The City of Delight

Then she had voluntarily left Julian, perhaps to seek him!

"You shall not go back to him!" he exclaimed. "After I have given up

everything but my life to have you for myself!"

"You must not think of me in that way!" she commanded him vehemently.

"I am a married woman! You shall remember that! If you forget it, I

will go out into the streets and ask the Idumeans to kill me!"

"Nay, peace, peace! I shall do you no harm! You are frightened! I will

do nothing that you would not have me do! Be comforted. Not any one in

all the world has your happiness at heart so much as I. Believe me!"

"Believe me!" she insisted. "I am weary of doubt and denial. I am

only safe if you recognize me as that which I claim to be. Answer me!

You do believe I am the wife of Philadelphus?"

"I believed it, at once," he said frankly.

"Then--then--" but she flung her hands over her face and slipped down

on the rugs. For a moment he hesitated, restraining the impulse to

break over the limits she had laid down for him.

Then he rose and, summoning one of the women who had taken refuge in

the crypt, sent her to remain with the girl, and departed, shaken and

uncertain, to his own place.