1
I was under the full influence of a rather large dose of hachish, when, in imagination, I was transported to the door of a hut that was roughly built at the edge of a dark pine wood. Just without the threshold sat a woman in the prime of life and a beautiful youth, who was evidently her son.
"Arvah," said the woman, whom I may call Rheda, to her companion, "if you love me, love him; because I love him."
"And that is what I cannot understand," said Arvah, smoothing Rheda's dark hair with his brown hand. "If I were the stronger I could love a weak thing that did not love me; but if I were the weaker, as you are, I could not love a strong thing that treated me as my father treats you."
"But you do not know," ventured Rheda, half-heartedly.
"Oh! I know very well," said Arvah, as his dark eyes blazed. "How seldom he is with us now! We never see him as we used to see him. I call that cruelty.
