nd you
owe me no grudge, I know, for you understood how forlorn I must be
and came to see me. There is no ill-feeling, is there, nothing to come
between us?"

"Nothing, nothing!" he eagerly exclaimed, seizing her other hand with
passionate fervor.

She felt as if all the blood in her body had rushed in a full tide to
her heart--as if he were some part of her very being, that had been torn
out, snatched from her, and that she must have back again, even if it
cost them both their life and happiness. The impulse was irresistible;
she drew away her hands from his grasp and flung them round his neck,
clinging to him as a weary child clings to its mother. She did not know
how it had come about--how such a thing was possible, but it was done;
and without paying any heed to Marianne, who looked on in dismay
while her son's lips were pressed to the brow and lips of the lovely
idolatress, she wept upon her lover's shoulders, feeling a thousand
roses blossoming in her soul and a thousand thorns piercing and tearing
her heart.

It had to be, that she felt; it was at once their union and their
parting. Their common destiny was but for a moment, and that moment had
come and gone. All that now retrained for them was death--destruction,
with all things living; and she looked forward to this, as a man watches
for the dawn after a sleepless night. Marianne stood aside; she dimly
perceived that something vital was going on, that something inevitable
had happened which would admit of no interference. Gorgo, as she
freed herself from Constantine's embrace, stood strangely solemn and
unapproachable. To the simple matron she was an inscrutable riddle to
which she could find no clue; but she was pleased, nevertheless, when
Gorgo came up to her and kissed her hand. She could not utter a word,
for she felt that whatever she might say, it would not be the right
thing; and it was a real relief to her to busy herself over the removal
of the body, in which she could be helpful.

Gorgo had covered the dead face; and when old Damia had been carried
down to the thalamos and laid in state on the bridal bed, she strewed
the couch with flowers.

Meanwhile, the priest of Saturn had been found, and he declared in all
confidence that no power on earth could have recalled this departed
soul. Damia's sudden end and the girl's great grief went to his faithful
heart, and he gladly acceded to Gorgo's request that he would wait for
her by the garden-gate an