor Gulliveres, said her mother, but Mirandola still stood there a while.

Starting point is 04:14:53 Gauvarez, though flustered with pride, because he had been given the wine by Miranda first, yet dared not drink it before his august friend drank. Now they both drank together. Still, Marandala stood beside her mother between her and the Duke. A moment she watched him with those eyes that never saw less than keenly. Then she turned from a glance of the Duke's blue eyes, and answered her mother tardily, as though just returned from far dreams. yes mother she said and went to the chair besides signor govarez and now wine was carried by the maids to father joseph and the four chiefs of the bowmen whereafter they placed the goblet before their master and meats were set before all and to-o'-rose and men's hearts were warmed and they spoke of hunts that had been and the taking of ancient boars but silent and with a strange look set the duke of shadow-vales

Starting point is 04:15:51 End of Chapter 17, The Three Fair Fields. Chapter 18 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Duncaney. This Liber Fox recording is in the public domain. Read by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 18, The Love Potion The look on the face of the Duke of Shadow Valley was gradually growing stranger. The outlines of his face were wearying. His quick glances roamed no more, but turned to his plate listlessly, and he was breathing

Starting point is 04:16:37 faster. The lady of the tower thought his cheeks grew a little paler under the summer's tan, and yet she was not sure, when a pallor swept over his face even to the lips suddenly, and all at once the duke was very sick. Poison, wondered Father Joseph. Not the Lord of the Tower, he thought, nor his lips. lady nor Miranda. He looked quickly at the others from face to face. No? What then? So far, Father Joseph was right, but no one had spoken, and he needed more material to arrive at the truth.

Starting point is 04:17:13 Then the Duke was sick again. All the bowmen stood up, irresolute. Still no one spoke, unless the murmured anxieties of the Lady of the Tower were speech. Merendola was silent as a little sphinx long left by the earliest dynasty in a tomb of rock under sand galvarez was thinking to himself that he had fulfilled his part of the bargain whatever happened to the duke when he arrived the duke was sick again all in the silence then suddenly there was speech suddenly there was a tempest of words stinging and fierce and hot as when africa rains sand through the silvery darkness it was the duke's speaking. His courtly tongue, for whose grace he was known through Spain, shot forth the words as a long whip hurls the little lash at its end. The Lord of the Tower seemed to be growing smaller, as though shriveling under the words. Father Joseph's eyes turned downward as he became absorbed with humility. I will not repeat the words. Against his hostess, the Duke said nothing,

Starting point is 04:18:21 but his speech so blasted Golvarez for bringing him there that she, she shuddered. And the bowman stood there ready, awaiting any command from their master. He accused none of poison. Had he done so, the hands of the bowman would have been on that one's shoulders instantly, but he deemed himself insulted, either with meat, long dead, or with wine of so deadly a cheapness, that when the gypsies brew it out of no honest berries, they neither drink it themselves nor allow their children near it. It was this insult that the serene Hidal go felt more than the pains of the wretchings and these were severe his anger raged as though from some magical source rather than any annoyance caused by mere earthly cares and he would have still raged on till all but he had gone trembling out from the chamber but another bout of retching came upon him and all pressed round him offering ministrations none of these would he have but only demanded of them the place of his bedchamber

Starting point is 04:19:25 desiring to rest a while before he should ride away from the cursed house, and this the lord of the tower offered to show him, bent almost to his knees by contrition at the neglect of his duty as host, and at the insult offered in his house to so serene a Hidalgo. But the Duke of Shadow Valley would have none of him, and commanded his bowmen instead to find the way to his bedchamber. They therefore searched discreetly, two going on before, the duke following slowly supported by the shoulder of another while the fourth marched menacingly behind to guard his master against whatever new outrage might be meditated in the suspicious house behind the fourth bowman and as near as they durst followed the whole household trying to tell the bowman the way to the duke's bedchamber but not to a word would one of the four chiefs hearken yet however much they disdained the cries of the

Starting point is 04:20:25 cries of the maids and the ejaculations of Gonzalvo himself, these must have been clues in their search, and soon they came to a larger room than the others, which was clearly prepared for a guest. Into this they led the Duke, who immediately banished them, to be alone on the bed with his sickness and anger. And in the afternoon the Duke's sickness ceased, so far as the bowman could hear who guarded the door, but his anger remained with him, and none could bring him food, not even his own bowman. And the evening wore away, and the Duke was weak after his vomitings, yet none of his bowmen durst entered to bring him food, for he roared with anger whenever one touched his door, and any mention of food increased his fury. And at nightfall, the Lord of the Tower

Starting point is 04:21:16 himself brought food, but when he came to the door the Duke swore an oath to eat no food in that house, nor even drink water there, so he went disconsolately away. In the anxiety that hung over all that house, the suit of Galvarez made but little progress. He talked to Mirandala, but there was a strange silence upon her, and she had spoken seldom since the Duke had drunk the wine that was in the chalice she brought him. He spoke a while with her mother, but whatever words were said, all ears were only alert for any sounds that might tell or hint any changes in the Duke's health or his anger. And it grew late, and none durst go again to the Duke's chamber with food. So they went to their own bedchambers, passing by the silent bowman, sternly guarding the door,

Starting point is 04:22:10 and when midnight came it brought no hush to that house that was not lying heavily there already. For the whole house seemed to brood on the enormity of the insult, that it had offered to that serene magnifico, the Duke of Shadow Valley. But when morning came, and still the Duke refused food, and still lay weak on his bed, and his anger was strong as ever, and not even the bowmen durst bring him food or drink, then a new and darker anxiety troubled the house. For if his weakness forbade him to ride away,

Starting point is 04:22:44 and his anger would not permit him to touch food or drink in that house, might not the Duke die? Then the lord of the tower told his lady that he would try once more, and he went with a savory dish and a flagon of wine. But he returned so soon, so flushed, and so ill at ease, that the anxieties of all that saw him were only increased. Of what had passed he said nothing, beyond saying to his lady, and often telling over again whether to others or muttering it low to himself, that he knew that the duke had never meant what he said. then Father Joseph, noticing his distress, went without a word to the savory dish and the flagon and carried them from the room, and soon his suave phrases were heard outside the Duke's door by such as listened round corners in their anxiety, and none failed to hear the roar of the Duke's answers.

Starting point is 04:23:41 So Father Joseph sighed and returned to the Lord of the Tower, who wishful to conceal that he had heard what the Duke had shouted, said to his guest, how fair did you the power of the holy church is waning said father joseph it is not what it was in the good days alas said gonsalvo and there were looks of commiseration toward father joseph it is because of all this sin father joseph continued that there has been in the world of late and the commiserating looks changed all of a sudden for they knew that father joseph knew all their sins then the lady's of the tower took the flagon, thinking that perchance the Duke might drink if no word was said about food. He will not touch it. He will not touch it, said her lord, as she left, nor did he. When the Lady of the Tower was gone, Father Joseph drew Miranda a little apart.

Starting point is 04:24:38 It is a strange and awful anger, he said to her. Is it? She said, a little above a whisper, her eyes much hidden under the dark lashes. Yes, said he. and no more said Mirandala till in a little while he spoke again. What was it, said Father Joseph. A love potion, said Mirandala. Father Joseph thought for a moment, though his face showed no more sign of thought than surprise.

Starting point is 04:25:07 I fear your brother mixed it ill, he said. I fear so, said Mirandala. And his curiosity satisfied he had leisure to turn to the things of his blessed calling. Nor does Holy Church commend these snatchings, he said, at the good things of the world by means of the evil art and the bruise of magic. I have sinned, said Miranda. Father Joseph waved a hand. It was a small sin to bring to the notice of one of his years and calling, for there were enough men and women in his little parish for the study of every sin. Nevertheless, he was thinking deeply. Then Miranda saw her mother return and put down food and flagon with a sigh, and she knew that

Starting point is 04:25:57 the splendid young man was lying there without food, and the thought of the harm she had done him touched her heart to a sudden impulse. I will take the food to him myself, she said. Instantly, Father Joseph laid a firm hand on her arm, when he is weaker, he said. Marandola looked at him, held back by his grip while her impulse died away. Yes, not till evening, said he, with that assurance that he was wont to use whenever he spoke of the certainties of salvation, and more than his heavy grip,

Starting point is 04:26:31 that tone held Miranda. She passed the long day anxiously, fearing what weakness and the want of food might do to that mirror of chivalry, the young duke, at whom folk gazed in the glorious courts of Spain, when he came to visit the victorious king. What wonder then he stirred hearts when he rode through the little fields to such a tower

Starting point is 04:26:54 as this in the lonely lands where the forest ended all, and illustrious knights rode rarely and were gone by in a candor. She was ill at ease all day. Only once a sparkle of her own meriness came back to her. Her mother had asked her to walk in the garden with Galvarez, and Miranda spoke of the Duke's hunger and thought that he might take food from his friend and would doubtless drink with him. So Galvarez went with a large plate full of food and a flagon of wine and two glasses, and the voice of the Duke was heard ringing out with that magical anger.

Starting point is 04:27:34 Back then came Galvarez, denying all the things that were said the loudest, and that must have been clearly heard, and brooding upon the rest. there was no walk in the garden. And all that day went by, and none could bring food to the Duke. But when evening came and all was quiet but the birds, the light came in serenely, level through the windows, with the flash of insects silver across the rays. All in the calm, Marandala took the flagon,

Starting point is 04:28:05 and passed the bowman, went to the Duke's door, and opened it and stood there in the doorway. and for a moment his anger muttered, then stumbled, and was all silent, as though it had faded out with the fading of day, or had some magical cause whose power had waned, and he lay there looking at Miranda, and she stood looking at him. So passed a moment. Then she came to him and poured into a chalice a little wine from the flagon. Once more she offered him wine, but it was all earthly now. glory and the glow of southern vineyards and distilled by no prentice hand such as Ramona Lanzos, and he accepted the wine lying weak on his bed. A while she spoke with him until there came to him the thought of food, and when he spoke of it, she went to bring it to him. She passed again by the bowmen who questioned her in low voices. He will recover, she said, and sighed as she said

Starting point is 04:29:09 thinking of all the night and day he had lain there pale and weak. She went to the kitchen and gathered small, savory things, such as might be lightly eaten by one that has been so strangely troubled, small earthly condiments of daily uses that had not to do with magic. And a rumor of things overheard from the mutterings of the bowmen spread through the house and told that the Duke would eat again. Then came Gulliveres to the kitchen, offering to carry the plates for Mirandala, and this she let him do. And when they were come to the door of the Duke's bedchamber, he carried the plates in,

Starting point is 04:29:49 Mirandola waiting without. But even yet the Duke's anger was not over, and the sound of it boomed down the corridor as he swore that none in that house should bring him food unless Miranda. And least of all, Gulliveraz, who had brought him to those accursed doors, doors within which he had suffered so vilely. And Gauvarez came out so swiftly that the food shook and slid on the plates. Then Marandela took them and went in. And Golvarez remained a while with the bowman, explaining such things as men explain when sudden fault has been found with them unjustly or justly. The Duke ate little for weakness, but Miranda sat by his bed, and somehow her eyes

Starting point is 04:30:35 strengthened him when he looked in the deep calm of them, as though he found a power in their gentleness, and often he stopped, overwrought by the wrong that the house had done him, but flashes from Miranda's eyes seemed to beat across his wrath and seemed to parry it, and after a while he would eat a little again. And so a little of his strength came back, and for brief while he slept. Then Miranda crept out and told the bowman, and one by one they stole in on their soundless feet and saw that his sleep was natural and stole out again, and all the house was hushed, and the Duke slept till morning. End of Chapter 18, The Love Potion.

Starting point is 04:31:28 Chapter 19 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Dunsainey. This Lieberwobox recording is in the public domain, read by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 19. Father Joseph explains how the laity have no need of the pen. Gonsalvo and Gullvarez went early to the Duke's bedchamber to assure themselves that the hopes of last night were just and that the Duke would live. He still lay weakly upon his bed, but his anger flamed up at once as soon as he saw them, and was the old enormous wrath they had known the last two days. before it they backed away towards the door, and ever as they tarried, fresh waves of it overtook them and seemed to sweep them further.

Starting point is 04:32:20 Sometimes one would delay and stammer polite excuses, while the other backed away faster. Then the rush of the Duke's anger would bear down on the one that was nearest and drive him back spluttering, and another swirl of it soon would overtake the other. So, breathless with protestations, they were both swept out, and behind the closed door the Duke's anger died into mutterings like the croon of a tide along a deserted shore.

Starting point is 04:32:48 Descending, they joined the Lady of the Tower and Father Joseph in the room where the boar spears hung. And in answer to the anxious inquiry in his lady's eyes as they entered, Gonzalvo said, he has slept and is no weaker, but the humors of his sickness have not yet left him. She turned then to Goverres, seeming to look for some clearer news from the stranger. He does not yet lucidly understand your hospitality, he said. He comprehends where he is, but the fevers of his malady delude him concerning it, as yet he knows not his friends, or only sees them transmuted by the vain humours of fever. At this moment, Mirandalla passed by the door, carrying two dishes,

Starting point is 04:33:36 one of meat and the other of fruit. The lady of the tower was about to call her, for she was perplexed between the Duke's weakness and the strength of his fevers, but Father Joseph laid a hand on her arm, and Miranda went by. Then Father Joseph went to the open doorway and blessed the carrying of the dishes. And much of that morning, Miranda sat by the Duke's bedside, and at Whiles he spoke with her, and at whiles ate a little from the two dishes, and while she was with him his great anger was lulled. But not yet would he take food or drink from any in all the household, save only Miranda, nor tolerate one of them at the door of his bedchamber. And the rumor went through the house that the Duke would live,

Starting point is 04:34:25 but it passed through gatherings of doubts and fears that had haunted the house since first he was taken ill, and many a fear clung yet to the hopeful rumor, But Father Joseph, who had some familiarity with the ways of life and death, saw how it would be, and deeming that there would be no entertainings at the tower, nor high doings, nor any need of him, his thoughts turned down to his own little house, and the humble folk that came there from any a work-a-day need, and to be unburdened of their different sins. He therefore said farewell to his host. "'What?' said the Lord of the Tower.

Starting point is 04:35:05 "'You leave us already?' "'It is time,' said Father Joseph. "'But you will help us to entertain the Duke?' "'Haply,' said Father Joseph. "'He will lie a while in bed.' "'But when he is recovered,' said Gonsalvo, "'we will give a banquet to celebrate his deliverance.' "'But Father Joseph was more sure of the passing

Starting point is 04:35:28 "'of the illustrious visitor's illness "'than he was of the fading of his anger, in the heat of which he had himself stood once already. I must return to the village, he said. Mirandala had entered the room. Then you will come again, said Gonsalvo, to marry Marandola to Signor Gauvarez? For Gonsalvo had a small chapel in his house.

Starting point is 04:35:53 Gladly, said Father Joseph. Thank you, father, said the lady of the tower. Thank you, said Mirandala. then away went Father Joseph, and soon from the pinnacles of lofty plans, his mind descended to the little sins that the folk of the village he tended would have been sinning while he was away. He tried to think as he walked of the sins that each would have done. Sometimes some girl of strange or passionate whims would a little puzzle his forecast, but for the most part he guessed rapidly, and just as he named to himself the sin of his last parishioner, he reached the door under the deep black thatch of the house he loved so well.

Starting point is 04:36:36 He turned the handle and entered. It was not locked, for none in those parts dared rob Father Joseph's house, nor was the sin of robbery much practiced in houses there, but rather on the road in the open air. He entered and was once more with his pleasant knick-knacks that he had not seen for two days, and for a while his eye roamed over them going from one to another as he sat in his favorite chair in deep content for a long while he sat thus drawing into his spirit the deep quiet of his house which had never been broken by such events as trouble the calm of the world No illustrious Hidalgo's sojourn there. Rarely even they passed it by. The sound of a trumpet or the sight of a gonfalon came once or at most twice in a generation. His gaze was reposing now on an old mug shaped like a bear which rested upon a bracket. Sometimes he was wont to fill it with good ale and so past lonely evenings when sunset was early. Gazing now at the mug those evenings came back. to his memory, and he thought of the joyous radiance that there seemed to have been about them,

Starting point is 04:37:52 when again and again, till it interrupted his thoughts, came a very furtive knock on his back door. He imagined the timid hand of some penitent sinner come there to be rid of his sin, and arose to open the door. When he opened the little back door that looked to the forest, who was there but Ramon Alonzo? The young man was wearing a fine old cloak of his father's, which Mirandela had begged for him on the day that he had gone cloakless away from the tower. She had told Peter to take it after him, but Peter's master had not allowed him to go until the Duke had been received at the tower. But when the banquet came to that sudden end, none thought any more of Peter except Miranda, so he took the cloak and went, and quietly as he left, Arandela said to him,

Starting point is 04:38:45 Tell him all that you saw. So Peter had traveled all the rest of that day and all through the night, and had come on Ramona Alonzo in the magician's wood, for Ramonelanzo going circuitously around Aragona, over fields and wild heath by night, and in the daylight, traveling cautiously, at such times as his shadow looked human, arrived on the second night,

Starting point is 04:39:11 so late near the house of the master, that he decided to sleep in the wood and enter by daylight. There Peter found him about dawn with the cloak, and glad Ramon Alonzo was of it. But when he heard of the malady that had overtaken the Duke, the dreadfulness of which Peter told in all fullness, and learned that the Duke had just drunk of a flagon of wine, he knew at once with a guilty inspiration that it had been the love potion.

