"Why never? Those who hate _me_ love _you_, and how gladly I would give years of my life to win a smile from their lips. If one of us must die, why should it be you, whose loss will plunge them into despair? Why not rather I, whose death they would bless? You will preserve a happy life for others; I shall cast from me a wretched one." Sophronia clasped her sister's hands in both her own, and gazed with her pure eyes deep into Glyceria's troubled, sorrowful ones. "You were the woman who, on the night I was captured, offered me her horse to escape?" "Why do you speak of that?" "Do you remember my answer?" "You said that a Christian ought not to fly from danger." "Since then I have seen death in many forms, and I repeat it. If it is God's will that His name shall be praised by my martyrdom, let His will be done. I will accept with rapture the crown of thorns that encircled the Saviour's brow, and bless the hand which opens the door of salvation to me. Oh, death means no torture to those whose joys begin after it is over." "But those whom you would leave behind?" "They will see me again beyond the grave." "To which despair will bring them. O Sophronia, listen. Two human beings who execrate me are now praying for you. If you die this terrible death, you will not meet them in the other world, for the horrors of life will hunt them down to Hades. Oh, let me die, let me be forgotten, wept by no one, blessed by no one, missed by no one. Let your grey-haired father have two joys in a single day--my death and your life." "A heart so embittered is not fit for death, O Glyceria!" "Do you suppose I could not look it calmly in the face?" "But not rapturously. To the Christian death is a new world; to the unbeliever an eternal darkness." "May this darkness embrace me. Life only oppresses me like a burden. I do not desire to live again, but wish to pass away, to be forgotten, to rest undisturbed in a silent grave. I want to leave this brilliant chaos, whose sole reality is pain. But may you lead a long and happy life." "O Glyceria, why should your face become so gloomy?" "Is it not true that once there was not so great a difference between us? My soul was as radiant, my face as bright as yours. We were so much alike that even our father could scarcely distinguish us. Nay, the object of our love was the same, and we did not conceal this from each other, but agreed that if he chose one, the other would silently resign him." "Ah, if he had only taken you! Then we might both be happy."