“It is better thus,” he said to himself. “Such trivial amusements on the very eve of death would, as a matter of fact, be most lugubrious. I wonder, however, that she should not have had a presentiment of it from the very beginning, and I marvel that she should have received me so enthusiastically. As for me, it is an adventure terminated. I regret somewhat this denouement, for all things considered, the only crime of which Chrysis is guilty is to have expressed very frankly an ambition which might have been shared by most women, without doubt, and if it were not necessary to cast a victim to the public indignation, I should be satisfied with the banishment of this too-ardent young woman, in order to get rid of her and at the same time leave her the joys of life. But there has been a scandal, and none can stop the course of events. Such are the effects of passion. Thoughtless sensuality, or its contrary, the idea without the reality, do not involve these fatal consequences. We ought to have many mistresses, but to beware, with the help of the gods, of forgetting that all mouths resemble one another.” ill-080 _Chrysis sat upon the low bed._ Having thus, in an audacious aphorism, summed up one of his moral theories, he lightly resumed the normal course of his ideas. He remembered vaguely an invitation to dine that he had accepted for the night before and then forgotten in the whirl of events, and he resolved to send an apology. He considered whether he should put his slave-tailor up for sale, an old man who had remained attached to the fashionable cut of the former regime, and who succeeded very imperfectly with the new puckered tunics. His mind was even so free from all preoccupation that he stumped out upon the wall a rough study of his group of _Zagreus and the Titans_, a variant which modified the position of the principal character’s right arm. Hardly had he finished, when a gentle knock was heard at the door. Demetrios opened without haste. The old executioner entered, followed by two helmeted hoplites. “I bring the little cup,” he said, smiling obsequiously at the royal lover. Demetrios kept silence. Chrysis, half beside herself, raised her head. “Come, my girl,” continued the gaoler, “the hour has come. The hemlock is crushed. There is really nothing left but to take it. Do not be afraid. There is no pain.” Chrysis looked at Demetrios, who did not turn away his eyes. Still continuing to regard him with her great black eyes that were rimmed with green light, Chrysis stretched out her hand, took the cup, and slowly raised it to her mouth. She dipped her lips in it. The bitterness of the poison and also the pangs of the poisoning had been tempered with honey and narcotics.