Starting point is 04:39:40 And suppose that by some mistake of the serving-man, the flag and meant for Galvarez had been changed with the one for the Duke. Then anger came on him against the magician and a hatred of all his spells, and he determined to put his plan into instant practice. But this plan involved writing, for he meant to write the syllables of the spell that opened the shadow box, one by one, amongst other writings, and to trick the magician into reading them for him. Therefore, he thanked and said farewell to Peter, and as soon as ever the man was out of sight, he turned his back upon the house in the wood, and traveling fast but cautiously, and going wide again

Starting point is 04:40:24 round Arragona under the cover of night, came secretly the next morning out of the forest, to the little door at the back of the priestly house. And there, as Father Joseph opened the door, ready to give absolution for some small sin, the first words that greeted him were, I pray you, Father, to teach me the way of the pen. Truly, now there is no sin in the pen itself, though it be a fully handy tool in the fingers of liars, and the greater part of the cheating that there is in the world

Starting point is 04:41:00 is done by the pen to this day. And whatever Father Joseph suspected of Ramona Lanzo's work, he could not easily refuse instruction in the proper, upper handling of aught that was in itself so innocent he therefore rather temporized the pen he said that is indeed no doubt a worthy tool yet of little use to the laity those things it is needful to know are written already and should more ever be necessary are there not monks to write it or is it to be supposed that those most illustrious presences our spiritual overlords should have not neglected some matter that it were well to write and should have failed to record it? Indeed, no, said Ramon Alonzo, lowering his head in a pose of appropriate humility. For what purpose, then, would you put your own hand to the pen? Father Joseph asked of him. I would fain know the handling of it, replied Ramon Alonzo, yet not from any wish to write upon

Starting point is 04:42:05 parchment, for that is no knightly accomplishment. Indeed not, said father Joseph, yet to know the handling of a pen, as your father knows, and the way that it takes up ink, and sometimes to have essayed sundry remarks with it, as he hath upon parchment, are things that add credit to a knightly house. This much I will teach you, but deem not that there is ought to be written that hath not long since been well said, and committed to parchment, and given to the charge of those whose duty it is to watch and protect learning. no more than this Ramon Alonzo needed. He therefore thanked Father Joseph courteously, who went and fetched a pen, and soon the young man was being taught the way of it, where the fingers go, the place of the thumb, the movement of the whole hand, the method of taking ink, and the suitable intervals. Here, said Father Joseph, near the window where you shall have the full light, for Ramon Alonzo had seated himself in a corner and dragged the little tape, to the darkest part of the room. But Ramon Alonzo, as it drew near noon, shunned any approach of light,

Starting point is 04:43:18 and would go near no spot on which shadows fell. Whether Father Joseph noticed or not this strange avoidance of light, his intellect pounced at once on his pupil's trivial answer, excusing himself for keeping his seat in the dusk of the corner, and from that moment his old suspicions came on to the right trail, which they never left till the strange, secret they followed had been tracked up to its lair. As Ramonso came by the knack of the pen, he began to copy one by one on the parchment, those three syllables clear in his memory that were the key of the shadow box. He rejoiced to think that by asking Father Joseph for never a letter of the Christian alphabet, he persuaded him that he sought for no more than he said a certain way

Starting point is 04:44:07 with the pen that should be a nightly accomplishment. Far otherwise was it, for as Father Joseph watched those sinister syllables that were no language of ours, he began to see a young mind given over wholly to magic, and as each syllable appeared on the parchment, he muttered inaudibly, The Black Art, oh, the Black Art. But with practice, Ramon Alonzo made those syllables clearer and clearer, until they appeared on the parchment whereon he wrote no otherwise than as they were in the great book of the magician that lay on the lectern in the room that was sacred to magic father joseph watched the work of the pen that he guided and all the while saw those syllables growing clearer until although he knew not what they were nor the language in which they were written he saw unmistakable omens and threats about them and all those omens were magical sinister evil.

Starting point is 04:45:10 Ramon Alonzo carried it off lightly, saying he but made idle strokes with the pen, believing he deceived Father Joseph. That hour for which he so often yearned went by when the shadows of other men were the same as his, and still he worked at the pen. He saw, still close in his corner, the red and level rays shine in

Starting point is 04:45:32 and lend a splendor to Father Joseph's knick-knacks. He saw the evening come, and those big Cothayan shapes that he made, black and bold in the gloomy. Then Father Joseph arose to light his tapers, and before he did that, Ramona Lanzo thanked him and hastily bade him farewell, and was soon away on his circuitous journey that should lead him wide in the dark round Aragona. So, Ramona Lanzo came next night to the house in the wood. But Father Joseph saddled his mule in the morning. and rode away by the very earliest light, and came in the afternoon to the hilly house of a priest he knew

Starting point is 04:46:14 who had much knowledge of magic, and with him he brought that parchment on which all day Ramona Lanzo had practiced those curious signs. This priest went sometimes down to the church in Aragona, but dwelt mostly in his house alone, where he worked out a scheme for the mitigation of sin, or read books exposing magic. up the rocky track to that house on his struggling meal father joseph arrived and when the gaiety of their greetings was over he showed his friend the marks that were on the parchment

Starting point is 04:46:49 i fear aloisius we have not good here brother aloisius took it not good he said not good at all then he put it down and put on great spectacles and looked at the parchment again and consulted a book repeating now and then there is no good here and shaking his head often and suddenly he became sure and spoke with a clear certainty indeed he said it is a most heathen spell End of chapter 19. Father Joseph explains how the laity have no need of the pen. Chapter 20 of the charwoman's shadow by Lord Dunsainey. This Librevox recording is in the public domain, read by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 20 The magician imitates a way of the gods.

Starting point is 04:47:59 And that day went by, we... his splendors and was added to past days and night came up and covered the skies of spain and the magician sat all alone in his house in the wood he was not wholly hostile to man but sitting there leaning forward upon a table where on one taper flared he was brooding on problems so far from our workaday cares so far beyond even the starry palings which bounds our imaginations that men and women were not to him that matter of first importance they are to us, but only something to be noted and studied, as we might study whatever rumors may come of our life upon planets of suns that are other than ours. His care for humanity was solely this, that amongst his children, whether in Spain or elsewhere, were those that were worthy to receive and cherish and carry to those that would bring it to the far dimness of time, the mighty learning that he himself had had,

Starting point is 04:49:01 from the most illustrious of all the line of professors that had held the chair of magic at Saragossa. For the rest, his care was more with the dominion that he held over captive shadows, and their far wanderings, the messages that they carried and the inspirations they brought, than with the narrow scope and the brief stay, with which we are familiar. Could we know the supplications that his shadows sometimes took for him to great spirits that chanced on the journey near to Earth's orbit, could we know the songs and the splendors with which they often replied, it might be that our hearts would thrill to his strange traffic

Starting point is 04:49:42 till we might forget to blame his aloofness from man. Only in rarest moments, perhaps as an organist sleeps, and his hand falls on to the keys, playing one bar straight from dreams, or just at the apex of fever in tropical forests, when strange birds are mating, or eastward from here where a player upon a reed in the barbarous mountains hits ancestrally on a note that his tribe have known from the days of Pan, or when some flash from the sunset shows a worldwide band of color

Starting point is 04:50:18 that is not one of the colors that man has named, only at rarest moments comes any guess to us of those songs and splendors that the lonely man drew from the spaces that lie bleak and bare about the turn of the comet. And only that day he had learned a curious story, a legend of the interstellar darkness, from a spirit that was going upon a journey, and had passed through the solar planets, wrapped in thunder, and had been that morning at his nearest to Earth. Ramon Alonzo had been absent now for six days, and having no pupil to whom to transce, met the mysteries that he himself had had from so glorious a source,

Starting point is 04:51:01 the master was solely occupied in his loneliness with legend and lore that are not of earth or our peoples. And as he brooded on matters that are of moment outside our care and beyond the path of Neptune, the step of Ramonelonzo was heard in the hush of the wood. The young man entered, vexed at that notable failure of the potion he had compounded, and angry for Miranda, his father and mother, and the whole household of his home. He had pictured the consternation of that house, of which Peter had told him tremblingly,

Starting point is 04:51:39 not only all, but more, and he laid the blame on the author of the spells, which had seemed too easy for mistakes to be possible, rather than on his own forgetfulness. He entered, believing that he owed nothing to the magician, and determined to learn no more of the making of gold, so that he should still owe him nothing, and to get his own shadow back as his lawful dew, and to rescue the charwoman's as an act of Christian chivalry. The two men met, one brooding upon a wrong,

Starting point is 04:52:11 the other upon affairs beyond the orbit of Neptune, so that they each spoke little. And presently Ramon Alonzo, drawing forth a parchment, said, master this script which was brought to Spain by a wandering man of cathay perchance hath matter of moment and may even be worthy of your skill in strange tongues and with that he handed the parchment to the magician and the master took it and held it low near the candle ting he said ting then he was silent and shook his head so the first syllable was ting all the rest were nonsense that that Ramon Alonzo had written in levity.

Starting point is 04:52:54 More than that one syllable he darts not write, lest the master should know that he was seeking his spell. There remained two more, and these he would get in the same manner hereafter when the master's suspicions should have had time to sleep. For this he bided his time, but he thought within a week to have the key of the shadow-box. I know not what language it be, said the master.

Starting point is 04:53:20 "'No?' said Ramonelonzo. "'None of earth,' said the master. "'And the young man took back the parchment, "'apologizing for troubling the master's learning. "'All had been as he had planned, "'and he went then to the dingy nook below the wooden stair "'to share his high hopes with the charwoman. "'And there he found her among her brooms and pails

Starting point is 04:53:43 "'about to lie down for the night on her heap of straw. "'Her eyes flashed a welcome to him, and at once he said, I have the first syllable of the spell. Then thought overcast her face, and a little slowly her old mind turned to the future and tried to find all it would mean if he came by all three syllables.

Starting point is 04:54:05 And while youth under these old stairs was swiftly building hopes on the roof of hopes, age was finding objections. How will you find the others? she asked. The same way, he said, and told her how he had carried out his plans. He will suspect, she said. He does not yet, said he,

Starting point is 04:54:26 and she shook her head as she thought of old wiles of the master. Has he taken back the false shadow he made? She asked. I have not yet asked him, the young man said, but he will. If he does not, she said, the false one will show whenever your own true shadow dwindles at noon. But these objections he had not come to hear in the triumphant moments that followed on his success. He had thought that his own high hopes would have driven away her melancholy,

Starting point is 04:54:58 but now it was saddening him. You shall have your own shadow back, he said, and shall wear it in Aragona. That was his final attempt to cheer the old woman, then he left while he still could hope. He went to his spidery room in the lonely tower, and there lay down to sleep, but plans came to that moldering bed instead of dreams, and far on into the night he plotted the rescue of shadows. How many a man, through hours of silent darkness, has laid his lonely plans for things more insubstantial. Plans of caution and plans of impatience came to Ramona Lanzo that night, and by the early hours he blended them and decided to wait three days before asking the master to read another script.

Starting point is 04:55:47 and he satisfied his impatience so far as it could be satisfied by planning to go the next day into the wood and bring back another parchment, with a tale when the time came of a meeting with one from Cathay, and a certain radiance in the youthful mind decked the plan with glittering prospects of success, then Ramon Alonzo slept. Descending a little late on the next morning, the young man found the food waiting, him that the magician never failed to supply. He ate, then went to the room that was sacred to magic, and there was the master seated before his lectern, considering things beyond the concern of man. Would you learn more of the making of gold, he said? No, said Ramon Alonzo. A thin streak of joy passed through the master's mind, for it was the established duty of all the masters, more especially of those, that were as glorious as he however far they might fare down the ages surviving the human span to secure a pupil to whom when he might be worthy the ancient secrets should be revealed at last so should the wisdom that had been brought so far by caravans that had all crumbled away and were long since dust blowing over desolate lands

Starting point is 04:57:11 pass on to centuries that would surely need it and he had thought that romano lanzo might after years of toil and loneliness and study and abnegation be fit one day far hence for the dreadful initiation but if he persisted with his uncouth interest in so trivial a matter as gold then he was not the man therefore the master's mind was briefly lit by a joy when he heard his pupil renouncing this light suit, and then his thoughts were afar again with those things that lie beyond the concern of man. From these he was brought back by the young man speaking again. Master, said Ramon Alonzo, I would fain go to the wood and walk there a while before I study again. As you will, said the master, and returned to the contemplation of the curious way of a star, which had not as yet been seen by any mortal watcher. again those contemplations were interrupted master said romano lanzo i thank you for that shadow that you designed for me and having no longer any need of it i pray you take it back

Starting point is 04:58:25 however old he was however far were his thoughts beyond the orbit of earth he was not to be wholly duped by that young mind doubtless he knew not romano lanzo's plan yet the stir of a fetter upon a floor of stone may betray the hope of a slave to escape his prison, and Ramon Alonzo's wish to be rid of that shadow showed that something was afoot, which if left unchecked might rob the magical art of a chosen pupil. Therefore, calling back his thoughts from beyond the path of the comet across all the regions known to the human imagination, he replied to Ramon Alonzo, saying,

Starting point is 04:59:07 We that follow the art and that imitate so far is we are able, the examples of the gods, do not take back our gifts. No protestations moved him, and Ramona Lanzo, seeing at last that by every word he said he was disclosing more and more clearly the existence of a plan, turned away silent at last, and went into the wood. End of chapter 20. The magician imitates away of the gods. Chapter 21 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Dunsainey. This Libravox recording is in the public domain, read by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Starting point is 05:00:01 Chapter 21, White Magic Comes to the Wood. Through the wood to which Ramona Lanzo had gone with his plans, he walked disconsolate. What would he do when all his plans had succeeded, and he had got back his shadow, if this sinister thing of gloom was to show at his heels whenever his human shadow should drink in the noonday sun. And his plans had seemed so sure. Yet he was pledged to the nightly quest of the charwoman's shadow, whatever embarrassments might befall his own, and from this the laws of chivalry did not allow him to swerve. And the more that she was an ancient and withered crone, the more he knew that he must be true to his pledge, for she had no other night,

Starting point is 05:00:49 no sword would stir for her into the light but his, but he walked disconsolate because of his own redundance of shadows which he foresaw to the end of his days. It seemed but a little thing to have two shadows, too slight a cloud to darken the gaiety of any mood of youth. How often on glittering evenings has a man or a maiden danced, happy below the splen, of arrayed chandeliers and followed by scores of shadows. But Ramona Alonzo had learned, as those only learn who have ever lost their shadow, that side by side with great things and with trivial, there are deviations that are outside human pity. And this, the most trivial of them all, any unusual shape of a shadow, was no more tolerated than horns and

Starting point is 05:01:40 tail. So absurd a prejudice cannot be credited unless it has been experienced. He came in his melancholy walk to the mossy roots of an oak, and there he sat him down, and leaning back against the bowl of the tree took out from a wallet the parchment and pen and ink he had brought, and began to write supposed script of heathen lands, and amongst it the second syllable of the spell, which should shape for him two-thirds of the key of the shadow-box. Hardly had he written that one Cothayan syllable and added a few fantastic shapes of his own when he heard a rustling a little way off in the wood.

Starting point is 05:02:23 He sat upon the moss and listened, it grew to a pattering, a sound as of small feet scurrying over leaves, pushing through bracken, leaping rocks and dead branches, in a hurry that seemed to have suddenly come to the wood, and was stirring bramble and briar before him, and far on his left and right, and it was coming nearer. Then Ramona Lanzo heard shrill little squeaks above the sound of the scurrying,

Starting point is 05:02:51 and all at once an imp came bounding by, and two more, and then another. Then the snap of a twig and a rustle drew his attention upon his other side, and six more were running past him, and soon he saw a line of imps fleeing desperately through the wood not troubling to keep out of sight of him on the far side of trees going by some passing barely out of reach of his hand he saw their small round bodies bobbing by then heard them brush through the bracken into the distance and not for a moment did one of them cease to scurry they were jabbering to each other as they went evidently in great perturbation and then a gnome came came by carrying a bundle, an old fellow three times as large as an imp, and wearing clothes of a sort, especially a hat. And he was clearly just as frightened as the imps, though he could not go so fast. Ramona Lanzo saw that there must be some great trouble that was vexing magical things, and since gnomes speak the language of men and will answer if spoken to gently,

Starting point is 05:03:58 he raised his hat and asked of a gnome his name. The gnome did, not stop his hasty shuffle a moment as he answered, Alaraba, and grabbed the rim of his hat, but forgot to doff it. What is the trouble, Alaraba, said Ramon Alonzo. White magic, run, said the gnome, and shuffled on eagerly. More than this, he did not say, nor thought more necessary, for he had uttered the one thing that magical folk dread most. A few more things ran by that haunt woods that are subject to magic,

Starting point is 05:04:34 one or two elves and their like, then a deep hush came on the wood, for everything had fled. Ramon Alonzo, wondering and listening quiet in the hush, heard after a while shod hooves, coming from the direction from which everything had fled. Then he heard branches brushing by, far noisier than the soft scurrying of the flight of the magical things, but leisurely and calmly. This was nothing that fled. this then was the white magic. The hooves drew nearer and the brushing of large branches. Then a mule's face came through the foliage, and bending low to avoid the bow of an oak tree,

Starting point is 05:05:17 there appeared, Father Joseph. His face was very red and very moist, for riding through a wood is no joyous pastime. He did not look a shape to have driven to terror all magical things that dwelt in the dark of the wood, "'Good-morrow,' said Father Joseph. "'Good-morrow, Father,' replied Ramon Alonzo, rising up from his mossy seat and doffing his hat. Then Father Joseph turned a while to the business of clambering out of the saddle, after which he took his mule by the bridle and walked up to Ramon Alonzo. "'What brings you to the wood?' said Ramonelanzo uneasily,

Starting point is 05:05:57 for every dealing with magic leaves its trace on the conscience. Father Joseph beamed toward him with his red face. I came to see you. Again Ramona Lanzo doffed his hat, and what brought you to me, he said. Peril of your soul, said Father Joseph jovially. Ramona Lanzah was silent a while. Have I imperiled it?

Starting point is 05:06:23 He asked lamely. Have you had no dealings with the black art? Smiled Father Joseph. None to risk my salvation, said the young man. Let us see, said Father Joseph. Thereupon he made the sign of the cross before Ramona Lanzo, at which, though Romano Lanzo did not see it,

Starting point is 05:06:44 for his face was towards the sun, the false shadow fell off from his heels. Then Father Joseph took a bottle of holy water, a hollowed rock crystal that hung on a small silver chain from his belt, and cast the holy water upon the moss round Ramona Lanzo's heels, and the false shadow lying upon the moss got up and ran away. Ramon Alonzo saw it rush over the sunny clearing and lose itself amongst great true shadows of trees. Gone, he exclaimed.

Starting point is 05:07:19 Yes, said Father Joseph. Thus passed from the young man's sight and was lost forever, a shadow false, growthless and magical, which nonetheless was all the shadow he had. A little while ago he had longed for this very thing and had grown despondent with longing, but a new feeling came to him now as he stood there perfectly shadowless. What shall I do? he said wistfully. Get back your own true shadow, said Father Joseph. But how, if I cannot, replied Ramon Alonzo.

