But idle lamenting was of as little use here as at any other time; so
she resolutely drew her veil closer round her head and called to her
brother, "Wait here till I return!"

"What are you going to do?" asked Alexander, startled.

"I am going back to the invalid," she explained, decisively.

On this her brother seized her arm, and, wildly excited, forbade this
step in the name of his father.

But at his vehement shout, "I will not allow it!" she struggled to free
herself, and cried out to him:

"And you? Did not you, whose life is a thousand times more important
than mine, of your own free-will go into captivity and to death in order
to save our father?"

"It was for my sake that he had been robbed of his freedom," interrupted
Alexander; but she added, quickly:

"And if I had not thought only of myself, the command to release him and
Philip would by this time have been at the harbor. I am going."

Alexander then took his hand from her arm, and exclaimed, as if urged by
some internal force, "Well, then, go!"

"And you," continued Melissa, hastily, "go and seek the lady Euryale.
She is expecting me. Tell her all, and beg her in my name to go to
rest. Also tell her I remembered the sentence about the time, which was
fulfilled. ... Mark the words. If I am running again into danger, tell
her that I do it because a voice says to me that it is right. And it is
right, believe me, Alexander!"

The artist drew his sister to him and kissed her; yet she hardly
understood his anxious good wishes; for his voice was choked by emotion.

He had taken it for granted that he should accompany her as far as the
emperor's room, but she would not allow it. His reappearance would only
lead to fresh quarrels.

He also gave in to this; but he insisted on returning here to wait for
her.

After Melissa had vanished into Caesar's quarters he immediately
carried out his sister's wish, and told the lady Euryale of all that had
happened.

Encouraged by the matron, who was not less shocked than he had been at
Melissa's daring, he returned to the anteroom, where, at first, greatly
excited, he walked up and down, and then sank on a marble seat to wait
for his sister. He was frequently overpowered by sleep. The things that
cast a shadow on his sunny mind vanished from him, and a pleasing dream
showed him, instead of the alarming picture which haunted him before
sleeping, the beautiful Christian Agatha.

CHAPTER XX.

The waiting