Page:Weird Tales Volume 36 Number 04 (1942-03).djvu/52

 except in a bewitched mirror that causes snow to appear in the hair. Take her, and welcome, but I feel that I should be reimbursed for so great a loss. Would it be too much to ask you to grant me one day of your time each week to care for my garden in exchange for a girl of such perfection?"

And Loo Siang said, "Gladly do I agree."

Early the next morning, Loo Siang and Lari Kim set out afoot for the garden which was to be their home. They were accompanied by a representative of the Mandarin to show them the way. It was a distance of twelve li but neither Loo Siang nor his lady minded that. The sun stilled its heat so they might not suffer. A gentle breeze accompanied them and on the breeze floated the breath of flowers.

At last they arrived at the site of the new garden, a barren desolate wasteland. There was not a tree anywhere in sight. Once more Loo Siang had been tricked. This parched strip of desolation which would take a century to cultivate, was his. For this worthless heritage, he had given the best years of his life. Lari Kim put her soft arms about his shoulders.

"After all," she murmured, "I am still with you."

HAT afternoon they sat alone in the squalid hut which was the only habitation within miles. They had eaten the food which the servants of the Mandarin had packed for them. Until it was night they wandered over their domains. There was plenty of land, plenty of dead earth. It was a graveyard of hope.

"Something might be made of it," he mused, "if only there was a spring of fresh running water."

Even as he spoke, he noticed a small trickle of water breaking through the hard soil at his feet. With a cry of surprise, he fell upon his knees. With his bare hands he dug and pushed the soil away until the spring widened. For years Loo Siang had spoken to the earth as though it were his friend. Now as a wedding gift this spring was given unto him by the soil. Perhaps the spring had always been there and it needed but the help of human hands to break through. To Loo Siang there was nothing supernatural about its appearance. He prayed to many gods so it was not odd that one among them should answer his prayers.

That night the moon rose in a blaze of glory. It painted the hut with its silvery light until it seemed like a palace. And Loo Siang sat by the door of his house, holding Lari Kim in his arms, chanting love songs to the moon.

Hours later when the moon had set and blackness once more held the countryside in its grip, strange things began happening. It was the Black Night of Terror that has been told about in Chinese legend for a thousand years. The earth trembled as though it were spewing up poisons which it had swallowed and could not digest. Monstrous forms appeared upon the highways near Soochow. Men who beheld these frightful forms uttered shrieks and fled to their homes. All the terrors conceivable had broken loose that night. Merchants closed their shops and went to hidden places to pray to the gods for mercy. The wine taverns were deserted. Terror gripped the land. And all night long the highways were crowded by these silent, monstrous forms. It was not true as some believed that they were dragons. It was not true that they breathed forth fire. It was not true that they snatched up tiny men and women and devoured them as they strode along. All these things were partly imaginative. For all those dark, grim forms were really trees. That queer night of terror was caused by the march of the trees. They were marching from the garden of the Mandarin to the barren