Starting point is 05:07:56 At all costs, get back your shadow, said the priest. Is it so urgent as that? asked Ramon Alonzo. Then the benign red face of Father Joseph became graver than he had ever seen it yet, like strange changes that sometimes come suddenly at evening over the sun, and he said in most earnest tones, on earth the shadow is led hither and thither, wherever he will, by the man, but hereafter it is far otherwise. and wherever his shadow goes alas he must follow which is but just since in all their sojourn here never once doth the shadow lead never once the man follow and what of the shadow that has gone through the wood asked romano lozzo awed by the priest's tone damned irretrievably said father joseph and if a man died with such a thing at his heels it leads him violently to to its own place. Four angels could not drag him from it. Ramona Lanzo had held his breath,

Starting point is 05:09:07 but breathed again when he heard that death with the thing at his heels was needed for its last triumph. It is gone from my heels now, he said cheerily. I, and to be thankful, said Father Joseph, but wait, where is your true shadow? In a box, the young man admitted. Such shadows darkened, nor grass nor flower in all the lawns of heaven. Cannot they come there? said Ramonelonzo, said the priest. They know not salvation. And I? asked Ramonelonzo. I have told you.

Starting point is 05:09:45 Can a mere shadow take me? They are of more account than man in the kingdom of shadows. Can one not struggle against them? said Ramon Alonzo. Their power is irresistible, said the. the priest, as the power of the body over the shadow is irresistible here. Alas, said Ramonelo. Can you not recover it? asked Father Joseph. I will try, said Ramon Alonzo.

Starting point is 05:10:16 Father Joseph smiled. He had come for no other purpose than to give this wholesome advice, and now he heavily clambered back to his saddle. Ramon Alonzo doffed his hat and gravely said, farewell, pondering all the while on the key he was making that should open the shadow-box and free his soul from the grip of a doomed shadow. But how if the magician would not read again for him? How if he did not mutter again as he saw the Cathian syllable? In the anxiety that these queries caused him, he hurried back to his mossy seat below the bowl of the oak,

Starting point is 05:10:55 and hastened to write that sentence, in which, like a curious jewel, the crystal of some rare element, he set the second syllable of the spell. And however fantastic he tried to make the letters that he invented, that Cathayan shape still loomed from amongst the rest the most exotic, and even, as he thought, the most dreadful upon that parchment. With this he hurried back to the house in the wood. End of Chapter 21. White magic comes to the wood. Chapter 22 of the Charwoman's Shadow by Lord Dunsainey. This Libravox recording is in the public domain, read by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Starting point is 05:11:51 Chapter 22, Ramona Alonzo crosses a sword with magic. shadowless ramon alonzo went through the wood as miserable in every glade and every shaft of sunlight as a man that crept through a city after being robbed of his raiment would feel whenever he came to a busy street shadowless he entered the house now was a time for caution his shadow gone his eternal soul in danger now was the time to watch the magician warily till an hour might come that should be favorable to a request. But every circumstance that should have urged delay drove the youth onward impetuously. How, if he should die that night and the doomed shadow get a throttle grip

Starting point is 05:12:40 immediately on his soul and drag it down to hell? He durst not wait. He must win back that shadow. And even as he thought of the daily pains of hell, which are far beyond the imagination of such as Ramon Alonzo, but he had been well instructed in these by good men. Even as he thought of the round of pains and terrors, he remembered with chivalrous faith, the charwoman's shadow.

Starting point is 05:13:07 He hastened along the corridors. The old woman that had been anemone at work by her pale, saw him go by and noticed that he was running. He came to the door of the room that was sacred to magic. He entered. There had been no spell on the door of late, so that the pupil might come to the room for work. He came breathless before the magician.

Starting point is 05:13:31 That learned man was sitting at his lectern, alone with his own thoughts that were beyond our needs or concern. He raised his head and looked at Ramon Alonzo. "'Master,' said Ramonelonzo, "'a script that I had from a man in the wood, "'Strange words, I pray you read them.' In the look that the master gave him, he saw he had failed.

Starting point is 05:13:56 Nonetheless, he spoke again all the more earnestly. I pray you, master, he said. Still, that look, and then the magician slowly shook his head, and Ramon Alonzo knew that hope was over. Give me my shadow, he blurted out then. No, said the magician. Why not? shouted Ramonelonzo. It is my fee.

Starting point is 05:14:21 I have learned nothing for your fee. "'You have learned from me,' said the master, "'the manner of compounding a love potion. "'I made it, and a man drank it.' "'He will love fiercely,' the magician said. "'It made him most monstrous sick,' said Ramonelo. "'Ah,' said the magician, "'give me back my shadow,' Ramonzo repeated.

Starting point is 05:14:47 "'I have taught you other learning for my fee. "'Rare learning come from of old. have not taught me the making of gold, said the youth. I have taught you the rarer wisdom, a more secret thing. What, said Ramon Alonzo? The magician paused, and in a graver voice, he said, the oneness of matter. It is not to me, said the other. It is the most rare learning, the master answered. Few know that there is but one element with a hundred manifestations. Few knew it of and few have handed this rare knowledge down. It is worth incomparably more than my fee.

Starting point is 05:15:32 It is not to me, repeated Ramon Alonzo. Give back my shadow. No, said the magician, for you cannot give back this rare, this incomparable knowledge. Neither shall I give back my fee. The shadow was worthless. It would not grow, and now it has run away. "'Ah,' said the magician, "'for the last time Ramona Lanzo blurted out his useless request,

Starting point is 05:16:00 "'Give me back my shadow!' "'And the magician answered, "'I keep my just fee.' "'And Ramonelanzo turned his face toward damnation, "'yet remembered his knightly quest. "'Then only give me the charwoman's shadow,' he said. "'She has had years for it,' said the master. "'Such years!' exclaimed Ramonelanzo.

Starting point is 05:16:27 "'They were many,' replied the magician. "'Give up her shadow,' said menacingly Ramon Alonzo. "'No,' said the magician. "'And on that no, the young man's sword was out, "'and its point was before the face of the magician. "'He did not move his gaze from Ramonelonzo, "'or from that glittering point, "'but leaned his right arm out behind him,

Starting point is 05:16:53 the hand feeling downwards and slightly bending his head as his arm went back. So the master's hand came to the lid of a box on the floor and felt the rim and opened it and went in and gripped what lay within all within an instant. Then, flaming before the eyes of Ramon Alonzo, appeared a flash of lightning, fixed to a resinous hilt that dark and rounded lay gripped in the master's hand. The flash was little longer than Ramonelonzo's sword, and more jaggedly crooked, and was rather red than yellow, as though it had slowly cooled while it lay in the box. At once the two men engaged, at first across the lectern, then working wide of it as they fought.

Starting point is 05:17:41 Young Ramonelonzo had a pretty style with the sword, and the skill of his antagonist was nothing magical, for his years had been given to other studies than those of thrusting and parrying, yet his weapon was magical, and thrilled up the steel the moment it touched the rapier, jarring the young man's arm as far as the shoulder, shaking his elbow and nearly wrenching his wrist. And every time that either of them parried, the young man felt that jar and shock, jolting along his right arm. So great a blow might have cast his sword from his hand, had it been delivered by an earthly weapon, but the lightning flash with which the magician fought had the curious effect of making Ramona Lanzo's fingers gripped tighter

Starting point is 05:18:26 whenever he felt the shock in his arm. Had it not been for this, he was lost. And even though he kept his sword in his hand, he had hard work to parry, for the magician thrust rapidly at him. Soon his arm was growing numb, and he attacked vehemently then, so as to end it while he still had strength in his arm.

Starting point is 05:18:49 But the magician parried each thrust, and once returning a lunge of Ramon Alonzo's brought the weapon so near his face that it singed his hair. And after that the magician beat his mortal antagonist backwards, dazzled and numbed, but still fighting. It became clear that had the master given his days to the sword and studied all the mysteries of the rapier, he had been a notable hand at it. None of the young man's thrusts went home, and suddenly a thrust of the magician, partially parried, slipped over the earthly hilt and along the mortal arm, searing the flesh and setting fire to cloth,

Starting point is 05:19:28 so that Ramona Lanzo fought a few strokes with a flaming sleeve, till he patted it out with his left hand, and still fought on. And now he was near the door, and the master pressing him still, a dark lith shape lit up by the flash of his eyes, in a gloomy room crossed and recrossed by the glare of the lightning, A sudden rally Ramon Alonzo made from the lintel, but was beaten back, and again his arm was seared, and tumbling more than retreating, he reeled back through the door. Cross no swords with magic, said the magician warningly, with his strange sword in the doorway.

Starting point is 05:20:08 But he came no further, and Ramonelonzo was left alone with despair. While the master returned to the gloom of the room that was sacred to magic, and to occupations that are beyond our knowledge. Ramon Alonzo stayed a while by the door, which still opened to the gloom of the magical room, his sword in his shaken hand, and not till he saw that his enemy did not deign to follow, did he turn slowly away.

Starting point is 05:20:38 But as soon as the thrill of the risk of death was gone, new troubles and even terrors overtook him. On earth he had lost his shadow, and lost a fight hereafter his salvation. He was defenseless in this sinister house, for his sword had failed him, and impetuously he had cast his careful and patient plans away. He believed that none could advise him.

Starting point is 05:21:03 He saw, as men often do in such times of despondency, nothing between him and everlasting damnation. He would not even pray, counting himself already among the damned, under whom prayer is forbidden. He heard the charwoman late at her work in the corridor, but moved away from her, being in no mood to speak. But she saw him and came after him,

Starting point is 05:21:29 and seeing all at once the need that he had of comfort, she brought at him, though he would have none of it, so that she had to give comfort without his knowledge. He did not tell her that his false shadow was gone, and would not tell her that the magician had been, beaten him, and that the shadow-box was locked forever, and his soul involved in the doom of his true shadow, but he said, all is lost, and this he repeated often whenever he thought she was trying to give him comfort. But you have the first syllable of the spell, she said. Little had this comforted

Starting point is 05:22:07 her when first he had told her, but now that he needed comfort, she said it as earnestly as though by this one syllable alone, the long box could be opened. All is lost, he repeated. The first syllable is ting, she said. All is lost, said Ramon Alonzo. The next might be Tong or Tang, said the old woman. Iddle enough such a remark, unlikely to be true, light words on which to build a hope of escape from hell.

Starting point is 05:22:40 Ramon Alonzo did not even answer them, and yet they started a thought in the young man's mind that later led to a plan, out of which he built a hope, as slender as that last bridge that the mausloom crosses, but the hope seemed to lead to salvation. End of Chapter 22. Ramon Alonzo crosses a sword with magic. Chapter 23 of the charwoman's shadow by Lord Dunsani. This Libravox recording is in the public domain, read by Michelle Frye, Vatn Rouge, Louisiana.

Starting point is 05:23:26 Chapter 23 The Plan of Ramona Lanzo When the charwoman found that the despair of Ramonelonzo was so vigorous that she could bring him no comfort then, she went back to the dismal haunt of her brooms and pans, while he went lurking down the passages to watch for the egress of the magician, bent only on clutching the shadow box without any thought or plan how to rescue the shadows within it. He found his sword was still gripped in his hand, and looking at it, even in that dim light, he saw that its glitter was gone and all the steel gone gray from its meeting with magic.

Starting point is 05:24:07 A long while he waited, and shadowless there amongst so many shadows, he envied once more the common inanimate things that had their simple shadows, excited no man's wonder. The magician lingered in his gloomy room, till Ramon Alonzo wondered what dreadful plan he was working out against him for having drawn sword in the room that was sacred to magic. But already he had forgotten Ramon Alonzo, and was brooding on problems beyond the young man's guesses. That he had fought to protect his shadows was no more to him than it is to a master chess player that he had locked the door of his room, when he goes to study alone the mysteries of Rui Lopez.

Starting point is 05:24:52 Fight and antagonist were soon forgot, and he was following intricate orbits of unknown moons, a lonely imagination. From such studies he rose late, and Ramona Lanzo saw his dark shape loom through the doorway when the light of evening was far gone from the corridors. To his joy he saw that the door had been left while. open, and before the magician's steps had died wholly away, the young man rushed into the room that was sacred to magic, and had his hands on the shadow box. First he put his swords point to the crack between box and the lid, then he smote the box with the edge of it, but not thus easily

Starting point is 05:25:33 our souls won from damnation. The open door would have hinted to any mind that was calmer that there was something about that box that was not to be opened by the first earthly implement. The gap between lid and box was narrower than the gap between one granite slab and the next in the temple beside the sphinx, narrower than the line between night and day, the delicate point of the rapier looked gross beside it. And as for the material of the box, it was not of wood, which the young man had thought to shatter, but some element that cared for the edge of steel, no more than steel itself cares for the edge or point of a thin feather. he picked at the padlock then and something about the padlock's glittering hardness brought him to calmer ways and taught him that though his soul was in peril of loss yet unreasoning haste would help him no better in this than it would in any trifle of daily things

Starting point is 05:26:34 he put the shadow-box slowly back in its place and sheathed his sword from which lustre and temper and ring seemed all to have gone and walked thoughtfully thence and came to the stairs of stone and ascended them and saw his spidery bed there he lay down for such a night as men have who see doom close though the doom be only earthly they plan and plan and mix up their plans with hopes and then again they mix them with despairs till all over the web of reason that makes their plans come curious patterns of the despairs and hopes and least of all the weaver knows which is which and the stars go slowly gliding by and the gradual affairs of earth and the plans race on and on. And if the doom be earthly, often towards dawn, fatigue overtakes their plans, and they sleep when the birds sing. But Ramon Alonzo did not dare to rest from his whirl of plans,

Starting point is 05:27:37 and did not sleep till he saw clear reason shine faint through his hopes and despairs, and then it was broad mourning. That ray of reason that shone at last on his plan came from the remark of the charwoman that she made in her feeble efforts to bring him comfort. It might be tongue or tang. Some time between dawn and midnight these words had come back to him in all their absurdity. Of the myriad sounds that might form a syllable in an utterly unknown tongue, how would it be possible thus lightly to guess the right one?

Starting point is 05:28:13 Tong or tang? The suggestion was ludicrous, and it could not be tong or tang in any case for the second syllable of the spell was far too unlike the first for the difference to be in no more than the change of a vow what might it be he had much of the night before him with all its wide spaces for fears and lost hopes to roam in he had ample leisure in which to wonder what was the second syllable but not until light began to creep through the wood did he order his wonder and guesses into a plan his plan was this the number of possible syllables was limited he knew the first syllable he would suppose the last to be ab and he would say the spell over and over a again to the shadow box, varying only the second syllable. When every possible sound had been tried for that, he would change the last syllable to bab and try again, then to back, and then bad, and then baff, and every time that he changed the last syllable, going through all the sounds that could possibly form the second. He would work through all the hours of day and night in which the

Starting point is 05:29:26 magician was away from his room. And one day, years hence, he would hit on the three syllables and see the shadow box open before he died. He calculated it might take 40 years. That he would hold on to the end, crouching upon the gloomy floor, murmuring three syllables to the padlock, he did not doubt. Sooner or later a man might have stopped saying, is it worth it if the box had held the whole wealth of the Indies? But Ramona Lanzah would work. for his soul's salvation, and all the while he remembered the nightly quest to which he had pledged his chivalry. Morning shone wide on the wood, and he fell asleep. When Ramon Alonzo woke, his plan was as clear in his mind as though he had pondered it further during his sleep. It was then late in the morning. He went to the charwoman, following the sound of her pale, and putting aside the old woman's efforts to comfort him,

Starting point is 05:30:27 obtained from her carefully the hours at which the magician left his room the result of all her experience often before he had discussed plans and hopes with her but not now for he based upon this plan all the hope that he had in time or eternity and would discuss it with none thence he went straight to the room that was sacred to magic and offered his sword hilt foremost to the magician the magician bade him keep it for whatever terrors vexed him from beyond the path of the comet, he had no fear of any earthly sword. Neither man desired to continue their quarrel, the youth because he saw that his folly already had brought his soul to the very brink of hell, and he regretted his haste. The magician because his need of a pupil, upon whom to unburden himself of some of the wisdom he had carried alone down the ages, was a greater need than Ramona Lanzo knew. So that the tensity between them passed, and the magician turned his mind to the obligation

Starting point is 05:31:31 that is laid upon all magicians of handing on to a pupil the lore that has come to them from the dread masters, for so the magicians of old are known by all that follow the art. Thus is their magic even to this day. Ramona Lanzo, meanwhile, was only planning and waiting to rob the box

Starting point is 05:31:51 within which the magician enslaved his shadows. He knew not when the day would come, on which he would rob the box. It might be years hence. He might be gray when he did it, but all his fervor and patience were centered on this. His scheme may seem little better than the black art, but he had been taught from childhood that such crafty ways were justified in cases that touched the safety of the soul,

Starting point is 05:32:18 nor did he hold that the master had earned his fee. his whole attention lost in the plans he was making arranging in countless formula a legion of possible syllables he scarcely heard the suave voice of the master speaking across the gloom to him what learning would you have of me back came his thoughts from a far-imagined year in which with a sudden spell that was right at last he should free his shadow from the eternal doom that onerless shadows share with the of those who were once their masters, back came his thoughts as alert as though they had wandered never an hour away from that very morning. I would learn the making of some more durable thing, said Ramon Alonzo, than gold.

Starting point is 05:33:07 And the master smiled thereat, as Ramona Lanzo had hoped. We shall therefore study, the master said, the making of Persian spells, which more than any other inscription of magic charm spirits whose courses are not within this sphere, and thus they shall be remembered after earth. He rose and placed upon the lectern, a tome in a leather binding, as rough and black as a saddle on an old battlefield, written by one of the magi in his old age before the fall of Sidon.

Starting point is 05:33:42 If speech would be had by the folk of earth with those that dwell not here, and spell be soft, that shall compel their answer. It is in this book, said the master. Then began the teaching of heathen script, with its dots and curious flourishes, the pronouncing of alien vows, and strange intonations, and all that labor that thoughts must undergo to bring up wisdom out of a former age, which is no lighter than the toil of the miners who dig up bygone forests from out of the past of the earth. And all the time that Ramonelonzo learned, his attention was fixed upon the approach of that hour when the magician would leave his room that was sacred to magic and sail away a dark shape down the corridor,

Starting point is 05:34:33 and he should have leisure at last to attend to his soul's salvation. And that hour came so slowly that in one of those lingering moments, the fear came to Ramonelanzo that time was done and eternity was begun, and his doom was to learn heathen spells in the gloom for ever and ever, while the blessed sat in the sunlight singing in Spanish. And this fear passed, giving way to one more terrible, that told him far worse awaited him than this, unless he could rescue his shadows from the doom.

