me up the mountain
again. What has happened to the poor fellow? But it is all the same:
there is something else for you to do besides grieving over a hole in
Polykarp's head. Go up to the tower, I tell you, and let him lie--or
carry him up with you into your new den, and hand him over to your
sweetheart to nurse."

"Demon!" exclaimed Paulus, taking up a stone.

"Let him he!" repeated Miriam. "I will betray her hiding-place to
Phoebicius, if you do not do as Dermas orders you. Now I am off to call
the others, and we shall meet again at the tower. And you had better not
linger too long with your fair companion--pious Paulus--saintly Paulus!"

And laughing loudly, she sprang away from rock to rock as if borne up by
the air.

The Alexandrian looked wrathfully after her; but her advice did not seem
to be bad, he lifted the wounded man on his shoulders, and hastily
carried him up towards his cave; but before he could reach it he heard
steps, and a loud agonized scream, and in a few seconds Sirona was by his
side, crying in passionate grief, "It is he, it is he-and oh, to see him
thus!--But he must live, for if he were dead your God of Love would be
inexorable, pitiless, hard, cruel--it would be--"

She could say no more, for tears choked her voice, and Paulus, without
listening to her lamentation, passed quickly on in front of her, entered
the cave and laid the unconscious man down on the couch, saying gravely
but kindly, as Sirona threw herself on her knees and pressed the young
man's powerless hand to her lips, "If indeed you truly love him, cease
crying and lamenting. He yesterday got a severe wound on his head; I have
washed it, now do you bind it up with care, and keep it constantly cool
with fresh water. You know your way to the spring; when he recovers his
senses rub his feet, and give him some bread and a few drops of the wine
which you will find in the little cellar hard by; there is some oil there
too, which you will need for a light.

"I must go up to the brethren, and if I do not return to-morrow, give the
poor lad over to his mother to nurse. Only tell her this, that I, Paulus,
gave him this wound in a moment of rage, and to forgive me if she can,
she and Petrus. And you too forgive me that in which I have sinned
against you, and if I should fall in the battle which awaits us, pray
that the Lord may not be too hard upon me in the day of judgment, for my
sins are great and many."

At this moment the sound