"It seems clear enough, Mitsos," he said; "but Taygetus is a big place. This will I do for greater safety. You go straight south, you say, and will be at Kalamata two evenings from now, and on the third night you will sleep at some village on the pass crossing Taygetus over to Sparta. On that night directly after sundown I will kindle a beacon here, and keep it kindled for two hours, and in that time you will be able to choose a well-seen place for the blaze on Taygetus. Look, it is even as I said, the mists gather again; but the winds of God have favored us, and our work is done."
Even as he spoke a long tongue of mist shot up from the valley below, and came licking up the hill like the spent water of a wave on a level beach, and Mitsos ran down quickly in order to find his pony in case it had strayed even thirty or forty yards, before the clouds swallowed them up again. But he found it where he had left it, browsing contentedly on the spicy tufts of thyme and sweet mountain grass, and for a couple of minutes more, before the earth and sky were blotted out, he stared amazedly at the tall gray ruins which stood there crowning the silence and strength of the hills, still unknown to all but a few travellers and to the shepherds that fed their flocks in summer on the hill-tops--a memorial of the life and death of the worship of beauty, and the god of sunlight and health and imperishable youth.
He waited there till the priest joined him, and was surprised to see him cross himself as he passed by the door into the temple, and asked why he did so.
"It is a story of a devil," he said, "which folks tell about here. Whether I believe it or no, I know not, and so I am careful. We will make haste down this valley, for it is not good to be here after night."
The mists had risen again over the whole hill-side, but not thickly, and as they turned to go Mitsos looking back saw a strange shaft of light streaming directly out of the ruined door of the temple--the effect, no doubt, of the sun, which was near its setting, striking through some thin layer of cloud.
"Look," he said to the priest, "one might almost think the temple was lit from within."
Father Zervas looked round, and when he saw it dropped lamentably off his horse and onto his knees on the ground, and began muttering prayers, crossing himself the while.