Starting point is 05:35:08 It must share with his soul. The hour came at last when, with an earnest reminder of the way of the heathen vow, the magician arose and went bat-like out of the room. For many moments Ramon Alonzo sat motionless, listening to fading echoes from the feet of that master of shadows. Then he was down by the shadow-box, eagerly uttering a spell. Not a flicker made the padlock. Rapidly he uttered another and then another,

Starting point is 05:35:39 and with a kind of sing-song, intoned spell after spell in the gloom and dust of the floor, bending above the shadow box. The first syllable was always ting, which he knew to be right. The last was always ab, which was only an assumption he meant to vary slowly through the weary years. The second syllable he changed every time. The thought of the years that he should spend in that room murmuring spells to the box did not appall him, for he knew that the relation of all time to eternity is as a drop to the sea. He only feared that those years, might be too few. Close to him lay the box that held the magician's weapon, the old flash of lightning.

Starting point is 05:36:23 It had neither padlock nor keyhole, and when he tried to raise the lid, it seemed to be shut forever. By what magic it opened, he knew not. He rightly reflected that the magician, having gone from the room without it, had other and probably more terrible weapons. He turned again to his monotonous work. Towards evening the magician came back again, and Ramona Lanzo ceased his lonely mutterings, and soon was learning again old Persian lore, for the plan was growing in the master's mind to make of him a magician. Had he studied with such a master, patiently following that lore, whose splendors have made many forget salvation, he could have had a name that would have resounded through wizardry, and hereafter have had great honor among the damned.

Starting point is 05:37:13 Of this honor the magician had spoken once, when Ramon Alonzo had wonderingly inquired, of the present state of that illustrious professor who had held the chair of magic at Saragossa. He walks through hell, said the magician, flaming, an object of awe and reverent veneration, while all abase themselves as he goes by, their faces low in the cinders. He is, as many have told me, an apparition of glory,

Starting point is 05:37:45 and amongst the first of all the splendors of hell. From such a fame, Ramona Lanzo now willfully turned away. Such choices have often to be made. Whenever the master blamed his inattention, he apologized gracefully and pretended diligence, but his heart was far from Persia, and never a spell he learned that would have hailed passing spirits and given him news unbiased by the narrower view of earth, and thus he lost what he lost, and gained what he gained. And at last night came, and the magician left him, and, rising as though he would go to, he tarried in the room and joyfully looked to have the long night alone with his work. He had no light but the gleam of a sickle moon, for he did not dare to burn the magician's taper, lest its shortening should show how late he had been at work,

Starting point is 05:38:41 and the young moon soon sank. He had forgotten food and even water, and sleep seemed unnecessary and impossible to him. He needed no light except to watch the padlock, and for this purpose he laid a finger upon it all night long, to feel if it moved for any spell that he said. Owls, going afield for their noturnal hunt, saw Ramonelonzo bent over the box, and saw him again as they returned in the chill. Bands of moths to whose glowing eyes the night is luminous saw his shape in the corner,

Starting point is 05:39:15 and with other hours of the night came other moths of wholly different tribes. They saw the same shape there. Mice that at first were terrified at the sound of the human voice grew used to its long monotony, and ran all around the motionless crouching figure, stars that he knew not saw him kneeling there. And then as a grayness paled the night and made all hopes seem groundless

Starting point is 05:39:42 and his long labor absurd, there came a sudden quiver into the padlock just as he uttered a spell. He felt it vibrating his fingertips. He had said thousands of spells that night, and for none had the padlock moved, and now it had quivered. but it did not open.

Starting point is 05:40:01 Hope had shot through his mind in that moment of quivering, singing to him of salvation, only to fall like dead birds. He said the same spell again. Again the padlock quivered, yet it remained shut. Ramona Lanzo sat back on his heels and wondered, then he said it again, and over and over, and always the same thing happened.

Starting point is 05:40:24 By dim gray light that came in, he now saw the padlock, and no movement of it could be perceived by the eye, but always he felt the quiver along his fingertip whenever he said that spell. Somehow it increased his despair, for he believed that the spell he was using was the correct one,

Starting point is 05:40:43 and for some reason he could not guess would do no more when uttered by him than to make that faint vibration. Again and again he repeated it, and always the same thing happened. The spell was ting, young, ab. He would not leave it to continue his formula because no other spell he had used had moved the padlock at all. So he went on hopelessly repeating it while the dawn grew wider and chillier,

Starting point is 05:41:12 and more and more objects appeared out of the dark with their shadows, and their shapes seemed to bring him back to his shadowless situation, and all these material things seem to be triumphing over him one by one, like an army of victors marching by one of its prisoners. Amongst these fancies of despair he noticed at last that the quivering of the padlock occurred at one part of the spell he uttered, and not quite at the end of it. It occurred at the word young. He said the spell slowly, then, to make sure of this, for hitherto he had spoken rapidly, and sure enough, just as he said the word,

Starting point is 05:41:54 young, the padlock always quivered, and it was quiet again as he said the word ab. A hope came to Ramon Alonzo, glorious and sudden as sunrise, but he would not acknowledge it in that chill hour, burdened by his despairs. Yet he planned a change in his formula, and went to bed and slept. And when he awoke in the broad and brilliant day, the hope was still with him, and it had grown since dawn. End of chapter 23, The Plan of Ramon Alonzo. Chapter 24 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Dunsainey.

Starting point is 05:42:41 This Libre Vox recording is in the public domain, read by Michelle Frye, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 24, Ramon Alonzo dances with his shadow. Ramona Lanzo descended, ate hungrily, and hastened to the room that was sacred to magic, and there was the master in his usual place. There was reproach in the master's eye for the young man's lateness, but words he did not waste, reserving them for that instruction in heathen spells, which he immediately commenced.

Starting point is 05:43:17 Every day the master's intention was growing clearer, and the young man guessed it now, his was to be the name as revered as dreaded as his who had held the chair of magic at saragossa his wisdom his loneliness his aloofness were to be as those of the dweller in the sombre house of the wood his should be power at which the just should shudder and mothers that could not call their children from play in the long evenings when they should be in bed would in the last resort shout romona lonson to them. Against this terrible fame, the young man's blood cried out, and the birds aided him, calling out of the wood, and the sunlight seemed on his side and against magic. Yesterday he had dared to make no protest against anything the master might teach him, for he had seen, in years of obsequiousness, his only chance of ever recovering his shadow. But a new hope strengthened him now, and he asked a question that was in itself a protest.

Starting point is 05:44:25 The master was teaching him slowly a spell of terrible potency when Ramonzo said, Master, what chances of salvation hath a man that shall make use of this spell? Salvation! Salvation? said the master, a thing common to countless millions, the ordinary experience hereafter of half the human race. Is this to be put against knowledge of the hour of the return of the comet? Against speech from these small fields, with spirits that wander from world to world, against strange tongues, ruins and enchantments,

Starting point is 05:45:07 the knowledge of ancient histories and visions of future wars? Is this to be put against a hold upon the course of a star? rather would i flame beside the count of the mountain who held the chair of magic at saragossa and burn in that bright splendour that torments but cannot subdue him than share with the ignorant populace any bliss that is come and divulver righteousness ay and upon the sulphur that he treads damned if you will but held in reverence kings have not hesitated to abase themselves in honour of his fame that resounds beyond time and far beyond earthly boundaries Ramona Lanzo did not dare to say more. It was as though a student at work in a dingy classroom had claimed that some boyish game for which his own heart was longing was of more importance than the honored learning that was being taught from the desk.

Starting point is 05:46:08 The magician was growing angry. Ramona Lanzo bent his head to learn those Persian spells. But his mind was far from them with his hope and his formula. He learned in silence. while the magician bent to the work of making him his pupil and rendering him worthy of the terrible wisdom that had been brought down through the ages by the labor of the dread masters. And at last the black shape of the master went out of the gloomy room, and Ramona Lanza was all alone with his hope.

Starting point is 05:46:42 His hope was that the first two syllables were right, that the quiver in the padlock was its preparation to open, as the spell thrilled through the brass till the final syllable ab disappointed its expectation. He had, therefore, to try only once the thousands of possible sounds that might make the last syllable, instead of multiplying them by thousands more and working on till old age. The magician would be gone for some hours, returning again in the afternoon for another weary lesson. Spells guarded everything around Ramon Alonzo, in the room that was sacred to magic, while the magician was gone,

Starting point is 05:47:23 spells, had he known it, could have brought to life one of the crocodiles when he drew his sword against magic, and it would have eaten him had the master not needed a pupil. But Ramon Alonzo cared only for one spell. He was down at once by the shadow box, and this time all the spells that he tried began with Ting Young, while he changed every time the last syllable. once more whenever he touched the padlock he felt it quiver as he uttered the second syllable while it calmed again as it heard the end of the spell he became more and more certain that he held two-thirds of the secret

Starting point is 05:48:04 and that hours would free his shadow instead of years then giving her shadow back to the poor old charlwoman he would flee from the sinister house and work in some simpler way for mirandula's dowry amongst unlike the poor old charlwoman he would flee from the sinister house and work in some simpler way for mirandala's dowry amongst unlike learned folks and have no more to do with such as should scorn salvation the work of those hours surpassed in patience the labor of many a scholar studying mathematics or chess-player analyzing position or opening yet when the master returned again he had tried little more than the syllables commencing with b and the padlock upon the shadow-box was shut as fast as ever more weary hours passed with the heathen arts of persia romano lanzo thinking all the while of heaven as a boy in school thinks of the green fields i would not convey the dullness of those hours they passed with the exact speed with which other hours pass if measured by those movements of the earth by which time is recorded but if spiritual measurements be used and the hours be marked by the impatience longing and the and weariness felt by Ramona Alonzo. By that measurement, they passed slowly. But the impatiences of man have their endings, as each of Earth's revolutions, and night arrived, and the magician left. Whither he went, Ramona Alonzo knew not, perhaps to sleep, perhaps he thought, to commune across the

Starting point is 05:49:39 gulfs with the damned. Want of sleep and too much work, far from wearying Ramona Lanzo, had lit a fever in his veins that drove him to fierce activity and he was down by the shadow-box rapidly uttering spells small winds and faint sounds went by and the moths and the owls and the stars and the mice went round and round and midnight came and that solitary shape crouching above the shadow-box had uttered to the padlock all the syllables that begin with k or d no inspiration came to lighten that laborer but he clung to his formula which was one long monotony thousands of phrases that all began with tingy young he did not look at the slow changes of night he scarcely saw the window and yet black branches slanted against the stars remained a memory for all his years and the sight of branches in stars wherever he saw it afterwards would always bring to him the weariest thought his mind was peopled with hopes and disappointments as the wood was peopled with little hunters going abroad through the dark but despair never came that night for he was determined not to admit despair till the last of the sounds was tried for the third syllable the stars paled as with illness with intensest weariness as it seemed to romano lanzo the dawn dragged upwards the voices of the birds jarred on his hearing made delicate by fatigue, and still he murmured on.

Starting point is 05:51:20 To the syllables he had tried, he had added now all beginning with and g. They had gone slower than those beginning with d, because d, he believed, could not be followed by I, which halved the number of sounds that he had to try. And now came H, which, as he hoped, could not be followed either by L or R, dawn grew wider again he felt a hopelessness at the myriad shapes of matter appearing out of the darkness all of them possessing what he lacked so conspicuously each master of a shadow and he alone without one now the sun had risen but was hidden yet by the trees and all of a sudden the hasp of the padlock opened the spell was ting young hans

Starting point is 05:52:14 hastily Ramona Lanzo removed the padlock and cautiously opened the box. It was full of shadows. He closed the box again as he saw them flutter and went to the window to stuff his kerchief into a broken pain so that they should not escape. Then he returned to the box. Then he opened the lid of the box a little way and took out a shadow in finger and thumb by the heels, as he had seen the magician hold his. This he laid on the floor and put a small jar upon it, which he took down from a shelf,

Starting point is 05:52:51 trusting any piece of matter to hold down so delicate a thing as a shadow. Then he took out another and treated it in the same way. Then a third and a fourth. There were shadows of all kinds of folk, men and women, young and old. The red sun peeped in and saw the shadowless man, laying out this queer assembly and holding them one by one with little weights. They did not grow as the Red Sun looked at them, for they were masterless and lost. They lay there gray on the floor, fluttering limply.

Starting point is 05:53:27 And then, and then, Ramonzo found his own shadow. He recognized it immediately. He put it to his heels. The shadow ran to them, and the instant that it had fastened. there, never again, as Ramona Alonzo swore, to be removed as any fee or for any bribe whatever, it grew long

Starting point is 05:53:48 in the early morning. At that moment, they danced together, as though they had been equal in sight of matter. Both of them ponderable and tangible things, both of them having thickness. And indeed, for some while,

Starting point is 05:54:04 Ramona Lanzo could not feel any of that superiority that matter feels towards shadows, he only felt that there had been restored to him here the proud place that humanity holds against solid things and hereafter salvation they danced as equals not as master in shadow round and round the floor went from monolonzo dancing and round and round the walls the shadow pranked behind him past every material shape in that room he went rejoicing knowing that with whatever dull feeling matter has these shapes had scorn him as being less than them, remembering that he had marked himself their inferior by envying all that had shadows. The fatigue of the night and his dread had fallen away, and he danced in sheer joy, and a wildness and fantasy about his leaping shadows seemed to show

Starting point is 05:55:00 that it also had a joy of its own. As he watched its silent leapings following his merry steps, he began to understand how a soul might follow a shadow, as here on the solid earth a shadow followed heels. He danced till a new fatigue, overtaking his happy muscles, not the fatigue of dread and monotony, began to wait his steps. Then he in his shadow rested. Again he went to the box, and the very next shadow he drew from it was the lith shadow of a slender girl, with curls that seemed just now shaken by a sudden turn of the head, which showed in profile with young lips slightly parted. There was a grace about this young shadow,

Starting point is 05:55:46 as though spring had come all of a sudden, to one that had waited, wondering at dawn while her elders slept, a maiden in spring. And as Ramonelonzo looked long at that delicate profile, his fancies began to hear bird-song and distant sheep bells, and all happy sounds of lost seasons that had made that wondering look. Who was she, he wondered, that could be so fair. Where was she?

Starting point is 05:56:14 What fields lent such beauty? He was a man now, with a shadow, he could face the world. He need envy nothing among material things. He would search all Spain for the girl with the curly shadow, and his thoughts ran on into golden imagined days. It was some while before he came back from those thoughts and remembered his quest and the promise he gave to the charwoman. He returned then to the shadow box. But he would not wait down the shadow box that had the waving curls, and it floated lightly about the room,

Starting point is 05:56:49 while he took more from the box. The sun was not yet up to the tops of the trees, but was shining between the trunks when Ramonelonzo took out the last of the shadows. There were shadows of two plump old women. There was the sweet curly shadow. All the rest were shadows of men. No shadow was there that could possibly belong to the charwoman. Before he imprisoned the shadows again in the box, he made sure that he should be able to free them again.

Starting point is 05:57:18 So he shut the box and put the padlock on and said the spell to it, and it opened again. He did this two or three times. Then he picked up the shadows again in his finger and thither. thumb and put them back one by one. Last of all, he went up to the slender curly shadow that was wandering free round the room, and it ran away from him, and he ran after. But soon he caught it, for it ran no faster than it had learned to run when it ran at the heels of a young girl, straying along the fields in spring. This also he put back into the box, although he

Starting point is 05:57:54 wept to do so, his own shadow only he kept. then he fastened the padlock and hastened away from the room for there was much to do he had first to find the charwoman and tell her of the failure of his quest and to offer her the protection of his sword wherever she wished to go if she desired to flee away from that house this much he was bound to do when he could no longer hope to find the shadow that he had promised to rescue next he must return to the room in which the shadow-box lay before the master came and wait in the gloomiest corner, so that the master should not see that he had robbed the box of his shadow. And then he must part from the master upon such terms that he could return to his house one happy day when he had found the girl that had lost the curly shadow. This shadow he meant to rescue and give to her, and so to restore her her lawful place among material things, and to marry her and forsake magic forever.

Starting point is 05:58:59 but his sword was still in the service of the charwoman and already he had planned another quest and he had not yet escaped from that house were the magician to see his shadow before he went or to go to the shadow-box and find it missing it was unlikely that any of his impetuous plans or golden hopes of youth would ever come to fulfilment he would perish upon that red flash of lightning or under some frightful spell and the master would have his feet He ran to find the charwoman. Morning grew older with every step that he took and brought the hour nearest when he must meet the magician. He came all out of breath to the nook where the old woman lived with her pails. Anemone, he said, I have opened the shadow box. There was a sudden catch in her breath.

Starting point is 05:59:51 It is not there, he said. Was it the shadow box? she asked. Yes, he said. Look, I have found my eyes. shadow, but yours it was not there. She looked and more jewelry came into her face at the sight of his rescued shadow than he had ever seen there before. He told her how his false shadow was lost and how he found his true one. He told her of the other shadows that he had found in the box. He described the shadows of the two plump old women that could not have belonged to anemone.

Starting point is 06:00:24 He described the young slender shadow, a little shyly, saying, little at first, but some kind of power the charwoman seemed to have, though she scarcely spoke, made him tell more and more, and soon his love of the shadow, with blown curls and slightly parted lips, became transparent. But your shadow was not there, he said, and I can never find it now. But if you will flee at once away from this house, you shall have my sword to protect you, instead of your shadow to whatever place that you may wish to go she pushed some straw together in a heap sit down she said end of chapter twenty-four alonzo dances with his shadow chapter twenty-five of the charwoman's shadow by lord dunsini this libravox recording is in the public domain read by michel fry baton rouge louisiana chapter twenty five the release of the shadow long ago said the charwoman a long long while ago i dwelt in my father's cottage in aragona i had not to do in all those sunny days but to tend his garden or sing unless in winter i sometimes fetched pails of water for my mother from the stream if the well in our garden were frozen i think the days of those summers were sunnier than those we have now and the springs were more sudden and joyous and i remember a glory about the woods in autumn ay and a splendour about those winter evenings that i have not seen ah me this many a year

Starting point is 06:02:21 so having naught else to do i grew in beautiful seasons and breathed and saw loveliness and through no merit of mine but only through borrowing and all idleness of god's munificence through listless years i grew beautiful yes young man for some expression must have changed on the youth's faith char women were beautiful once i had not loved for of those that came sometimes with guitars at twilight and played them near our garden none had the splendor fairer than my daydreams and they were of there came a most strange man at evening when i was seventeen all down the slope from the wood walking alone i remember his red cloak now and his curious hat and his venerable air he came to our village on that summer's day at the time that bats were flying. At the edge of our garden he stopped, I saw through my window, and drew a flute or a pipe from under his cloak, and blew one note upon it. My father came running out at that strange sound and saw the man and doffed his hat to him,

Starting point is 06:03:41 for he had a wonderful air and asked him what he needed. And the master said, I, it was he, the crafty magician, said that he wished for a charwoman, some girl that would mind the things in his house in the wood. My father should have said there was no such a girl in his house, but he talked, and then my mother came out, and then they talked again. I know not how he satisfied them, but he had a wonderful air.

