It is good night. For him the Noiseless One � and the dark.”

He made as if to start, but once again the stamp of the stallions held him, and the hillside bell rang out. He drew a deep inhalation through his nostrils of the air of balm, and loved it, and loved the fair land of his devising.

“‘I looked into time and saw none of me there,’“ he quoted, then capped it, smiling, with a second quotation: “‘She gat me nine great sons� . The other nine were daughters.’“

Back at the house, he did not immediately go in, but stood a space gazing at the far flung lines of it. Nor, inside, did he immediately go to his own quarters. Instead, he wandered through the silent rooms, across the patios, and along the