Page:Edmund Dulac's picture-book for the French Red cross.djvu/34

LAYLA AND MAJNUN Where was he who had stolen her dove and returned it with a message?

Wherever he was he had quick eyes, for he had discovered her in the shadows, and now came past the fountain, hastening towards her.

She darted into the light of the moon.

'Who art thou?'

Their eyes met. The moonlight fell on their faces. No other word was spoken, for they recognised each other in one glance.

'Laylá! thou hast come to me. I love thee.'

'And I thee!'

And none but the old moon, who has looked down on many such things before, saw their sudden embrace; and none but the spirit of the fountain, who had recorded the words of lovers ever since the first gush of the waters, heard what they said to one another.

And so Laylá and Qays met many times by the fountain and plighted their vows there in the depths of the forest. And once, as they lingered over their farewells, Qays said to Laylá, 'And oh! my beloved, if the desert were my home, and thou and I were free, even in the wilderness, eating the herbs that grow in the waste, or a loaf of thine own baking from the wild corn; drinking the water of the brook, and reposing beneath the bough,—then would I let the world go by, and, with no hate of thy people, live with thee and love thee for ever.'

'And I thee, beloved.'

'Then let us leave all, and fly to the wilderness——'

'Now?'

'No, not now. Thou must prepare. To-morrow, beloved, I will await thee here at this hour with two fleet steeds; and then, as they spurn the dust from their feet, so will we spurn the world —you and I.'

That night Laylá dreamed that she was in the wilderness with her lover, sitting beneath the bough, drinking from the waters of the brook, eating a loaf of her own making from the wild corn, and, in her lover's presence, happy to lose the luxury of palaces. 14