Starting point is 06:04:12 There are just men with far less a presence. They were poor and looked for work for me, and gold to him was ever stuffed to be given by handfuls unaccounted. Yet I know not how he satisfied him. My mother called to me and told me I was to go away with the Signor to work for him in his great house in the wood, and he would pay me beyond my expectation, and soon I should come back to Arragona a girl with a fine dowry.

Starting point is 06:04:46 Aye, he paid me beyond expectations, but I never came back. I never came back. I tried to once, but they would not let me. He would not wait. I must pack my bundle at once. So I did as I was bade and said farewell to my parents

Starting point is 06:05:05 and went away after the stranger through the evening. I turned my head as I went beyond the garden and saw my mother looking doubtfully after me, but she did not call me back. I was all sad walking alone After this strange man in the evening Thinking of Aragona And then without looking round in me

Starting point is 06:05:26 He drew out a reed from his cloak And blew another note upon it And all the world seemed strange And the evening seemed haunted and wonderful And I forgot Aragona I walked after him Thrilled with the wonders That that one node seemed to have called

Starting point is 06:05:44 From the furthest boundaries of wizardry They seemed to be lurking Just over the ridges of hills And the other side of wild bushes Things come from elfland And fancy to hear what tune he would play But he played no more And so he brought me to his house in the wood

Starting point is 06:06:03 Ah, I had eyes then Not like these, not like dim pools and rain They could flash, they were like the color of lakes With the sunlight on them in summer I had small white teeth, yes, I. And I had little golden curls. I loved my curls. God, what it was not this hair!

Starting point is 06:06:27 My figure was slender then, and straight and supple. And my face? Young man, it was not these wringled hollows. Ramona Lanzo stirred uneasily. Who will believe in a beauty he cannot see? Whithered infirmity claims pity, and he had given it, her to the full, but beauty demands love. Could he give that to a legend of beauty, to an old woman's

Starting point is 06:06:53 tale? He felt that silence were best. He could have pitied her more deeply without this sorry claim. Words could not build again a beauty that was gone. He patted her hand a little clumsily, where it lay all veins and hollows upon the straw. Yes, yes, he said, all passes, I make no doubt you were fair. And she saw that she had explained nothing to him. It was then, she said, with a sudden flash in those old eyes, then that he took my shadow. Ramona Lanzo knew from that look and that voice

Starting point is 06:07:34 that he was being told a thing of strange import before he understood anything else. He gazed at the charwoman and she nodded at him, and still he understood nothing. and all of a sudden he shouted the beautiful shadow and she went on nodding her head the morning was growing late at any moment he might appear whom they dreaded he leaped up and ran to the room that was sacred to magic once more he bent over the shadow box once more the spell the padlock opened again and he found the charwoman's shadow the rest he left locked in the box and carried the lovely young shadow gently to the old charwoman. For all the haste that was urgent, he carried the shadow slowly, for friendship and his nightly quest, demanded that he should give it to the old woman, and as soon as this was done, his love must be over, for he knew well enough that shadow and substance must be alike,

Starting point is 06:08:34 and that an old charwoman could never cast the shadow of a lith and lovely girl. He looked at that glad profile and those curls as he walked, murmuring farewells to them. for he had loved this shadow from the moment he saw it as he had loved no mortal girl it was that earliest love at which elders sometimes laugh prophesying that it will pass but now thought romano lanzo it must pass forever taking a glory out of his life and leaving all gray He did not reason that he had only loved for an hour. He did not reason that his love was given to a mere shadow. He did not reason at all. But a grief as profound as the argument of the wisest elders was settling on him, and not an argument could have removed its weight.

Starting point is 06:09:27 A little while ago he had planned a future in which he should wander through Spain, seeking always for the girl that had lost that shadow, and now this girl was gone, the future seemed empty. He came to the gingy haunt of brooms and pans, where the charwoman sat on straw, and stood still and looked long at the shadow. How long he stood there he knew not. There are loves that are each one, the romance of a lifetime.

Starting point is 06:09:56 Such a love must illumine the whole of a man's memories and light up all his years. It goes down time, like, lightning through the air. The length of it in hours is not to be measured. How long he stood there, he knew not. Then he went to the charwoman. Your shadow, he said. If consolation had been possible to him, the joy he had brought to the old woman's face might have indeed consoled him. Yes, she said, that is my shadow. And she spoke all hushed as people sometimes do watching rare sunsets or about the graves of youthful heroes too long dead for grief and then she would have fondled it and patted its curls but drew back her hand ere she did so for it would have clung to her and she did not wish to take it there

Starting point is 06:10:52 so they stood there looking at it a while longer as it lay on the young man's arm and the moments on which their lives depended went wasting away for the footsteps of the magician tapped faintly in the far corridor he was about and they did not hear him you were most lovely once said romano lanzo i she said smiling and gazing still at the shadow take your shadow he said currently after one sigh and at that moment she heard the steps of the magician plainly coming towards them he is coming here she cried Ramona Lanzo listened. It was clearly so, and then he remembered his kerchief that he had left in the pain in the room that was sacred to magic. After that they spoke in whispers. Nearer and nearer came the steps in the corridor. The magician was between them and the door to the wood. Ramon Alonzo stepped hastily towards the old woman. The shadow outstretched to her. No, no, she whispered. He must not see. It is dark in this corner. he said, pointing, no, no, she said, we must flee. They fled down the corridor away from the door to the wood, and the magician came slowly after them.

Starting point is 06:12:11 They tried to guess from his footsteps how much he suspected. They wondered how much their flight had increased his suspicions. They wondered what weapon he carried, whether of earth or hereafter, whether a blade to sunder mortal flesh or one deadly to shadows. They feared a wound that might end all earthly hopes Or a stroke that might rip their shadows clean away from salvation Leaving their helpless souls to share the doom of their shadows The house was full of fears

Starting point is 06:12:42 They ran on, Ramona Lanzo still holding the curly shadow And heard the magician plodding after them Did he suspect or no Had he had time at that early hour To open his shadow box and examine all his shadows? If so, he knew. But if at that hour he had just entered his room, seen the kerchief, and looked for Ramon Alonzo at once, then he only suspected. Yet his suspicions were often as shrewd as mortal calculations. Thoughts like these went through their minds more swiftly than they ran. When the magical

Starting point is 06:13:18 footsteps were now some way behind them, the old woman pulled Ramon Alonzo suddenly sideways, and they huddled or fell past two loose planks in the wall to a cranny behind the wainscot. She had known of this place for years. Rats, damp, and woodworm, and other serfants of time had gradually made it larger. There was just room for the two to hide there. They lay there waiting while the steps came nearer, and all the while Ramona Lanzo held the shadow, though it fluttered to come to the charwoman.

Starting point is 06:13:52 somehow she stifled her breathing, though she had been nearly gasping, and the steps drew near and passed. That he was looking for them, they could not doubt, but they felt as he passed so near, that he had not learned as yet of the opening of his shadow box, for he was muttering questioningly to himself as he went, Ramon Alonzo! Ramon Alonzo! The charwoman held the young man by the wrist and listened as she had. held him to the footsteps going away. Now, she said suddenly, they rose in cautious silence, though one of the timbers creaked. They left the moldering nook and tiptoed away.

Starting point is 06:14:34 They heard the magician turn and come back down the corridor, and then they were running for the door to the wood. The magician had quickened his steps, but they reached the door in time and were out into the wood before they saw him, though they often looked over their shoulders. They ran through the wood, not only to avoid his pursuit. but to be as far away as they could before he used his enchantments, for both of them feared that as soon as he found they were gone, he would go to his sinister room and take from the spell-locked box

Starting point is 06:15:04 some potent weapon of wizardry and loosen its deadly power towards the wood. And they did well to run, though they did not know, as those who have studied the science of magic, that the power of any spell or enchantment lessons according to the square of the distance. And the magician never caught them either with weapon or a spell, but they ran on safe through the wood, and at the edge of it, in the wholesome sunlight, which more than anything else yet known to science,

Starting point is 06:15:34 arrests the passage of spells, the old woman sank onto the grass, exhausted. End of Chapter 25. The Release of the Shadow Chapter 26 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Dunsainey. This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Read by Michelle Fry at Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 26, The Wonderful Casting They felt that they were safe in that honest sunlight, and Ramona Lanzo, sitting near the old crone while she rested,

Starting point is 06:16:20 looked longingly at the young and delicate shadow, which he had not thought to see for so long as this. He held it still in his hands, but now the time was come, to give it up, for his old companion was shadowless, and to this he had pledged her his word. He must give it up to take a wise in shape, for shadow and substance must be alike in outline, as all the world knows. He must give it up and end his love story that was not three hours old. He would see that profile change. He would see those curls scatter to thin wisps. He would lead

Starting point is 06:16:56 the old woman back to her, Aragona, and then go forth alone, and then go forth alone, and you joined the forlorn companionage, that he felt sure there must somewhere be of men that had loved a shadow. Meanwhile, the old woman rested, she could spare him a little longer, that shadow on which all his young dreams were builted, dreams that he knew, as you so seldom knows, would soon come tottering down. He turned from dark thoughts of his future to think of hers. What would the old thing do, back in a world again that had gone so far without her? Her parents would be dead. Who knew how long?

Starting point is 06:17:34 None would know her in Aragona. How would she fare there? He turned to her to make again that offer that he had made once before. If ever you weary of Aragona, he said. Ah, Aragona! she interrupted. How could one weary of it? If you wish for a warm house, he said, for light work, for little comforts,

Starting point is 06:17:56 I know my father will give you employment. again that strange smile that he had seen amongst her old wrinkles when he had offered this before he had intended to say much of his home telling of the comfort of it the quaint old nooks its pleasant rooms the mellow air about it and how a charwoman might saunter there with none to vex her dusting old tapestry slowly and resting when she would doing easy work to keep just ahead of the spider dusting as quietly and leisurely as he he spun till the rays came in all red through the western windows, sitting and watching then the faces of olden heroes reddening to life in the rays, and all the tapestries wakening in the sun's moment of magic. No, he would not have used that word, for she was weary of magic. He would have spoken of the son's benediction, which truly those rays would have been, on that old face in the evening in the happy quiet of his home. But his words all halted before that smile, and he said no more at all. Then I will take you to Arragona, he said after a while.

Starting point is 06:19:09 As you will, she said. He did not understand such listless words about her loved Aragoona. He did not understand her smile. But she was more rested now. The end was near. She must have back her shadow. He gazed again at the young curly head, the happy lips and slender shape of that sweet shadow. Then looking up, he saw that the end which was near was now. For a man was coming towards them along a track that wound across the hill outside the wood, driving before him a donkey that bore a green heap of merchandise. If Ramon Alonzo waited any longer to fulfill his nightly word, the man would see she was shadowless. He sighed once. "'I pray you stand up,' he said.

Starting point is 06:19:58 He stood up himself. She arose without a word and stood, as he said, a calm serene over her agitation as the calm of lakes that freeze amongst the mountains in the midst of winter's violence. Then he carried the shadow to her and kneeled down on the grass near her heels. He turned his back to her as he laid the shadow down, to look his last on the form that he so much love. before it should be a shadow cast by a substance on which time had wrought its worst.

Starting point is 06:20:31 He knew that from these last moments there is nothing to be had but sorrow, and that it were better to have turned away towards the charwoman, looking as it were time full in the face. Yet he gazed long at the shadow. And now the shadow was to the charwoman's heels. It slanted a few degrees to its left, to be right with the sun, the lines of its clothing fluttered a little, but his eyes were only on the merry head to see the last of the curls. Still the curls crinkled there, still the lips parted in wonder. He kneeled,

Starting point is 06:21:07 gazing there, silent and motionless, as a prophet might kneel and listen before a revelation whose words were dying away. And still the shadow had not taken the shape of the old substance that cast it. Then he heard a soft laugh behind, him, and its tones were akin, if there be any meaning in tones, and any speech in mere merriment, to the tones of streams to which spring had suddenly come, rushing down alpine valleys, unknown as yet to the violets, and unbound them from months of ice. And the shadow, the young shadow with wondering lips, responded. It was the shadow of one that laughed under swinging curls.

Starting point is 06:21:50 and as he gazed, as lost Mariners gaze at sails, he saw the little curls moved backwards and forwards, and the parted lips shut. Still he waited for the change that he dreaded. Still no change came, and a wonder came on him greater even than his unhappiness. How could this thing be? How could a withered substance cast such a shadow? Again, that low laugh. He looked round then, and sorry. saw the form that cast the shadow, saw the young girl he loved, for the shadow was stronger than the magician's gift. That weary immortality was gone, and the ravages of those years that magic had given had all fallen away. Rinkles and lank hair were gone at the touch of the shadow, for although weaker than all material things, yet amongst spiritual things and the things that wore against them, the shadow for the sake of its

Starting point is 06:22:50 shape and its visibility is accounted as substance, and it was stronger than magic. She had had magical years for a shadow. Now the shadow was back, and the evil bargain over, and the work of all those dark years was brushed away at the sudden touch of reality. For the shadow was real and had its rightful place amongst our daily realities, while magic was but the mustering of the powers that are in illusion. Ramo donoanzo wondered to see substance taking the shape of a shadow, for he had become so accustomed to the withered shape that magical years had fastened upon the charwoman that he thought it her own true shape.

Starting point is 06:23:36 But her true shape was laughing gently at his wonder, with blue eyes in the sun, while golden curls were bobbing with her laughter. One wistful look she took at her first. fair young shadow, and her laughter ceased as she looked on it. Then those blue eyes turned again to Ramona Lanzo, and anemonez, smiled again. Well, she said, did you know, were his first words to her? Yes, she answered. How, he said. By the long time I have lived with magic, she answered ruefully. Can magic come and go like this? he asked. That is the way. That is the way. of it, she said. And still he could hardly believe what he saw with his eyes.

Starting point is 06:24:24 The bargain is over and my shadow is back. But your shadow is casting a body, he said in amazement, not your body a shadow. It was only a shape of illusion, that body, she said. But you, where were you? he said. It was not my true self, she said slowly. He asked her more of this wonder, but she answered more slowly still, and with confused words and fatigue of mind. She was forgetting. The dark house, the magician, the evil bargain, the long, long corridors, and the peril of soul were all slipping away towards oblivion, after those lank wisps of hair and the long, deep wrinkles. Her efforts to recall them became harder and harder, and soon the flowers, the gleaming grass blades, the butterflies, or any youthful whim turned her so easily

Starting point is 06:25:23 away from effort that Ramon Alonzo saw he would learn no more from her about the ways of illusion, and perhaps never quite understand the power that shadows held amongst shapeless, invisible forces, such as magic. And while her memories of magic waned, his own interest in the things of illusion was waning too, for he had found the one true illusion, and in the light of love all other illusions were fading out of his view. I, and substantial things for the man and his donkey passed by them, and the high load of green merchandise, and neither anemone nor Ramonzo saw anyone go by, or any donkey or merchandise, and though they answered the greeting that the man gave to them, they did not know they had answered.

Starting point is 06:26:13 but in a haze that was made of golden sunlight and many imagined things and that moved with them and shut them from what we call the world they wandered together slowly away from the wood end of chapter twenty six the wonderful casting chapter twenty seven of the charwoman's shadow by lord dunsini this levervox recording is in the public domain read by michel fry that Ruge, Louisiana. Chapter 27, They Dread that a Witch has ridden from the country, beyond moons rising. As Ramona Lanzo and Anemone Wandered away from the wood, her memories of pales and old age and the magical house dwindled faster, and she seemed even younger than her face amongst its little curls, and that was the face of a girl of seventeen. Often she glanced at her shadow to see if it was there, prompted by some dark memory like the fears that frighten children, but when she saw it going lightly with her light steps over the grass and small leaves,

Starting point is 06:27:33 she laughed to see it and forgot the memory. At such moments Ramona Lanzo tried to comfort her for those dark ages that she had known and all those wasted years, telling her that the future and years of his love should repay her. But more and more as they wandered away from the he noticed that talk of the past would puzzle her. She would listen attentively as though trying to remember or trying to understand, and then she would suddenly laugh to see a butterfly scared at her shadow or to see the glint of a flower change as her shadow went over it. Then she would go grave again when she saw the grave face of Ramona Lanzo

Starting point is 06:28:14 offering her sympathy for all she had suffered, and puckering her forehead, she would half remember and, half understand until she saw a lizard run in the leaves or a young goat leaping then all the memory she had of those dark ears would go again so he spoke only of the present and his love and of the future and how his love would endure and how it would be with her still in old age to shield her latest years from any sorrow to this she listened though when they spoke of old age it seemed to both of them like the ending of a story often told, and even pleasant to hear, but not wholly true. This defeat of invincible youth on the distant day was no more to them than is the thought of defeat to the men of a great army just fresh from their first victory. Far into the future the radiance of that day shone for them, for where they walked on the

Starting point is 06:29:14 hillside hand in hand in the morning, till all the years to be seemed to shimmer and glow in the gold of it, as though shafts of that one day's sunlight could flash across time. And even backwards, its splendor seemed to pierce the mist of the past, casting a glow far off even on years that were gone. But the past, to anemone, lay in Aragona and not in the dark house. Across a gulf of time that she could not measure, gardens and cottages of Barragona now glowed with a brighter light for her because of the radiance of one wonderful morning. They spoke a while of those gardens and those cottages, Ramona Lanzo's swift fancies, racing back through the years from far dreams of the future to hear of them,

Starting point is 06:30:03 for all ways that were ever tried by anemone were to him enchanted paths, because they had brought her at last to him. She told of her early days, of her childhood, that she had, should have been yesterday, but that magic had separated from her by a bleak waste of years, and now her memories flitted across those years, not knowing how many they were, as the swallows come back to us over leagues of sea, straight to their own eaves. And as she told of that old home of her memories, a cottage garden at twilight in Aragona, the sky all haunted by the hint of some color, too marvelous to tarry, till we can name it,

Starting point is 06:30:47 but caught and held in her memory. The flowers shining softly with a faint glow of their own, the voices of children playing, who must all long since be dead, and air trembling towards starlight, bells and their mellow echoes, faint notes of a lonely far music, as she told, he lifted his gaze for a moment away from her lips, and saw, though dazzled a little, by the shining gold of her curls, saw Aragona. This was not the Aragona of her memories, in which every flower welcomed him to come and walk in her garden, and every soft song called him to share old joys of her childhood. It was the Aragona in which night and day men watched with swords at their sides for the man with the bad shadow. And Ramona Lanzo saw that he must look into the future to pick difficult paths that would not be lit by any light shining from daydreams.

