by no means
crowded.

Ledscha cast a wondering glance sometimes at one object, sometimes at
another, but without understanding its meaning or its use.

The huge figure on the pedestal in the middle of the studio, upon which
the full glare of light fell through the open windows, was certainly
the statue of the goddess on which Hermon was working; but a large gray
cloth concealed it from her gaze.

How tall it was!

When she looked at it more closely she felt small and oppressed by
comparison.

A passionate longing urged her to remove the cloth, but the boldness
of the act restrained her. After she had taken another survey of
the spacious apartment, which she was visiting for the first time by
daylight, the torturing feeling of being neglected gained possession of
her.

She clinched her white teeth more firmly, and when there was a noise at
the door that died away again without bringing the man she expected, she
went up to the statue which she had already walked past quietly several
times and, obeying an impatient impulse, freed it from its covering.

The goddess, now illumined by the sunlight, shone before her in gleaming
yellow gold and snowy ivory.

She had never seen such a statue, and drew back dazzled.

What a master was the man who had deceived her trusting heart!

He had created a Demeter; the wheat in her hand showed it.

How beautiful this work was--and how valuable! It produced a powerful
impression upon her mind, wholly unaccustomed to the estimate of such
things.

The goddess before her was the very one whose statue stood in the temple
of Demeter, and to whom she also sacrificed, with the Greeks in Tennis,
when danger threatened the harvest. Involuntarily she removed the lower
veil from her face and raised her hand in prayer.

Meanwhile she gazed into the pallid face, carved from ivory, of the
immortal dispenser of blessings, and suddenly the blood crimsoned her
cheeks, the nostrils of her delicate, slightly arched nose rose and
fell more swiftly, for the countenance of the goddess--she was not
mistaken--was that of the Alexandrian whom she had just watched so
intently, and for whose sake Hermon had left her in the lurch the
evening before.

Now, too, she remembered for what purpose the sculptor was said to have
lured Gula, the sailor's wife, and her own young sister Taus, to his
studio, and in increasing excitement she drew the cloth also from the
bust beside the Demeter.

Again the Ale