Then a knocking....

The man starts, rises to his feet, and stares about him with wide eyes, as if unable to recognise his surroundings.  He glances towards the door, and a shudder of fear comes over him—­are they coming to torture him again?

Furiously he rushes to the door and flings it wide.  “Come in, then!” he cries.  “Come in—­as many as you please!  Rags or finery, sane or mad, in—­in!  I’ve hung my head long enough!  Bid them begone—­and they come again—­well, come in and have done.  Bring out your reckoning, every one.  Here’s what’s left of me—­come and take your share!”

But he calls to the empty air.  And his courage fails as he looks into the blank before him—­as a warrior seeking vainly for enemies in ambush.  Slowly he closes the door, and goes back again.

A knocking....

“Ghosts, eh?  Invisible things?  Come in, then—­I’m ready.”

And he faces about once more.

Again the knocking—­and now he perceives a little bird seated outside on the window-sill, peeping into the room.

“You, is it?  Away—­off to the woods with you!  This is no place for innocent things.  Or what did you think to find?  Greedy, evil eyes, and groans, and hearts dripping blood.  To the woods, and stay there, out of reach of all this misery!”

But the bird lifts its head, and looks into his eyes.

“Do you hear?  Away, go away!”

He taps at the window-pane himself.  The bird flies off.

* * * * *

Once more cold fear comes over him; his pulses halt in dread.

“Not yet—­not yet—­no!  One by one, to tear me slowly to pieces.  Shadows of vengeance, retribution, following everywhere; burning eyes glaring at me from behind, fear that makes me tremble at every sound, and start in dread at every stranger’s face.  And if I forget for a moment, and think myself free, one of them comes again ... ghosts, ghosts....”

He sat down heavily.

“Why do they follow me still?  Is it not enough that I have lived like a hunted beast so long?  Because I loved you once?  And what did we swear to each other then—­have you forgotten?  Never to think of each other but with thankfulness for what each had given!  We were rich, and poured out gold with open hands—­why do you come as beggars now?  And talk of poverty—­as if I were not poorer than any of you all!  Or do you come to mourn, to weep with me over all that we have lost?

“But still you come and ask, and ask, as if I were your debtor, and would not pay.  Mad thought!  I was your poet, and made you songs of love.  Life was a poem, and love red flowers between.  What use to tell me now that the poem was a promise, the red flowers figures on a score that I must pay?  Go, and leave me in peace!  I cannot pay!  You know—­you know I have pawned all I had long since—­all, to the last wrack!”

His own thought filled him with new horror; drops of sweat stood out on his forehead.