Starting point is 06:31:47 Immediately before him lay Aragona, and what after that? Would his father receive anemone? He thought of her fair young face, her delicate curls, the rippling light of her. her eyes, her fairy figure, her merry childish ways, rejoicing in girlhood, to which she had returned after such wanderings, daydreams all. His father would not see her as Ramona Lanzo saw. Then he thought of soberer things more reasonably. His father was going to marry Mirandala, with those lightning eyes under that stormy hair, to the neighbor Signor Gauveriz. If they asked where anemone came from, she too was a neighbor. If they asked who she was, who was Galvarez?

Starting point is 06:32:34 And if anemone were unknown, was that not better than to be known as Galvarez was known, a gross, mean man that had excellent pigs, but not himself excellent? So Ramon Alonzo argued, and I give the theme of his argument, considering it worthy thus to be handed down the ages, not for any intrinsic brilliance in the logic, But because it was remarkable that out of that glittering daydream that was lulling him and anemone from all the cares of the world, he was able to awake to argue at all. Then he told anemone of his father's house and how they would marry there and be happy forever after, and of the welcome that his father would give her. And in his vision of their future there, long, languid days of summer and beautiful springtimes, and October sun's huge red and mysterious through haze and gorgeous fires in winter and hunted boars brought home, all blended to build

Starting point is 06:33:35 one glory. He told of his mother and Mirandala and Father Joseph and Peter and the great dog that he loved, who, as he believed, could have killed a boar alone. A little, he told her of hunts that he had had, but told not much of the past, because it seemed to him so bleak when compared with their future. Of the future, he told in all its magnificence, and so came back to his daydreams. Once she questioned him about his father's welcome, but his faith in Gullvarez had grown since first he had thought of him, and Gauvarez presided now over all that situation. His father, he said, would surely welcome her. Yet her question brought him back again to the things that are outside daydreams. They had come nearer Aragona now, and its walls shone bright at noon, but with none of the light that shines from happy dreams.

Starting point is 06:34:37 Now they must plan. Whither their steps. "'Aragona first said Anemone, and then the tower,' said Ramonzo. They could be there that evening. But anemone besought him for some days at Aragona, now that she had come back to it after all that mist of years, that seemed banked up impenetrable to her memory, although over them all shone clear the roofs of the old Aragona. But in what house, he asked, she knew not, with whom she cared not.

Starting point is 06:35:15 Aragona, Aragona, the memory of it was in her mind like bells, and she besought some days there. Then he told her how men waited there for the man with the bad shadow, because of what had happened there on the hill at evening, and he drew his sword as they went toward the village. She laid her hand on the arm that held the sword, and made him put it up. Not now, she said. We will go in the evening late when shadows are long, and they shall see that your shadow can grow, and is as good a shadow as any Christian man's.

Starting point is 06:35:52 Aye, and better, and better, look at it now on the flowers. who has a shadow to equal it, and at evening it shall be beautiful, dark and long, and who dares speak of it except in envy? And this seemed wise to him, for he could not believe that any prejudice against a man on account of a short shadow could remain when he had a long shadow for everyone to see.

Starting point is 06:36:18 So he praised Anemone's plan and said they would wait. But prejudices die slowly, as they were to find out that evening. And on the bright hillside they waited, spending the shining hours in happy talk. They had neither food nor water, they had fled too swiftly to have brought provisions away from the house in the wood,

Starting point is 06:36:42 but it was the time of year when pomegranates ripen, and a grove of these was near them, and the pomegranates were food and drink to them. Sitting amongst the flowers, their talk went on all through the afternoon. There is no memory of what they said. The sound just came to them from the limits of hearing of bees in the tall lime,

Starting point is 06:37:05 swift insects flashed across the yellow sunlight with sudden streaks of silver. Butterflies rested near them, all motionless, showing their splendors. A wind sighed up out of Africa to turn the leaves of a tree. Children a long way off called across bright, fields to their comrades, the flowers sparkled and drank the sunlight in, their talk was part of the joy with which earth greeted the sun. But when the rays slanted and shadows crept a field,

Starting point is 06:37:38 and more and more appeared where there had been only sunlight, till multitudes of them were gathered upon the hill, and they seemed to possess the landscape more than the rocks or trees, and earth seemed populated chiefly with shadows and even destined for them. Then Ramona Lanzo and anemone, hand in hand, their two dark shadows stretching long behind them, walked confidently into Aragona. And those who watched espied them. Then bells were rung, and a man ran out of houses,

Starting point is 06:38:15 and there were shouts and mustrings, and the murmur arose of a crowd in its agitation, and above the murmur one phrase loud and often, For the faith, for the faith. Ramona Lanzo drew nearer them with anemone, thinking to satisfy them with the sight of his long shadow. But when they saw it, they only cried, Magic! Magic!

Starting point is 06:38:39 For having come out of their houses to look for a false shadow, they would not recognize a true one, though it lay there for all to see. Again, Ramona Lanzo drew his soul, sword. Without a ring it came from the scabbard and was all leaden to look on and tarnished, not like the bright swords flashing here and there in the crowd, for it had been dulled and disenchanted when it had crossed the lightning stroke in the hand of the master. Then anemone steped forward before Ramon Alonzo and raised her voice above the sound of the bells

Starting point is 06:39:14 and the cry of the crowd for the faith, till they all stood silent and listened, halted by her bright vehemence no magic she said no magic but a young man's shadow watch you shall see it grow as it hath grown ever since noon see it now fair and shapely can magic do this who hath a longer shadow who hath a shapelier see how the daisies rest in it i know what magic can do but never this and one lifted his voice from the silence that lulled them all, as with one arm high she spoke her speech in their faces, he lifted his voice and said, What is this stranger? Then all who had listened to her, looked at her strangely, and noted that many times she had used the word magic. What was she? Magic, too, maybe, and a fear fell on them all. I, said another, and with more in his voice than the first, what stranger is she?

Starting point is 06:40:21 They thought that voice, those questions and all their looks had quelled her, but she flashed a look at them and spoke again with irresistible voice. Stranger, she said, Stranger, I am of Aragona, I. And an elder peered at her a while and slowly said,

Starting point is 06:40:41 You know not Aragona. Aye, she said, every lane of it. "'Maybe the roadway,' the elder said, "'and our notable Belfrey, but the small lanes never.' "'Aye, every lane,' said anemone. "'Easily said,' cried another. "'And one said, "'Let her tell us tales of it.

Starting point is 06:41:03 "'Let her tell us of this Aragona that she has known.' "'And Ramona Lanzo, behind her with his sword yet in his hand, "'would have stopped them, for he feared that the Aragona she knew "'would be all faded away. and that telling of olden things that to her were dearest she would bring upon her their derision so he tried to turn them but they did not hear him and all were crying out tell us what you found when you travelled to aragona and they made pretence that aragona was some far town that they knew not then she raised her hand and hushed them and spoke low and told of aragona she told not of things that change when old men die, or when children grow and leave gardens, but she told of things that abide or alter slowly, even now when time has a harsher way with villages. She told of yew trees. She told of the older

Starting point is 06:42:01 graves. She told of the wandering lanes that had no purpose, with never a reason for one of their curves, and no reason for altering them. She told the place of the haystack in many fields. She told old legends concerning the shape of the hills and the lore that guided the sower. She crooned it to them with her love of those fields vibrating through every phrase, fields that had shown for her across the bleakness of unremembered years. She told them their pedigrees, quaint names to them in faded ink on old scrolls in their houses, but she knew with whom their grandfathers went amaying. She told, and perforce they listened, held by her love of those fields.

Starting point is 06:42:49 And when she ceased crooning the last word to them, that told of some old stone there was on a hill where the last sound died away like a song that fades softly, a low hum rose in the crowd from wondering voices. She stood there silent while the hum roamed up and down and back again. Then one spoke clear and said, "'She is a witch-woman, for none knows her here, and hath seen our village upon starry nights, riding by broom from the country beyond moons rising.' "'Hi,' said the others, speaking deep in awe, "'she is from that land.' And they opened their eyes a little wider, looking towards her in horror, for that land lies not only beyond salvation, but the dooms of the last judgment cross not its borders either, so that, though

Starting point is 06:43:43 those who have trafficked in magic and known the black art walk abroad there boldly unpunished a most dreadful sight only they must come to it before ever they die for then it is too late no she said not from the country beyond moons rising whence then said they and again she said arragona and one asked her what house she pointed to it with where one window had flashed and blazed at the sunset, but now the shadow of the hill went over it, and someone lit a candle then, and placed it in the window. There, she said, and no more words than this came to her lips. "'It is empty,' they shouted, "'and hath been for years,' said one. "'The candle,' she said,

Starting point is 06:44:37 "'an old custom,' one answered, "'it is clear that you know not Aragona.' No, she said. I know not that custom. A girl lived there in the old time, one told her, and left it and came not back. And the candle, she said. The folk that dwelt there put it there all their days, lest she should come back, he said. And after? asked the nemeny. They left money by testament, as all men know, for a candle to be lit there always at sunset.

Starting point is 06:45:13 the money is long since spent but we keep the custom ay they waited for her yet then she looked long and saw how the thatch had sagged the doors and windows were gone except that one window and it was indeed as they said the house was empty and had long been so there was a hush to see what she would do all the crowd waited romano lanzo stood there with his sword to defend her none stirred they waited for her yet and how could she claim to be the one that legend expected a tale for a winter's night with none to doubt it of those that warmed at the fire but in the open air with the sun still over the sky-line who would believe her and how tell of the long black years without speaking of magic. A long, long look she took at the tumbled cottage, then turned away, and touched Ramona Lanzo's arm. Come, she said. They went back to the hill, and none followed, but they set guards around the boundary of Aragona, lest he or she should return to corrupt them with magic. For a while he did not speak, seeing her sorrow, but when voices hummed far behind them, Their accusations blurred and harmless with distance,

Starting point is 06:46:39 and he saw that none pursued, he turned to anemone. Where now, he said, and anemone answered, I know not. Then to my home, said he, and at these words she smiled, for they came to her thoughts like lights to a dark chamber. The past was all gone. But there was still the future.

Starting point is 06:47:04 She let him guide her whither he would, and he made a wide circle about Aragona and then walked towards his home. The sunset faded, and a star came out and peered at them. Others stole out and watched them, and still they strode on swiftly through the night. Anemonee spoke little, for she was troubled about the future. What if it should crumble like the past? What if the parents of this splendid young man should refuse to receive one whose natal house was moldering walls under a sagging roof that was more moss than thatch upon which oats were growing. Only once she spoke of this

Starting point is 06:47:44 on their walk through the dark, but he, thinking yet of Galvarez, answered so certainly that his father would receive her, that she feared so great assurance to be unreasoning, for she knew nothing of the mean, gross man that the Lord of the Tower was to receive as a son-in-law. The stars that had come out earliest beckoned quietly to others as soon as they saw that pair, and the others came up hastily, and all that peering multitude all night long saw Ramonelonzo and Anemonee walking, till the luster went out of their watching, and they all faded away. In the paleness of morning the young man saw his home lifting a gable above the dark of the forest. He did not tell Anemone what it was, for there was a certain spanish of the moment.

Starting point is 06:48:34 spot from which he wished her to see it first, because from there he believed that the tower looked fairest, but he told her that they were very near his home, for he saw that she was weary. Before they came to that spot from which he wished her to see the tower, they saw a man coming towards them. It was too far to see his face, yet at the first glance Roman Alonzo thought of Peter, though it was not ever his want to be up so early, and he had no cause to be going by that road. Then he watched a while to see who it could be. Peter, it was, and with a letter for Romano Lanzo that his father had written overnight. I started full early, said Peter. Ramon Alonzo took the letter, while Peter's eyes drank in the sight of his young master.

Starting point is 06:49:24 Then he looked at anemone and saw how it was, and said nothing. My lady, said Ramon Alonzo to Peter, looking up from his letter. And Peter, went down on one knee in the road and kissed anemone's hand and this first greeting that she had from the tower an omen full of good fortune heartened anemone for a fleeting instant then she turned to romano lanzo and saw him reading the letter with great astonishment at first the news however strange seemed good she could not read the parchment yet this she read clear in the face of romeona lanzo but then the tenor of the letter changed and she saw him read the end with troubled anxiety. End of Chapter 27. They dread that a witch has ridden from the country towards moons rising. Chapter 28 of the Char Woman's Shadow

Starting point is 06:50:24 by Lord Dancani. This Libravox recording is in the public domain, read by Michelle Fry, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 28, Gonsalvo sings what had been the latest air from Provence. Thus it came about that the Lord of the Tower sent again for Father Joseph and bade him write him a letter, and the letter was folded and sealed and given to Peter to bear to Ramon Alonzo at the magical house in the wood. On the day that Father Joseph had left the

Starting point is 06:50:58 tower to go to his own small house, the Duke lay in his bed all day very restless. It was the third day of his strange illness. Whenever a step was heard outside of his own, his room, he watched his door with a fierceness, a light in his eyes which only faded from them when he saw Miranda. He seldom spoke to her, but he could not curse her. He accepted the food that she brought to him, and none else ventured near him. And so that day went by, and the evening came, and Gauvarez, in the room where the bore spears hung, took an old guitar of his hosts that years and years ago Gonzalvo had played, and striking up a tune, Gauvarez sang. And the tune was one that so long haunted valleys of Andalusian hills that none knew who first sang it or whence it came.

Starting point is 06:51:50 It was a common love song of the South. The words were vague and varied in different villages so that a lover had wide choice how he would sing the song. Gauverrez sang it with a heavy feeling, looking towards Miranda and singing all the tenderer lines the loudest. When he had finished, his hostess thanked him, and Gonsalvo began to tell of old songs that he too had known, but his lady checked him that Miranda might speak, and they both sat silent, waiting for their daughter to thank Galvarez. Then Marandola said,

Starting point is 06:52:27 "'Tis a pleasant song, I pray the saints that the Duke hear it not.' she said it with such an awe that alarm touched galvarez the duke he stuttered yes i pray he hear not she said for he hath a most strange fury and small sounds troubled it much i fear lest he should rise from his bed and slay you and she listened even as she spoke to hear if the duke were stirring, and Gulliveres grew red and said, Not at all, and by no means, and the lady of the tower said, Marandela, and the lord of the tower knew not what to say. And a silence fell, and Gullverers still glowed red, like a misty autumnal sun in the still evening, and only Miranda was quite at ease. At last, to break the silence, Gonzalvo sang a merry love song

Starting point is 06:53:26 that in his own young days was newly come from Provence. Only those had known it then who kept an ear to what was doing in the wider world beyond the boundaries of Spain, and who watched the times and were quick to note whenever they brought a new thing, and of these Gonzalvo was one,

Starting point is 06:53:44 and so he had got that song, no great while after its arrival in Spain, brought over the Pyrenees by a wandering singer, as birds sometimes carry strange seeds. But the song was old among the troubadours. As Gonzalvo sang, he thought of the days when it was something to know that song, showing either that the singer had travelled far, or was one of those quick minds that caught all things new, the merrier the notes, the more he thought of those days, and the more he thought of them, the more he regretted that they were all gone over the hills. A melancholy came into Gonzalvo's voice. Each line of the song seemed to roll him further and further away from that young man that had known so long ago

Starting point is 06:54:31 the latest heir from Provence. Ah, well, such feelings must come sooner or later to all of us. but Gonzalvo was not a meditative man, and to him they came most rarely, troubling him scarcely ever. Now they all welled up in him at the sound of that song, and at they thought that for Ot Gonzalvo knew it was no longer the latest air. His melancholy deepened, his memory drew those merry lines from the past, with a tone as sad as the groans of an aged man, who winds up a pail of bright water out of the way, with pain in all his old joints.

Starting point is 06:55:14 Galvarez no more than Gonzalvo knew that Provencal tongue, yet the lilt of the tune should have told him that it was a merry song. But he watched his host's face with care, and saw there what he heard in his tones. He therefore mopped his eyes with a kerchief, thinking to please Gonzavo. Then Gonzalvo sought to explain that it was a merry song and was highly thought of as such in better years, if not now,

Starting point is 06:55:43 and all amongst his explanations, Gover's thrust in words, seeking to explain his kerchief. Why was it that during all this time, Mirandela seemed to sit there smiling, for her lips never moved? Then the lady of the tower, seeing that the silence that had hung so heavily over them after Miranda's remark had not been bettered,

Starting point is 06:56:06 though broken, by Gonzalvo's men, song, rose from her seat and beckoned to Mirandala, and closing the explanations of the men with fair words to Galvarez, went thence with her daughter. So passed the third day of that illness that so strangely afflicted the Duke. And the fourth day came, and on this day Father Joseph was seen, riding away on his mule. When Father Joseph walked over to the tower, and for a few days left the little village. The folks sinned there gladly. But when he rode away on a mule, they knew not whither, and was not back by evening, a piety came uneasily down on the village, and not only no one sinned, but they scarcely sang, for none gave absolution like Father Joseph. In the tower it was, as yesterday,

Starting point is 06:57:00 for an anxious hush still hung over all the house, because of the dreadful thing it had done to the duke. and none dared trouble that hush by suggesting a new thing, and events came slowly. The Duke's strength still gained gradually, and his magical fury gradually faded, if indeed it faded at all. Mirandala still saw a glitter of wrath in his eyes whenever she opened his door, which only faded when he saw it was her, bringing him food or drink, and the wrath with which he watched the door seemed to Miranda. magnificent for it seemed to her that no more than lightnings or splendid dons would he turn aside to let mean things have their way or assist gross things to prosper and she had seen gross men and watched mean ways and had had a fear that for aught that she could do she would come amongst grossness and meanness in the end so what was common and crude would teach the mundane way once more to the rare and fine they spoke little for the duke's wrath would not easily allow him to speak to any of that house that had so strangely wronged him although it could not rage at merendela

Starting point is 06:58:18 downstairs gauvarez said tender things to her but as it was ever his way to say these the loudest she hushed him with one hand raised and an anxious air lest the duke should hear any sound and be moved to yet fiercer humours and none knew how the duke's fared except Miranda, and she told all truthfully, yet always with an anxiety in her voice, which made all the future uncertain, and checked Gauverers's boldness, as though he had suddenly come to the verge of a country that was full of a damp white mist. Among such uncertainties, this day passed like the last. The fifth day of the Duke's strange illness came. A troubled piety he reigned in the village, and Father Joseph was still far away, being then with Ramon Alonzo in the magician's wood. In the tower, none knew if the Duke's illness abated, but now he had grown accustomed to Mirandela's entry, and knew her step and her hand upon the door, and no longer

Starting point is 06:59:22 watched the door with glittering wrath whenever he saw it move. But none knew if he would yet suffer the approach of any other, and none touched his door that day but Marandala. Gauvarez inquired of her how the Duke fared. I fear, she said, he will never forgive our poor house. I will speak to him later, said Gauvarez. I trust he may forgive you for bringing him here, she said. If so, he may well forgive us. It was thus that Miranda would speak to Gauvererese.

