Of such was the landscape made.
As before, he could hear the incessant undertone of vague music,
of rhythmical, shimmering and whispering sound. And the whole air
was laden with the hint of sweet scents; tinged with the perfume
of attar and myrrh--of a most delicate ambrosia.
He opened the window.
For a moment he stood still, the air bathing his face, the unknown
fragrance filling his nostrils. The whole world seemed thrumming
with that hitherto faint quiver of sound. Now it was resonant and
strong, though still only an undertone. He looked below him; as he
did so, something dropped from the side of the window opening--a
long, delicate tendril, sinuous and alive. It touched his face,
and then--It drooped, drooped like a wounded thing. He reached out
his hand and plucked it, wondering. And he found, at its tip, a
floating crimson blossom as delicate as the frailest cobweb, so
inconceivably delicate that it wilted and crumbled at the
slightest touch.
Chick thrust his head out of the window. The whole building, from
ground to dome, was covered--waving, moving, tenuous, a maze of
colour--with orchids!
He had never dreamed of anything so beautiful, or so splendid.
Everywhere these orchids; to give them the name nearest to the
unknown one. As far as he could see, living beauty!
And then he noticed something stranger still.
From the petals and the foliage about him, little clouds of colour
wafted up, like mists of perfume, forever rising and
intermittently settling.
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