Over the Top ! ai
as a snake would have done. She saw me at once,
and ran almost into my arms excitedly. She whispered
something in my ear. I didn’t hear it.
The club had suddenly been, so to speak, struck
dumb. Lou was coming through the door. Over her
shoulders was an opera cloak of deep rich purple edged
with gold, the garment of an empress, or (shall I say ?)
of a priestess.
The whole place stopped still to look at her. And I
had thought she was not beautiful!
She did not walk upon the ground. “ Vera incessu
patuit dea,’ as we used to say at school. And as she
paced she chanted from that magnificent litany of
Captain J.F. C. Fuller, “Oh Thou golden sheaf of
desires, that art bound by a fair wisp of poppies! I
adore thee, Evoe! I adore thee, 1 AO!”
She sang full-throated, with a male quality in her
voice. Her beauty was so radiant that my mind ran
to the breaking of dawn after a long night flight.
“In front the sun climbs slow, how slowly, but
westward, look! the land is bright!”
As if in answer to my thought, her voice rolled forth
again :—
“QO Thou golden wine of the sun, that art poured
over the dark breasts of night! I adore Thee,
Evoe! I adore Thee, I AO!”
The first part of the adoration was in a sort of
Gregorian chant varying with the cadence of the words.
But the chorus always came back to the same thing.
TN FN er
‘ ae a ae =
bal aa =
I a-dore Thee, Evoe ! IadoreThee,I A O!
EE-AH-OH gives the enunciation of the last word.
Every vowel is drawn out as long as possible. It
‘seemed as if she were trying to get the last cubic milli-
metre of air out of her lungs every time she sang it.
if me
&