Starting point is 06:59:57 Such words did not at first seem wrong, but there was no comfort in them. Rather they stirred anxieties, and on thinking over them afterwards, it often seemed as though nothing less than a slight to Galvarez were hid in them. Miranda's mother spoke to her about this, telling her how she ought to converse with Galvarez, and Miranda listened readily. Still, it was a hushed house, in which it seemed that nothing dared happen until the Duke was cured. So the fifth day passed, and the next day brought back Father Joseph, tired on his mule to his little house by the village and the folk rejoiced and made merry when they saw him riding their way in the afternoon and through the evening they kept up their rejoicing and into the starry night with dancing and song

Starting point is 07:00:49 and of this came things that are not for this tale but over the tower a hush still brooded heavily it was like a prisoner who waits in the dark for his trial he knows not how great his crime will prove to have been again and again he guesses its consequences meanwhile his judge eats and sleeps and has not yet heard of him something of this uncertainty hung over all that household until they knew how gravely the duke had been wronged and if he would surely recover and still none dare approach him but mirandala and on this day the duke spoke with her not merely answering questions that she asked of him concerning the food or drink that he desired but talking of small things distant from that house. And she sat so long while they talked that all the house grew troubled, for only from Miranda could they learn how the Duke fared. All the while that she tarried, their alarm was growing, and when at length she appeared it was anxious questions they asked of her.

Starting point is 07:01:55 The Duke was no worse, she said. And his anger? What if his anger, one asked of her tremulously? He has his whims, she said, but he is not angry. She returned to the room in which her parents sat with Gauvarez, and there she found a certain restraint, as they spoke with her, for the same strange things all at once had surprised all three, and this was that in the sore perplexity that had come upon them,

Starting point is 07:02:22 and of which they had thought so deeply for six days, the key seemed suddenly in the hands of Miranda. She knew how he fared, knew that he would recover, above all she seemed to be able to soothe his wrath. Terrible menaces seemed to be lifting, of which the worst was that the Duke should die, but after that they feared almost as much his recovery, dreading what he might do for the insult that had been offered him.

Starting point is 07:02:49 But now it seemed at least to Consalvo, and was indeed obvious to all, that if Miranda could thus soothe his wrath, it might be averted from all of them. Then Gonsalvo and Gauvarez walked in the garden and planned how when the Duke should be recovered Miranda should lead him out to the road with his bowman so that he should pass neither his host nor his friend

Starting point is 07:03:14 who would be at that time in the garden and the Duke should not see Gauvarez till long after when his wrath was abated and Gonsalvo never again From this planning they soon returned well satisfied Gonsalvo, his mind now eased of a burden that had weighed on it for six days, was telling volubly of old hunts he had known, while Gauverers meditated gallant phrases and stepped gaily into the house, all ready to utter them to Mirandala. But Miranda was gone again to sit and talk with the Duke. End of Chapter 28. Gonsalvo sings what had been the latest heir from Provence.

Starting point is 07:03:59 Chapter 29 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Duncini. This Librevox recording is in the public domain, read by Michelle Fry, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 29 The casket of silver and oak is given to Signor Golvarez. This was the seventh day of the Duke's illness. Of his wrath none knew, for he had no wrath from Mirandula, and none else durst venture into his presence to see. But his illness was waning fast,

Starting point is 07:04:41 and it was clear that all his strength would soon be recovered. Soon he would be up and away. And then, thought Consolvo, Father Joseph must come, and farewell to my fair fields. So he went that morning to see the three fields that he loved, with the dew still on them, and the shade of the forest,

Starting point is 07:05:03 still lying over half of them. He had gone wondering if they could really be so fair as they seemed to be in the picture his memory had of them. Alas, they were! It would have cheered him to find that they were but common fields, but no, there was a glamour about them, something dwelling perhaps in the forest, seemed to have stolen out and enchanted them.

Starting point is 07:05:27 They lay there deep as ever in their old mystery, under a gauzy gray of spider's webs and dew, and that old feeling lay over them all in the morning, which we feel when we speak of home. They were very ordinary fields, lying under dew in the morning, and very ordinary tears came to Gonzalvo's eyes, for he was a simple man, and the roots of the grasses that grew there

Starting point is 07:05:54 seemed tangled up somehow or other, all amongst his heartstrings. Looking there long at his fields, he became aware of a man approaching across them and looked carefully at them as he came. It was Golvarez. He also had come to see if they were really as fair as had been thought. The sun now came over the tips of the trees, and de Gonzalvo stared at it a while. Very bright, he said, as Golvarez came up. I, said Golvarez jovially, a merry day.

Starting point is 07:06:29 And then he spake more gravely. "'Yonder style,' he said, "'will need much repairing. "'It was an old style "'whose wood was damp and soft "'and moss and strange things grew on it. "'Grand old timbers had made it "'and it had been thus

Starting point is 07:06:45 "'through all Gonzalvo's time. "'It was a good style once,' said Gonzalvo. "'Maybe,' said Galvarez. "'Gonsalvo sighed. "'They are fair fields, are they not?' "'Gonsalvo said. "'I,' said Goverres, "'but he looked all round at them before he answered,

Starting point is 07:07:06 "'which somehow saddened Gonsalvo. "'It is time for breakfast,' Gonsalvo said. "'I,' said Govarez, again with that jovial voice, "'I have a merry appetite.' "'So back they went together from those fair fields, "'and the morning seemed to shine bright for Gauverres only. "'The lady of the tower awaited them, "'but not Mirandola, nor did she appear,

Starting point is 07:07:30 they breakfasted. Gauverrez, refreshed by the morning and charmed at the sight of those fields, was full of a joviality that he would have expressed by gallant's sayings told to a beautiful girl. But where was Miranda? She is taking her breakfast with the Duke, said Miranda's mother. So Gauveriz waited. And the morning went by, and still she did not come, and distress of impatience caused a change in the nature of Gauverers's joviality. as the nature of fruit changes when it ferments.

Starting point is 07:08:05 She came to them in the early afternoon with little in her face to show whether the Duke fared well or ill and say nothing of him until asked by her father. He prospers, she said, and will take the road tomorrow. He will go, said Gonsalvo. Yes, tomorrow, said Miranda. Is he wroth with us yet? I know not, she answered.

Starting point is 07:08:32 They would know tomorrow. Gonzalvo thought again of his plan and went into the garden with Galvarez to discuss how Miranda should lead the Duke to the road while he and his lady and Galvarez were elsewhere. Within the house her mother looked at Miranda and was about to speak, but in all the moments that she looked at her daughter,

Starting point is 07:08:52 she saw no sign of the matter upon which she would have spoken. So closed her lips again and did not. speak. When Gonzalvo and Galvarez came back from the garden, Miranda had gone again with more food and drink to the Duke. And now Galvarez sat silent, speaking indeed when spoken to, but always returning to brood, as it seemed to Gonzalvo upon the same theme, whatever that theme might be. He seemed to be thinking some thought, or working upon some problem, that was surprisingly new, and that could only be followed with difficulty, and yet could not be left. Once he opened his lips to speak, but what he was going to say seemed so strange to him that in the end he said nothing.

Starting point is 07:09:40 So he sat there brooding upon his new thought, a man unaccustomed to thinking, and all the more perplexed at having to brood alone, yet the thought was too strange to share with Gonzavo. It seemed too near to madness, and as he brooded there from amongst the things that he could see in his mind, the three fields faded away. Next morning the Duke rose. The four chiefs of his bowmen, who all that week had moved about the house seldom speaking to any, like stately silent shadows, showed now an alertness such as comes to the swallows when they know that September is here, and all was prepared for departure. The Duke had breakfasted before he descended. He was all ready for the road.

Starting point is 07:10:29 Nothing remained but that Miranda, meeting him at the foot of the stairs, should lead him by a path through an arm of the forest, the four bowmen following, and out onto the road at a point at which Peter should have his horse for him. When not seeing his host or Galvarez, where he would be given to expect them, he would ride away, and Miranda would carry any farewells for him. These were the plans of Gonzalvo, whereby he hoped to escape the wrath of the Duke if that magical anger still smoldered. He had told them to Mirandala overnight, and she had dutifully hearkened and promised to do the bidding of her father.

Starting point is 07:11:09 All will be well, he had said to Galvarez. But Galvarez had maintained that silence of his that was troubled by his new broodings. The step of the Duke was heard on the stair. Behind him tramped his four bowmen. Miranda looked up. Your horse is on the road at the end of the path, she said. I will show you. Is it not at the door? he asked.

Starting point is 07:11:36 I think my father sent it to the end of the path, she answered. She gave no reason. There was none. It was the weak part of Gonzalvo's scheme. She watched his face a moment with anxiety, but a glad smile came on his face. We will go by the path, he said. great indeed was the wrong that had been done him in that house, but it pleased the Duke to think,

Starting point is 07:12:00 and he invented many reasons to help his contention, that Miranda could have no part in it. From this he had come to believe that she had no real part in that house, but was something almost elfin that had haunted it out of the forest, or something that had come for a little while to cheer its hateful rooms, as a ray from the sun may briefly enter a dungeon. Indeed, it is hard to say what the Duke was thinking, for his brain was all a whirl, whatever he thought was unjust, for Miranda was the one light to him in the dark in hospitality of that house, whereas, but never mind, it all happened so long ago. So they went by the path. It ran through a part of the garden, then to the wild,

Starting point is 07:12:48 then turned from the heather and rocks, and ran a while through, through the forest, and out to the high road. It was the way that Peter and the dairymaids took, for it brought them into the tower by a small door at the back, but the road went by the front door. The Duke walked slowly, full of thought, and quite silent. He had looked long for this day, when he could go forth again and hail man once more, and be in the sunlight, and hear the birds, and ride away, and never have any more to do with that house. Yet here were the sun-lilers. But, light and birds, and the house was behind him, and his horse was waiting for him a little way off, and none of the joy he had looked for came near him at all. He was free of that house at last,

Starting point is 07:13:34 and unhappy to be free. Never had he thought so much, or thought less clearly, for all his thoughts were contradicting each other, and Miranda's eyes made it harder to think than ever. They were happy eyes, caring little, it seemed, for his story. trouble. And what was his trouble? Something profoundly wrong with the bright morning that could not be easily cured, and the future coming up all dull and listless for years and years and years. Indeed, his brain was in a whirl. You are glad to be leaving us, said Mirandola, as they crossed the strip of Heather. Yes, said the Duke. I am sorry. It was the Duke that thought over what he had answered more than Mirandula. She said no more, but he pondered on his own words. He had said he was

Starting point is 07:14:27 sorry. Yes, that was the truth of it. An accursed house no doubt, and yet it had hold of his heartstrings. Sying, he walked on slowly and came to the forest with Miranda beside him, and the four chiefs of his bowmen a short way behind. And now his thoughts became fewer and simpler. "'Señorita,' he said, "'are you glad that I am leaving you?' "'Yes,' she said. "'I am sorry.' She had repeated his own confused words.

Starting point is 07:15:02 "'Which did she mean?' He turned round to his four men who halted to hear his orders. "'Hunt rabbits,' he said. And at once the chiefs of the bowmen disappeared in the forest, and the Duke with Mirandula walked on in silence, and no words came to him to say what was weighing upon his heart to this flashing elfin lady.

Starting point is 07:15:23 He that ruled over the deeps of so great a forest had many affairs to weigh and discharged them with many commands, and his words had earned from men a repute for wisdom. But as for the fauns he loved that slipped noiselessly across the clearings, and wide-winged herons that came down at evening along a slant of the air, foxes, eagles, and roe deer, he knew not their language. And now he felt, as he had sometimes felt, watching alone by the clearings, when the things of the wild came gliding by through a hush that seemed all theirs. And he loved their beautiful shapes, and their shy wild ways, and his heart went out towards them. But there lay the gulf between him and them across which no words could call.

Starting point is 07:16:12 So he felt now as he looked on Mirandala, fearing that words were not shaped for what he would say. He halted and looked long on her, and no words came to his lips. They were near the road at the spot where his horse waited, and he feared that they soon might part with all unsaid. But those proud eyes of his were saying all, he would say. The twinkle of merriment in Miranda's eyes died down

Starting point is 07:16:41 under the gaze of them, and a graver look came to her face, and her merry look did not return till he spoke, and she heard common human words again. "'Will you marry me, Mirandola?' he said at last. "'It was then that the twinkle dawned again in her eyes. "'I am engaged to signor Gauverres,' she said. "'Govarez,' he said. "'Yes, my father arranged it,' said Miranda. "'Golvarez shall hang,' said the Duke.

Starting point is 07:17:14 "'I thought he was your friend,' said Miranda. "'I,' said the Duke, truly, but he shall hang.' "'And one last favour she did for Gauvarez, that had so few favors of her hitherto, for when she saw that the Duke was truly bent on hanging him and was indeed earnest in that matter, she besought him to put it aside, and would not answer the question that he had asked her

Starting point is 07:17:38 until he had sworn that Gulliveres should go unhung. Then she consented. And now, from the obscureer part of the garden, where they lurked while the Duke went by, Gonsalvo and Gulliveres came forth. Gonsalvo walked with all the lightness of one from whom a burden had slipped, and Gullvarez with downcast head and moody air, and silence grudgingly broken when at all.

Starting point is 07:18:07 So they walked. in the garden. He never saw us, said Gonsalvo cheerily. No, said Gauvarez. Little light shells crunched under their feet along the path while Gonsalvo waited for a further answer. He is gone, said Gonsalvo. This time Gualverrez made no answer at all, and the shells crunched on in silence. Gonsalvo believed that all things were as bright as his own mood, but when he perceived that this was not so with Gauvarez, he spoke to him of the three fair fields, though it cost him aside to do it. And even this made no rift in the heavy mood of Galvarez. They are fair, are they not? asked Gonzavo.

Starting point is 07:18:53 Yes, yes, said Galvarez impatiently, and fell to nursing again that curious silence. And at this, Gonzalvo wondered, until he wondered at a new thing. For all of a sudden he wondered, where is Peter? peter was holding the horse of the duke a little way down the road why had he not returned was the man straying away to wanton in idleness when there was work to be done in the stables he peered about in vexation and still no sign of peter the duke must have reached the road long since and ridden away peter should have returned immediately no work no wages he thought and in his anger his mind dwelt long on peter and then he thought, "'Wherever is Mirandela?' "'It is curious,' he said to Galvarez.

Starting point is 07:19:45 "'I do not see Marandala returning.' Almost a look of contempt seemed to color the gloom of Galvarez as he turned to the Lord of the Tower. "'No,' he said. "'It is curious,' said Gonsalvo, and an uneasiness began to grow in his mind slowly until it was two silent men that walked in the garden together. "'A little this way,' said Gonsalvo, going through a gap in the hedge to a knoll that rose in a field outside the garden,

Starting point is 07:20:16 from which one saw more of the road. Gauverrez moodily followed, and there was the Duke's horse, with Peter waiting, not even wondering as his whole attitude showed, but holding the horse in the road and merely waiting, as flowers and vegetables wait. "'Still there,' said Gonsalvo, and Gauvereriz, grunted. There was nothing to gaze at, a patient man and an almost patient horse, and presently Gonzalvo turned from them, and came with Gauveris slowly back to the garden. They walked again upon the small seashells. And then, with the summer burning in their faces, with the splendors of wonderful hopes and imaginations, led by such inspirations as troubled the hills and spring, came Mirandula and the Duke of Shadow Valley,

Starting point is 07:21:08 together back from the forest. He returns, said Gonzalvo. Govarez nodded his head. But he comes back, Gonzalvo said. And on walked Mirandala and the Duke of Shadow Valley, as though they had crossed the border of a land full of the morning, and were walking further and further into its golden brightness, which lit their faces more and more as they went,

Starting point is 07:21:35 while behind them lay colder lands, lonelier and lacking enchantment. And Gonzalvo said nothing but little words of surprise, and Galvarez said nothing at all, for his gloomy mood was set for these very events. But the Lady of the Tower, as she passed by a high window, looking out, saw all at once Miranda's story. Soon these five met by their three separate ways

Starting point is 07:22:01 at the door that led to the garden. And the Lady of the Tower, looking out on the huge glum, of Galvarez and the radiance of Mirandula, while her husband repeated phrases and questions, all shrill with surprise, recalled a thunderstorm she had seen long since, coming over the sea at sunrise, while small white birds ran crying along the coast. And then with a gasp, Gonzalvo's eyes were opened to the obvious situation, which had long been clear to Galvarez. They entered the house.

