The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-04-05

nearer, Sdlu III d pilcOuS
 voice. q know all.' And, hurried on
 by her own terrible emotion, she told Mi
 riam what she had seen.
 T do not dream of betraying vou to
 justice" she concluded. But I see how
 1t is, Miriam. must keep your secret
 and die of it. unless God sends me some relief by methods which are now beyond l my power to imaglne''
 Poor Hilda turned from her unhannv
 friend and sank on her knees in a cor
 ner of the room. Miriam gave the little
 doves nest one long, last look and turned away from its white purity forever. Donatello fled to his domain of Monte
 Beni and there spent the succeeding days
 in anguish and the bodily and mental self-torture that his religious faith taught him to inf1ict on himself as penanee. He was blessed with no rest, day or night. So Kenyon, who journeyed out to Tus- cany to visit him. found him sadly
 altered. The face, as beautiful as ever.
 had lost almost all its. resemblance to the Faun of Praxiteles Sorrow and
 knowledge had come into it in the stead of the Joyous innocence of only few months ago, and only in very rare mo-
 ments, when a sudden old time smile
 sped over his countenance, did the hap
 py glorious woodland creature shine out
 once more.
 Vainly did Kenyon strive to awaken in
 him again the old torrent of buoyant life
 Donatello would neither laugh nor play
 He met all Kenyon's remonstranees with
 the reply that he had committed a hein-
 GUS crime for which there was no pen
 ance great enough.
 At last the sculptor prevailed on him
 to take horse and ride forth through the
 Apennine country. At every shrine, at
 every cross on the wayside, Donatello
 alighted and prayed fervently; and again
 and again the sculptor. waiting for him,
 thought that he saw a woman, heavily
 yelled, praying at other shrines near by.
 Thus they arrived at last at Perugia,
 and in the great square under the statue
 of the Pontiff Julius they met Miriam
 face to face. She looked at Donatello,
 but made no motion toward him until he cried: Miriam"
 It was but the single word but it told Miriam that the sense of their mutual crime had only stunned and not de- stroyed the vitality of his affection. She went to him quickly and in the presence
 of the grave sculptor they clasped hands and stood there, the beautiful man and the beautiful woman, feeling that they were united forever.
 Kenyon returned to Rome to find poor 1 Hilda sadly worn and thin. She had
 wandered like a lost soul from gallery all etn | brought her no comfort and no hope,
 and her brush failed In it's work. A dead 1 ly despondency had seized on her, and l every day she felt herself sinking deeper
 under the knowledge of the crime whose secret she had in her heart.
 | The sculptors arrival took her out of l herself and began to reawaken the old happy courageous IIida. One day he took her to his studio and showed her bust that he had modelled while at Mont 1 Beni. It was that of Donatello. What do you see in it?" asked he. l T hardly know how to define it,'' said she "It has an effect as if could see
 his countenance gradually brighten while 1 I look at it. A soul is being breathed into him. It is the Faun, but advancing
 to state of higher development. |" 'I believe you are right" answered l Kenyon thoughtfully. And, strangely
 enough, it is the very expression that could not produce in the clay. Not an- | other chip shall be struck from the mar | ble."
 And accordingly Donatello's bust has | ever since remained unfinished Most 1 spectators mistake it for an unsuccessful | attempt toward copying the features of l the Faun of Praxiteles One observer in | a thousand is conscious of something 1 more and fingers long over the mystery | The next day Hilda remembered that l the time had come when Miram's packet
 was to be delivered to the Palazzo Cenci, | since she had not claimed it. She set | forth alone and entered the immense DOT | tai. little later Kenyon wandered through | the Vatican galleries, looking in vain for | Hilda who had half promised to meet 1 him there. After a long time, during 1 which all the glores of sculpture and l paint looked down on him coldly and 1 without arousing a single thrill in him, 1 he departed with chill of disappoint- l ment. He went to his studio and tried
 to work. but threw the clay aside He | wandered through the streets and found 1 no satisfaction.
 l Suddenly a carriage passed him. It | stopped and a beckoning hand protruded | from the window. A woman in rich
 dress, with a great red gem on her i breast, leaned forward. It was Miriam l By her side sat a dignitary who was known to all Rome through the high
 rank that he held in the Papal govern 1 ment.
 | Miriam leaned forward and whispered:
 When the lamp goes out, do not de- ] spair," Before he could ask question
 the carriage drove swiftly on.
 1 His mind groped for d clue to the ! strange words. Suddenly it flashed on l him that the lamp must be the lamp that 1 Hilda kept alight before the shrine on
 her tower He hastened there. The light | was out! 1 In wild alarm he toiled up the steps 1 and knocked at her door. There came | no answer. \ He awoke other inmates of i the building, but none could give him | any information. The next day he
 spread the news of Hilda's disappear 1 ance through the artist settlement and | enlisted the police. But week passed l and still Hilda was not found.
 | He stumbled through Rome like one | stricken mortally. His imaginative mind