e to shipwrecked ruin, and didst hang
doting on the lips which lied thy heart away and called thee 'slave'!
Well; the game was fair, for thou wouldst have slain me; and yet I
grieve. So thou dost die? and this is my farewell to thee! Never may we
meet again on earth; and, perchance, it is well, for who knows, when my
hour of tenderness is past, how I might deal with thee, didst thou live?
Thou dost die, they say--those learned long-faced fools, who, if they
let thee die, shall pay the price. And where, then, shall we meet again
when my last throw is thrown? We shall be equal there, in the kingdom
that Osiris rules. A little time, a few years--perhaps to-morrow--and we
shall meet; then, knowing all I am, how wilt thou greet me? Nay, here,
as there, still must thou worship me! for injuries cannot touch the
immortality of such a love as thine. Contempt alone, like acid, can
eat away the love of noble hearts, and reveal the truth in its pitiful
nakedness. Thou must still cling to thee, Harmachis; for, whatever my
sins, yet I am great and set above thy scorn. Would that I could have
loved thee as thou lovest me! Almost I did so when thou slewest those
guards; and yet--not quite.

"What a fenced city is my heart, that none can take it, and, even when
I throw the gates wide, no man may win its citadel! Oh, to put away this
loneliness and lose me in another's soul! Oh, for a year, a month, an
hour to quite forget policy, peoples, and my pomp of place, and be but
a loving woman! Harmachis, fare thee well! Go join great Julius whom thy
art called up from death before me, and take Egypt's greetings to him.
Ah well! I fooled thee, and I fooled Caesar--perchance before all is done
Fate will find me, and myself I shall be fooled. Harmachis, fare thee
well!"

She turned to go, and as she turned I heard the sweep of another dress
and the light fall of another woman's foot.

"Ah! it is thou, Charmion. Well, for all thy watching the man dies."

"Ay," she answered, in a voice thick with grief. "Ay, O Queen, so the
physicians say. Forty hours has he lain in stupor so deep that at times
his breath could barely lift this tiny feather's weight, and hardly
could my ear, placed against his breast, take notice of the rising of
his heart. I have watched him now for ten long days, watched him day and
night, till my eyes stare wide with want of sleep, and for faintness
I can scarce keep myself from falling. And this is the end of all my
labour!