gleaming whiteness, the sea sparkled brightly, and as soon as the porter
had left the happy young pair together, and they found themselves in a
shadowy alley, Pollux said, opening his arms to the girl:

"Now--one more kiss, just for a remembrance, while I wait."

"Not now," begged Arsinoe.

"I am no longer happy since we came in here. I cannot help thinking of
poor Selene."

"I have not a word to say against that," replied Pollux submissively.
"Then when waiting is over may I have my reward?"

"No, no, now, at once," cried Arsinoe throwing herself on his breast, and
then she hurried towards the house.

He followed her, and when she paused in front of a brightly-lighted
window on the ground floor, he stopped also. They both looked in on a
lofty and spacious room, kept in the most perfect order and cleanliness;
it had one door only opening on the roofless forecourt of the house; the
walls of the room were plainly painted of a light green color, and the
only ornament it contained was one piece of carved work over the door.

On the farther side stood the bed on which Selene was lying; a few paces
from it sat the deformed girl asleep, while dame Hannah softly went up to
the patient with a wet compress in her hand which she carefully laid on
her head.

Pollux touched Arsinoe and whispered to her:

"Your sister lies there in her sleep like an Ariadne deserted by
Dionysus. How wretched she will feel when she comes to herself."

"She looks to me less pale than usual."

"Look now, how she bends her arm, and what a lovely attitude as she puts
her hand to her head!"

"Go--" said Arsinoe. "You ought not to be spying here."

"Directly, directly--but if you were lying there no power should stir me
from the spot. How carefully Hannah lifts the wet wrapper from her poor
broken ankle. You could not touch your eye more gently than the good
woman handles Selene's foot."

"Go back, she is looking straight this way."

"What a wonderful face! It would do for a Penelope, but there is
something singular in her eyes. Now if I had to make another star-gazing
Urania, or a Sappho full of the deity, and with eyes fixed on the heavens
in poetic rapture, that is what I would put into her! She is no longer
young, but how pure her face is! It is like a sky when the wind has swept
it clear of clouds."

"Seriously you must go now," said Arsinoe drawing away her hand, which he
had again taken. Pollux saw that his praise of another woman'