a dry tongue.
"Say that again, girl! Thou hast--Is this thy raving? Nay, tell me, who
is the man?"

But another mood was on Varia. She laughed, like a rippling brook.

"He hath no name!" she said merrily. "No name--nothing; for he is
nothing! He comes in the clouds and in the storms and in the moonlight,
and whispers strange things which none may hear but I. His voice is the
wind and his words are the rustle of the leaves, and his speech is
golden as flame; and oh, the tales he hath told to me!"

Eudemius laughed shortly.

"At first I even thought--" he muttered, and broke off. "Child, are thy
women always with thee?"

"Ay, save at night. I sleep alone," said Varia.

Eudemius poured wine from the silver pitcher and drank it. Outside, the
rain was falling with a gentle dripping. The thunder had died; the
breeze, cooler, came laden with damp earthy smells. Varia went to the
window and knelt beside it, leaning out into the warm darkness. Her
father's eyes followed her. But if Varia's mood had changed, his was
not to be shaken off so lightly. He sat down on the couch, wiping his
forehead free from sweat. Here, he was close enough to touch her, and he
drew her back from the window so that she leaned against the couch and
his knee.

"Varia," he said, moved by an impulse born of what had gone before,
"dost love thy father?"

"Nay," said Varia, simply. "Why should I, my lord?"

"True," said Eudemius. "Why shouldst thou?"

Varia leaned her elbows on his knee, looking up at him with her chin on
her hands. Her attitude held the frank fearlessness of a child.

"Does my lord father love me?" she asked, and smiled up at him.
Something within him warned Eudemius to honesty.

"Nay, Varia," he said gently, and put a hand on her dark soft hair. "Thy
father hath never loved thee."

Varia suddenly rested her cheek against his other hand.

"Poor father!" she murmured, as though he were somehow deserving of all
sympathy for this, "Didst ever wish that I had not been born?"

"Ay," said Eudemius, still gently. "I have wished that."

Varia considered a long moment, and he knew that her eyes were on him.

"Why was I born?" she asked.

Eudemius turned his head away.

"Because thy mother loved me," he said, low and harshly.

"Because--my mother--loved thee!" Varia repeated. "Now that is strange!
Did ever any one love thee?"

Eudemius started. Then he laughed.

"_Habet!_" he exclaimed, in the language of the arena when a