Page:Thus Spake Zarathustra - Alexander Tille - 1896.djvu/226

 TQ2 THUS SPAKE ZARATHUSTRA, II

On high there I guarded death's coffins. The damp vaults stood full of such signs of triumph. Out of glass coffins, overcome life gazed at me.

The odour of dusty eternities I breathed. Sultry and dusty lay my soul. And who could have aired his soul there !

Light of midnight was always round me, loneliness cowered beside me, and, as the third, the death-still- ness-and-rattle, the most wicked of all my female friends.

I had keys with me, the rustiest of keys ; and I knew how to open with them the loudest-creaking doors.

Like a very cruel groan the sound ran through the long corridors when the door opened on both hinges ; weirdly cried that bird ; it liked not to be awakened.

But still more terrible, strangling one's heart, it was when it became silent again and still round about, and I sat alone with that insidious silence.

Thus the time went on and crept on, if there really was time. What know I thereof ! But at last that came to pass which awakened me.

Three times blows struck the door, like thunder strokes ; three times the vaults resounded and groaned ; then I went unto the door.

'Alpa!' I called, 'who carrieth his ashes unto the mountains? Alpa! Alpa! Who carrieth his ashes unto the mountains ? '

�� �