Starting point is 07:22:36 Gonzalvo walking behind in silence. My story draws near to its close. In the room where the Boris Spears hung, they planned the future, as far as men ever do, for they turned blindly and confidently towards the strange, dark ways to speak as though they could see them, and would have spoken, but the Duke talked instead, fervidly, gayly, and lyrically. It was a great while before Gonzalvo had opportunity to. touch on the matter that had long lain near his heart, the matter of the casket in Miranda's dowry. As for dowry, said the Duke, give me, but he spoke incoherently, naming foolish things, a lock of her hair,

Starting point is 07:23:23 an eyelash, a common fan. Then, your magnificence, said Gonzalvo, when opportunity came to speak again, except at least that casket which had the fortunes of my house been grander had long been filled with gold for it was ever destined for my daughter's dowry though still by ill fortune empty as you shall see and he took its key and opened the casket there showing it to be empty as he had said and was about to hold it forth in his two hands to the duke but mirandola said father it was promised to signor gauvarez gonsalvo as he bowed forward with his casket stopped with a sudden jerk and looked with a maze at his daughter but miranda's eyes under curved black lashes remained unwavering and she said no more and after a while in silence and puzzled at his own action gonsalvo handed the casket to gulvarez who took it without any thanks midmost in that courteous age and put it under his arm and walked from the room and went away from the house and then the lady of the tower would have spoken but the duke spoke again it was more like the words of such songs as they sometimes sang in youth upon moonlight night in the golden age, to the tune of a mandolin than any sober pre-vision of the future, and as he spoke, thoughts so swam through Gonzalvo's mind, so swift and so unrelated,

Starting point is 07:25:00 that he longed with a great yearning for Father Joseph, who had such an easeful way with unruly thoughts, and wondered upon what pretext he could summon him, for the need of a priest was not yet. and then he thought of his son and that business of gold for the dowry and the propriety of acquainting him with his sister's betrothal the occasion was well worthy of a letter and he slipped from the room and sent peter in haste for the priest plump and mellow and calm in due course father joseph appeared and his calmness came to gonsalvo like snow upon torrid sands and they greeted and in due course father joseph appeared and his calmness came to gonsalvo like snow upon torrid sands and they greeted and and spoke a while, and Father Joseph said soothing things that were easy to understand, and this was the letter that was written. My dear son, a thing has befallen so strange, that I am readier to marvel at it than to acquaint you with the truth of it, or to tell you how it befell, if indeed this could

Starting point is 07:26:03 be told, but it is of those things whose ways are inscrutable, and that befall as they may, and are not to be traced to their origin. are to be studied by any of the arts of philosophy, but are only indeed to be marvelled at. The Duke of Shadow Valley is betrothed to your sister, and will marry her. That is, as it is. Ask me not how it became so, for I am no philosopher to unravel the causes of events, and methinks that many events are only made for our wonder, and have no cause and no meaning, but that we should wonder at them. as indeed I do at this event, most heartily.

Starting point is 07:26:46 Now, this being, as I have said, with the aid of Father Joseph, whose pen has been most ready in this matter, there is no need any longer of that business which we have discussed heretofore. Return home, therefore, with all speed, and abide with us. But of all earthly needs, place this the foremost, to wed in due course, and may the saints whose care it is hasten the happy okay. only the daughter of some illustrious house. For the Duke of Shadow Valley is, as the world knows,

Starting point is 07:27:20 the loved companion of the king's self, and they have hunted the magpie together with their falcons, and have strolled abroad when all the city slept, seeking such adventures together as were appropriate to their youth. Bring no shame, therefore, on so illustrious a head by marriage with any house not well established in honor, before the coming of the Moors. Your loving father, Gonzalvo, of the Tower and Rocky Forest.

Starting point is 07:27:49 After the dictation of so long a letter, and the work of signing it with his own hand, and all his wanderings and perplexities, Gonzalvo sat in his chair so much bewildered that he could not wholly extricate his thoughts, nor could even Father Joseph make their meaning perfectly clear to him. and in this perplexed state there came to him all of a sudden one vivid lucid thought of his three fair fields he rose and though father joseph would have assisted him with his counsel he went forth in silence out of the house alone and soon he was walking on those remembered grasses dewy now with the evening with folded hands in a chair father joseph ordered his thoughts but to gonsalvo pacing his feet fields again, there came a calm along the slanting rays, and out of the turf he trod, and from the

Starting point is 07:28:46 cool of evening and glitter of leaves, it came from that quiet moment in which day ceases to burn, and it welled up out of memories of other evenings that had illumined those fields. Far off he saw the form of Gauvarez riding away, bent on his horse, his two men at arms behind him. He turned to call to him some word as he went. He filled his lungs to hail him, but turned instead to some flowers among the grasses that the sun had touched in his fields. End of Chapter 29.

Starting point is 07:29:23 The casket of silver and oak is given to Signor Gulliveres. Chapter 30 of the Char Woman's Shadow by Lord Dunsainey. This Librevox recording is in the public domain, read by Michelle Fry, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Chapter 30, The End of the Golden Age When Ramona Lanzo read his father's letter, a fear came into his daydreams, and he stood a long while wondering.

Starting point is 07:30:00 Peter stood before him, gazing into his face, and anemone by his side was quietly reading his thoughts, and both saw trouble there, rushing up black and suddenly to darken the coming years. and there he stayed while two phrases went up and down amidst his dismayed thoughts, the daughter of some illustrious house, and well-established in honor before the coming of the Moors, what should he do? Were those two phrases to wither away his happiness, and yet what way of escape? Hope herself seemed blind to it.

Starting point is 07:30:37 What is the matter, anemone said, as he stood there, still and silent, "'It is from my father,' he said, "'and she knew then that his father would not receive her, "'but she said nothing. "'Peter,' he said after a little while, "'I must go on alone. "'Guard, my lady.' "'To her he turned to give excuses and reasons

Starting point is 07:31:01 "'for leaving her a while in the forest, "'but she left all to him and needed no reasons. "'A little way further they went on together, "'Peter walking behind, and then Anemone and Ramonelonzo parted as though it had been for years, though they were only a few hundred paces from the tower. And Ramon Alonzo had sworn to return to her long before evening. Then he left her and went down to the edge of the forest, where it touched the rocky land at the end of the garden, and Peter assured Anemone that his young master would soon return, for that he ever kept his word to the last letter of it.

Starting point is 07:31:39 but she was full of heaviness from that dark news that had troubled Ramona Alonzo, although she knew not the words of it, yet she felt it as on sultry days in summer we feel the thunder before we have seen a cloud. When Ramon Alonzo came to the edge of the forest, he hid himself carefully by an old oak that he knew, then he looked towards the garden. And soon he saw walking on those remembered paths, his sister, with the Duke of Shadow Valley. They were coming towards him, and he saw her clearly, a new gaiety in her dress, and a look in her face that was almost strange to him. Then they turned back again.

Starting point is 07:32:23 The next time that they approached he watched her face to find a moment when he could show her that he was there without the Duke perceiving him. And for long he only saw that new look, increasing the spell of her beauty, and though the Duke looked seldom. him toward the forest, and had she glanced for a moment he might have signed to her, yet he caught not one of those glances roving from under her lashes, and the pair went back again to a further part of the garden. The Duke was talking to Mirandaela, that handsome head bending towards her, and suddenly she lifted her head, looking far beyond the garden, and her gaze was out over the forest where Ramona Lanzo hid. And suddenly he waved his kerchief to her, by the

Starting point is 07:33:09 the hollow old bowl of that oak by which they had played of old. She saw the sign and at once walked nearer to him, the Duke walking beside her. And when he saw the tall and slender figure in black velvet and sky-blue plume coming towards him with her, he signed to her again and again to come alone. But they still walked on, and left the end of the garden and crossed the strip of rocky heathery land. They found him standing by the old high, high, and hollowed oak. He daft his hat to the Duke, then hastily said what he had tried to sign. Mirandola, I have a word to say to you apart. And she said, My secrets are his. Then Ramon Alonzo felt that his judgment had not been trusted,

Starting point is 07:33:57 and that Miranda, his sister, should have doubted that he had good grounds for his request, troubled the lad to the heart. And when she made no motion to draw apart with him alone, he blurted out in his peak every word of his father's letter, though the Duke was standing beside him, petulantly bent on showing how right he had been to ask her to hear him alone. And then he told her mournfully how he was engaged to wed a maiden whom he had rescued from the magician, and he was fairer than the earliest flowers on bright March mornings in Spain. When the Duke heard this he smiled, and she is of no noble house, he said.

Starting point is 07:34:40 Ah, there it is, said Ramonelo. Where is she? asked Marandela in her quiet, kind voice, whose very tones seem to know her brother's heart, as the echoes of chimes, no bell-freeze. There in the forest, he said, Miranda looked at the Duke. Let us see her, he said. So Ramon Alonzo turned and led the way,

Starting point is 07:35:04 and the betrothed pair followed together. He strode on as though all alone in the wood with his sorrows, disappointed at having had no talk with Mirandala alone, for he had had much hope from her wisdom if he could have talked with her thus, as so often he had talked when they were younger, smoothing the difficulties of tinier troubles. So he walked downcast and moody, though once he fancied that he heard behind him the sound of soft laughter.

Starting point is 07:35:34 When Ramona Lanzo came where Anemone waited with Peter, he was silent yet, extending an arm towards her where she stood smiling, fair, as indeed he had said, as any flower looking up at the morning, through dews of the earliest spring. The Duke doffed his hat and bowed, and Miranda went up and kissed Anemone. So I must wed illustriously, said Ramonelonzo, in bitterness. during one of those brief moments that destiny uses often to perfect an event with which she will shape the years none of them spoke then anemone slowly turned towards aragona towards her own people that rejected her hold said the duke i will write to the just monarch bless his heart he will do this for us none knew till the letter was written quite what would be asked nor what the just and glorious monarch would do, yet suddenly all seemed decided. Back then they went to the tower, Mirandala, the Duke, and Ramona Alonzo. But not anemone, for Ramona Alonzo knew not yet what to say of her to his father, though the Duke had suddenly lit his hopes again, and they shone down vistas of years.

Starting point is 07:36:56 So with one swift thought that long pondering would not have bettered, he remembered Father Joseph and commanded Peter to lead her to the good man's little house. This Peter did, and there she was lodged a while and honorably tended, and had her memory held any more than hints of those dark ages in a sinister house in the wood, Father Joseph would have been, as he nearly was, surprised, and this so well knew he man and his pitiful story, he had not been since long and long ago when he was first a curate and all the world was new to him. In the tower, while his parents were greeting Ramona Lanzo and hearing halting fragments of his story, whose whole theme he must hide a while, the Duke of Shadow Valley,

Starting point is 07:37:46 with toil and discomfort, yet still with his own hand, inscribed a letter to the victorious king. therein he told his comrade in many amariment the glad news of his happiness then added a humble request concerning anemone and closed with a renewal of the devotion that his house ever felt towards that illustrious line and now with meager spoils his bowmen were coming in for he had bidden them hunt rabbits and to one of these he gave at once this letter bidding him haste to its splendid destination and the bowmen hastened as he had been commanded and travelled for all the remainder of that day and through most of the night so that he saw the next sunset glint on the spires of that palace that was the glory and joy of the golden age and there the most high king the victorious monarch sat on a throne of velvet and wood and gold and lights had been brought but lately and two men stood by the throne holding strange torches that the king might see to do any new thing but the king had not to do but to ponder the old cares over for he had wide dominion then into the hall came the bowman when the king read he rejoiced then he rose and he gave a command commanding preparations and these preparations were for his own presence at the wedding of the duke and mirandala but amongst his rejoicings and those august preparations and the grave cares he inherited he forgot not his friend's petition and the humble affair of anemone so again he commanded bidding his pen be brought so one bore the pen down

Starting point is 07:39:35 the hall on a cushion of scarlet and yellow which are the colors of spain and the victorious king took up the pen and wrote upon parchment writing out with his own hand the humble name of anemone and in that illustrious hall the pride of the golden age he wrote an ample pardon for her low birth and set his name to the pardon that he had written and sealed it all with the glorious seal of spain and the pardon was carried then on the cushion of scarlet and yellow to that archbishop that waited upon the king watching his spiritual needs from moment to moment and when the pardon was come before the archbishop he raised his hands and blessed it the bowman bore the pardon back to the duke who gave it to romano lonzo thenceforth it became treason to speak of the low birth of anemonee nor may historians allude to it to this day. That pardon had annulled it, she became of illustrious lineage. And in their loyal avoidance of any reference to anemone's occupation, the Spanish people let drop into disuse the very name of charwoman, lest inadvertently they should ever apply it where it was treason to do so. Still they speak there of broom lady, woman of the pale, crockery breaker, floor warden, scrub mistress, but,

Starting point is 07:41:03 never of charwoman, unless a light and unreliable spirit blown over the Pyrenees by a south wind out of Spain has grossly misinformed me. What more remains to be told of the fortunes of Ramona Lonzo and of the Allied House of the Duke of Shadow Valley? Of the wedding of Miranda, good old books tell, in words whose very rhythms dance down the ages, with a stately merriment and a mirthful march that are well-worthy of their most happy theme. To them I leave that chronicling. In London alone, the lucky wayfarer going north by the charing crossroad and taking fortunate turnings will find in the antiquarium at the end of Old Zembla Street,

Starting point is 07:41:51 sufficient of these to his purpose. if the old curator dreams not too deeply of bygone splendors of the enchanted days, as may happen on long dark Saturdays, he will find the books that he needs. For their sleep in their mellowed leather on those shelves, and laugh in their sleep as they dream of the golden age, such books as fortunate revelries, the glorious waning of the golden age, the sunset of chivalry, and happy days of the illustrious. and all these tell of that wedding, illumining the event with a dignity and a splendor,

Starting point is 07:42:30 such as our age considers presumptuous for any affair of man. I make no mention of such books as may be stored in Madrid, nor such as peddlers are likely still to be selling in hamlets of unfrequented valleys in Spain. Suffice it that no full tale is told of the golden age that does not revel happily over that day. of the wedding of romone london and anemone the good and glorious books tell a brief retell for no archbishops performed the holy rite and the king's self had returned to the burden of his dominion yet were they well wed for father joseph did this with his own hands and blessed them out of the store of his kind old years and she with the years of magic cast away aged as we all age slowly and mortally. And all those golden books agree on one quaint exaggeration, and record sometimes with curious and solemn oath that she and Ramon Alonzo lived happily ever after. And what of the magician?

Starting point is 07:43:40 He whose strange threads have run so much through all the web of this story. He sent no spell to follow after anemone and her lover, as for a while they had feared, but went all alone to his room that was sacred to magic, and took from the dust and darkness of the high shelf, a volume in which he had written all he had learned about boar hunting. And indeed, no more was known of that art in any land, for he that had taught him had followed the boar well. In this he read all that day and all the night, assured that therein was the manifest way to happiness that all philosophers sought. But about the third day, when none returned to him, and he was quite alone, and he felt it was vain to look for another now who should be worthy

Starting point is 07:44:29 to receive from him the tremendous secrets of old. He rose from his book and said, The years grow late. He went then to his tower and quaffed one gulp of that fluid that was named Elixir Vite, and carrying the bottle to that passage that for so long anemone scrobed, he cast it heavily down upon the stone. and then he took from a box a flute of reed and cloaked himself and went out of his magical house he went a few paces into the wood then raised the reed to his lips he blew one bar upon it of curious music then waited listening eagerly and there came to his ears the scurry of little things nimble elvish and sprightly over dead leaves of the wood at that he strode away going swiftly northwards, and there followed him all manner of magical things, fays, imps, and fawns, and all such children of pan.

Starting point is 07:45:35 In the open lens he raised his pipe again, and blew on it two strange notes, which seemed for a while to haunt the air all round him, then they drifted slowly afar. And to that call responded the things of the world, tiny enchanted folk from many an elf, mound and many a fairy ring, they joined the fantastic group that had come from the deeps of the wood and followed after the master. And with him went old shadows, some taken from earthly folk,

Starting point is 07:46:08 and some that seemed cast upon other fields than ours by other lights than our sun. He led them on through all the beauty of Spain. On the high hills he blew those two notes once more, and all that had their sole dwelling in the moonlight and river mist are in the deep romance that overflows from old tales told at evening and glamour of firesides came out from there lurking places at the edge of the olden years and the dimness of distance and the other side of grey hills and followed him over the fields and valleys of Spain

Starting point is 07:46:45 till there came in sight one morning the tips of the Pyrenees soon he was crossing these with that wild crew behind him and butterflies that had followed him out of spain he blew his strange notes once upon a peak where his tall cloaked figure looked tiny seen from the fields and his uncouth following only specks on the snow nevertheless spain heard him and as those notes with their lure and persuasiveness went murmuring among the villages singing and promising i know know not what, and calling away as not should call from the common orderly ways, all the cathedrals rang their bells against him, and the chimes filled all the valleys and lapped over the rims of the hills till all the air of Spain was mellow and musical with them, and yet the things of romance and mystery went leaping after the master, and yet more hearts than ever told of it after turned that day towards the peak and the paths of the Pyrenees. Through the paths he went, and the children of Pan followed.

Starting point is 07:47:57 Then they turned eastwards and away and away. In Provence today there are tales that few folk tell, yet still remembered in the hearts of the peasantry. They tell how once the things of the olden time came that way from the mountains, and away they went through Europe, leaving a track of fable and curious folklore, that except where it is lost near cities and highways can be followed even yet. And after them always went whatever was magical,

Starting point is 07:48:27 and all those things that dwelt in the olden time, and are only known to us through legend and fable. On and on the magician strode, undaunted by rain or night or rivers or mountains, going onward guided by dawns, always due eastwards. weariness came on him and still he strode on going homeless by quiet hamlets in the night and waking new desires by the mere soft sound of his footfall and the scurrying of little hooves that always followed his journey and there came upon him at last those mortal tremors that are about the end of all earthly journeys he hastened then and before the human destiny overtook him he saw one morning a clear where the dawn had been, the luminous rock of the bastions and glittering rampart that rose up sheer from the frontier of the country beyond moons rising. This he saw, though his eyes were

Starting point is 07:49:31 dimming now, with fatigue and his long sojourn on earth. Yet if he saw dimly, he heard with no degree of uncertainty the trumpets that rang out from those battlements to welcome him after his sojourn, and all that followed him gave back the greeting with such cries as once haunted valleys at certain times of the moon. Upon those battlements, and by the opening gates were gathered, the robed masters that had trafficked with time and dwelt a while on earth, and handed the mysteries on, and had walked round the back of the grave by the way that they knew, and were even beyond damnation. They raised their hands and blessed him. And now for him and the creatures that followed after, the gates were wide that led through the earthward rim part of the country beyond

Starting point is 07:50:24 moons rising. He limped towards it with all his magical following. He went therein, and the golden age was over. End of the charwoman's shadow by Lord Dunsainey. Read for you by Michelle Frye at Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Thanks for listening, and I hope you enjoyed it.

Classic Audiobook Collection - The Charwomans Shadow by Lord Dunsany ~ Full Audiobook [fantasy]

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