First, it would seem to her that she was wide awake in the middle of the night, and there would creep over her a sense of unmeasured space, infinite silence, and intense solitude.  She would think that she was standing on a dais at the end of a vast hall, down which ran endless rows of pillars supporting an inky sky which was the roof.  There was no light in the hall, yet she could clearly see; there was no sound, but she could hear the silence.  Only a soft radiance shone from her eyes and brow.  She was not afraid, though lonely, but she felt that something would presently come to make an end of solitude.  And so she stood for many years or ages—­she could not tell which—­trying to fathom the mystery of that great place, and watching the light that streamed from her forehead strike upon the marble floor and pillars, or thread the darkness like a shooting star, only to reveal new depths of blackness beyond those it pierced.  At length there came, softly falling from the sky-roof which never stirred to any passing breeze, a flake of snow larger than a dove’s wing; but it was blood-red, and in its centre shone a wonderful light that made its passage through the darkness a track of glory.  As it passed gently downwards without sound, she thought that it threw the shadow of a human face.  It lit upon the marble floor, and the red snow melted there and turned to blood, but the light that had been its heart shone on pure and steady.

Looking up again, she saw that the vault above her was thick with thousands upon thousands of these flakes, each glowing like a crimson lamp, and each throwing its own shadow.  One of the shadows was like George, and she shuddered as it passed.  And ever as they touched the marble pavement, the flakes melted and became blood, and some of the lights went out, but the most part burnt on, till at length there was no longer any floor, but a dead-sea of blood on which floated a myriad points of fire.

And then it all grew clear to her, for a voice in her mind spoke and said that this was one of God’s storehouses for human souls; that the light was the soul, and the red in the snow which turned to blood was the sin which had, during its earthly passage, stained its first purity.  The sea of blood before her was the sum of the scarlet wickedness of her age; from every soul there came some to swell its awful waters.

At length the red snow ceased to fall, and a sound that was not a voice, but yet spoke, pealed through the silence, asking if all were ready.  The voice that had spoken in her mind answered, “No, he has not come who is to see.”  Then, looking upwards, she saw, miles on miles away, a bright being with half-shut wings flashing fast towards her, and she knew that it was Arthur, and the loneliness left her.  He lit a breathing radiance by her side, and again the great sound pealed, “Let in the living waters, and cleanse away the sins of this generation.”

It echoed and died away, and there followed a tumult like the flow of an angry sea.  A mighty wind swept past her, and after it an ocean of molten crystal came rushing through the illimitable hall.  The sea and the wind purged away the blood and put out the lamps, leaving behind them a glow of light like that upon her brow, and where the lamps had been stood myriads of seraphic beings, whilst from ten thousand tongues ran forth a paean of celestial song.