In the Eastern story, the heavy slab that was to fall
on the bed of state in the flush of conquest was slowly
wrought out of the quarry, the tunnel for the rope
to hold it in its place was slowly carried through
the leagues of rock, the slab was slowly raised and
fitted in the roof, the rope was rove to it and slowly
taken through the miles of hollow to the great iron
ring. All being made ready with much labour,
and the hour come, the sultan was aroused in the dead
of the night, and the sharpened axe that was to sever
the rope from the great iron ring was put into his
hand, and he struck with it, and the rope parted and
rushed away, and the ceiling fell. So, in my
case; all the work, near and afar, that tended to
the end, had been accomplished; and in an instant the
blow was struck, and the roof of my stronghold dropped
upon me.
Chapter 39
I was three-and-twenty years of age. Not another
word had I heard to enlighten me on the subject of
my expectations, and my twenty-third birthday was
a week gone. We had left Barnard’s Inn
more than a year, and lived in the Temple. Our
chambers were in Garden-court, down by the river.
Mr. Pocket and I had for some time parted company
as to our original relations, though we continued
on the best terms. Notwithstanding my inability
to settle to anything — which I hope arose out
of the restless and incomplete tenure on which I held
my means — I had a taste for reading, and read
regularly so many hours a day. That matter of
Herbert’s was still progressing, and everything
with me was as I have brought it down to the close
of the last preceding chapter.
Business had taken Herbert on a journey to Marseilles.
I was alone, and had a dull sense of being alone.
Dispirited and anxious, long hoping that to-morrow
or next week would clear my way, and long disappointed,
I sadly missed the cheerful face and ready response
of my friend.
It was wretched weather; stormy and wet, stormy and
wet; and mud, mud, mud, deep in all the streets.
Day after day, a vast heavy veil had been driving
over London from the East, and it drove still, as
if in the East there were an Eternity of cloud and
wind. So furious had been the gusts, that high
buildings in town had had the lead stripped off their
roofs; and in the country, trees had been torn up,
and sails of windmills carried away; and gloomy accounts
had come in from the coast, of shipwreck and death.
Violent blasts of rain had accompanied these rages
of wind, and the day just closed as I sat down to
read had been the worst of all.
