San Antonio light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1911-1993, 1925-11-29
TIE Wtch Maiden 7Dulde Dea1ne|

entertained, and the young unmar-
ried girls exhibited their skill with
musical instruments to relatives or
politely attentive friends. Sidonia
parted the tapestries and walked
out, barefooted, onto the rush
strewn floor.
The room had both breadth and
length. Two windows looked down
upon the street. Unbroken tapes
tries of knights and diesJgrouped
with horses, hawks and grey
hounds, left nothing of the naked
walls visible.
Deer skins were laid upon the
rushes; there were carved seats
and an embroidery frame. Over
one of the seats lay a cloak Of
velvet embossed with silver fieurs-
de-lys.
A table bore chessmen, roses, a
basket of embroidery woods and
an hourgL.ss, from which the sand
had just run out.
Two women and a girl-their
plump, satin-covered backs turned
to the room-leaned from the
opened double window. The other
window, narrower and set some
what apart, was open, too.
Sidonia, the unlimited guest,
noticed the faint smell of the roses
and the sombre harmony of the
tapestries. These things were
good-her senses demanded such
things. But they were moth
ing to the beauties of the real
world, though terrors were en-
twined with them like serpents.
She made no endeavor to move
without noise and paused by the
disordered table to take a rose
from the medley that had been
split upon it. The three women,
pressed together, leaned out over
the street.
"Oh-h" gurgled the young one,
laughing at something.
Sidonia, passing close, went to
the window that no one had occu-
pied, and leaned on the broad stone
sill. The hinged square of loaded
glass lozenges, that was set widely
open, screened her partially from
the three other gazers if they
should look toward her. But they
were unconscious of her.
The cobbled street, that widened
out into the market about fifty
yards further on, was in confusion
as a few soldiers with pixies tried
to maintain clear passage. Imme-
diately beneath Sidonia's window
a shivering little monkey, wearing
a coat and cap with a, feather,
perched on the shoulder of gypsy
looking man, extending its tiny,
leathery hand as if to implore
aims. People shrank from it with
shrill laughter. To them it had
the look of changeling. It was
the same monkey that had crept
from under the bench in the
Thieves Kitchen the night before.
Another face from the same
sink, bea- ded and starveling, was
turned skyward, for with his back
to the house wall sat the beggar
with the contracted leg, who had
poured out gold pieces and offered
to buy drink for all the rascally
actors.
"Charityv His high-pitched,
almost infantile voice assembled
thinly. From time to time coins
were dropped into his hollow palm.
A dozen rikemen, three abreast,
appeared in the street, clearing a
forcible passage. People were
damned up against the house walls,
breathless but animated. Someone
who had trodden accidentally upon
the lame beggar gave him three
pieces of silver, and joy was reg
nant. Voices chanting in unison
mingled now with the clash of
bells - the sweet, approaching
strains of the TIE Ceum.
"The shrine. The shrine"
A hushed utterance like a wind
through leaves was upon the lips
of everyone. ~
The lame beggar was trying to
rise with the aid of crutches. There
was the suggestion of panic in
his hasty efforts. He managed to
lift himself up, but was immedi-
ately wedged between the bodies
of the crushed sightseers.
"Let me by, kind people, am
very ILL.,"
His childish voice rose, cracked
as a penny whistle.
"The sight of the .dint may heal
you," said stout woman, who was
likewise unable to bulge.
A muffled sound came from. the
beggar. That was precisely what
he was afraid of. He earned an
easy living lame he ~'ould have to
sweat like a laborer if he were
sound. The thought of work
turned him sick. The oncoming
shrine, with its power to perform
a miracle, inspired him with hate
and terror. But it was impossible
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