t her hands and feet turn
cold, and a rushing crimson mist floated before her eyes. Then the light
came back into the bed-room, and came nearer and nearer. She felt her
head pushed by his hard hand, and with a feeble scream she flung off the
coverlet and sat up.

Still he did not speak a word, but what she saw was quite enough to
smother the last spark of her courage and hope, for her husband's eyes
showed only the whites, his sallow features were ashy-pale, and on his
brow the branded mark of Mithras stood out more clearly than ever. In
his right hand he held the lamp, in his left Hermas' sheepskin.

As his haggard eye met hers he held the anchorite's matted garment so
close to her face, that it touched her. Then he threw it violently on
the floor, and asked in a low, husky voice, "What is that?"

She was silent. He went up to the little table near her bed; on it stood
her night-draught in a pretty colored glass, that Polykarp had brought
her from Alexandria as a token, and with the back of his hand he swept
it from the table, so that it fell on the dais, and flew with a crash
into a thousand fragments. She screamed, the greyhound sprang up and
barked at the Gaul. He seized the little beast's collar, and flung it
so violently across the room, that it uttered a pitiful cry of pain. The
dog had belonged to Sirona since she was quite a girl, it had come
with her to Rome, and from thence to the oasis; it clung to her with
affection, and she to it, for Iambe liked no one to caress and stroke
her so much as her mistress. She was so much alone, and the greyhound
was always with her, and not only entertained her by such tricks as any
other dog might have learned, but was to her a beloved, dumb, but by no
means deaf, companion from her early home, who would prick its ears when
she spoke the name of her dear little sisters in distant Arelas, from
whom she had not heard for years; or it would look sadly in her face,
and kiss her white hands, when longing forced tears into her eyes.

In her solitary, idle, childless existence Iambe was much, very much,
to her, and now as she saw her faithful companion and friend creep
ill-treated and whining up to her bed--as the supple animal tried
in vain to spring up and take refuge in her lap, and held out to his
mistress his trembling, perhaps broken, little paw, fear vanished from
the miserable young woman's heart--she sprang from her couch, took the
little dog in her arms, and exclaimed