efore, pretending to be afraid of him, she retired a few steps
to the end of the grotto, and sitting down on the edge of the bed,
artfully pulled her tunic across her breast; then, motionless and mute
and her eyes cast down, she waited. Her long eyelashes made a soft
shadow on her cheeks. Her entire attitude expressed modesty; her naked
feet swung gently, and she looked like a child sitting thinking on the
bank of a brook. But Paphnutius looked at her, and did not move. His
trembling knees hardly supported him, his tongue dried in his mouth, a
terrible buzzing rang in his ears. But all at once his sight failed, and
he could see nothing before him but a thick cloud. He thought that the
hand of Jesus had been laid on his eyes, to hide this woman from them.
Reassured by such succour, strengthened and fortified, he said with a
gravity worthy of an old hermit of the desert--

"If thou givest thyself to me, thinkest thou it is hidden from God?"

She shook her head.

"God? Who forces Him to keep His eye always upon the Grotto of Nymphs?
Let Him go away if we offend Him! But why should we offend Him? Since
He has created us, He can be neither angry nor surprised to see us as He
made us, and acting according to the nature He has given us. A good deal
too much is said on His behalf, and He is often credited with ideas He
never had. You yourself, stranger, do you know His true character? Who
are you that you should speak to me in His name?"

At this question the monk, opening his borrowed robe, showed the
cassock, and said--

"I am Paphnutius, Abbot of Antinoe, and I come from the holy desert. The
hand that drew Abraham from Chaldaea and Lot from Sodom has separated me
from the present age. I no longer existed for the men of this century.
But thy image appeared to me in my sandy Jerusalem, and I knew that
thou wert full of corruption, and death was in thee. And now I am before
thee, woman, as before a grave, and I cry unto thee, 'Thais, arise!'"

At the words, Paphnutius, monk, and abbot, she had turned pale with
fright. And now, with dishevelled hair and joined hands, weeping and
groaning, she dragged herself to the feet of the saint.

"Do not hurt me! Why have you come? What do you want of me? Do not hurt
me! I know that the saints of the desert hate women who, like me, are
made to please. I am afraid that you hate me, and want to hurt me. Go!
I do not doubt your power. But know, Paphnutius, that you should neither
despis