Now Antinea is in my arms. This is no haughty, voluptuous woman whom
I am pressing to my heart. It is only an unhappy, scorned little girl.
So great was her trouble that she showed no surprise when I stepped
out beside her. Her head is on my shoulder. Like the crescent moon in
the black clouds, I see her clear little bird-like profile amid her
mass of hair. Her warm arms hold me convulsively.... O tremblant
coeur humain....
Who could resist such an embrace, amid the soft perfumes, in the
langorous night? I feel myself a being without will. Is this my voice,
the voice which is murmuring: "Ask me what you will, and I will do it, I will do it."
My senses are sharpened, tenfold keen. My head rests against a soft,
nervous little knee. Clouds of odors whirl about me. Suddenly it seems
as if the golden lanterns are waving from the ceiling like giant
censers. Is this my voice, the voice repeating in a dream: "Ask me what you will, and I will do it. I will do it."
Antinea's face is almost touching mine. A strange light flickers in
her great eyes.
Beyond, I see the gleaming eyes of King Hiram. Beside him, there is a
little table of Kairouan, blue and gold. On that table I see the gong
with which Antinea summons the slaves. I see the hammer with which she
struck it just now, a hammer with a long ebony handle, a heavy silver
head ... the hammer with which little Lieutenant Kaine dealt death....
I see nothing more....