One of Cleopatra's Nights by Théophile Gautier

seemed to have been made by
the foot of a child. The garden was enclosed by very high walls. I
searched every nook and corner of it, but could discover no one there. I
have never succeeded in fully accounting for this circumstance, which,
after all, was nothing compared with the strange things which happened
to me afterward.
    For a whole year I lived thus, filling all the duties of my calling with
the most scrupulous exactitude, praying and fasting, exhorting and
lending ghostly aid to the sick, and bestowing alms even to the extent
of frequently depriving myself of the very necessaries of life. But I
felt a great aridness within me, and the sources of grace seemed closed
against me. I never found that happiness which should spring from the
fulfilment of a holy mission; my thoughts were far away, and the words
of Clarimonde were ever upon my lips like an involuntary refrain. Oh,
brother, meditate well on this! Through having but once lifted my eyes
to look upon a woman, through one fault apparently so venial, I have for
years remained a victim to the most miserable agonies, and the happiness
of my life has been destroyed forever.
    I will not longer dwell upon those defeats, or on those inward victories
invariably followed by yet more terrible falls, but will at once proceed
to the facts of my story. One night my door-bell was long and violently
rung. The aged housekeeper arose and opened to the stranger, and the
figure of a man, whose complexion was deeply bronzed, and who was
richly clad in a foreign costume, with a poniard at his girdle, appeared
under the rays of Barbara's lantern. Her first impulse was one of
terror, but the stranger reassured her, and stated that he desired to
see me at once on matters relating to my holy calling. Barbara invited
him upstairs, where I was on the point of retiring. The stranger told me
that his mistress, a very noble lady, was lying at the point of death,
and desired to see a priest. I replied that I was prepared to follow
him, took with me the sacred articles necessary for extreme unction, and
descended in all haste. Two horses black as the night itself stood
without the gate, pawing the ground with impatience, and veiling their
chests with long streams of smoky vapor exhaled from their nostrils. He
held the stirrup and aided me to mount upon one; then, merely laying his
hand upon the pummel of the saddle, he vaulted on the other, pressed the
animal's sides with his knees, and loosened rein. The horse bounded
forward with the velocity of an arrow. Mine, of which the stranger held
the bridle, also started off at a swift gallop, keeping up with his
companion. We devoured the road. The ground flowed backward beneath us
in a long streaked line of pale gray, and the black silhouettes of the
trees seemed fleeing by us on either side like an army in rout. We
passed through a forest so profoundly gloomy that I felt my flesh creep
in the chill darkness with superstitious fear. The showers of bright
sparks which flew from the stony road under the ironshod feet of our
horses, remained glowing in our wake like a fiery trail; and had anyone
at that hour of the night beheld us both—my guide and myself—he must
have taken us for two spectres riding upon nightmares. Witch-fires ever
and anon flitted across the road before us, and the night-birds shrieked
fearsomely in the depth of the woods beyond, where we beheld at
intervals glow the phosphorescent eyes of wildcats. The manes of the
horses became more and more dishevelled, the sweat streamed over their
flanks, and their breath came through their nostrils hard and fast. But
when he found them slacking pace, the guide reanimated them by uttering
a strange, guttural, unearthly cry, and the gallop recommenced with
fury. At last the whirlwind race ceased; a huge black mass pierced
through with many bright points of light suddenly rose before us, the
hoofs of our horses echoed louder upon a strong wooden draw-bridge, and
we rode under a great vaulted