“No, you’ll not see him ever more. And so much the better, my girl. Women who meet him once, learn to knew pain. Women who meet him twice, trifle with death.” ill-067 _“Oh, prophetess of evil! Take back what you’ve said!_ “Why say it? I’ve just met him, and I’ve only trifled with pleasure in his arms.” “You owe your pleasure to him because you do not know what voluptuousness means, my tiniest of tiny girls. Forget him as you would a playmate and congratulate yourself on being only twelve years old.” “So one is very unhappy when grown up?” asked the child. “All the women here chatter unceasingly of their troubles, and I, who never hardly cry, see so many weeping!” Chimairis dug her two hands into her hair and uttered a groan. Her goat shook its gold collar and turned its head in her direction, but she did not bestow a glance on the animal. “Nevertheless, I know one happy woman,” continued Melitta, significantly. “She’s my great friend, Chrysis. I’m certain she never sheds a tear.” “She will,” said Chimairis. “Oh, prophetess of evil! Take back what you’ve said, distraught old woman, or I shall hate you!” Seeing the young girl’s threatening gestures, the black goat reared up erect, its front legs bent under; its horns thrust forward. Melitta fled without looking where she went. Twenty paces farther on, she burst out laughing, as she caught sight of a ridiculous couple hidden between two bushes. That sufficed to change the current of her young thoughts. She took the longest road before returning to her hut, and then decided not to go home at all. It was a magnificent, warm, moonlight night. The gardens were full of many voices and songs. Satisfied with what she had earned through the visit of Demetrios, she was seized with a sudden fancy to play the part of a vagrant girl of roads and ditches, in the depths of the wood, with pauper passers-by. In this way, she was enjoyed twice or three against a tree, a stone pillar, or on a bench, and found amusement as if the game was new, because the scene kept changing. A soldier, standing in the middle of a pathway, lifted her bodily up in his robust arms and identified himself with the God of the Gardens who joins himself to the wenches who tend the rose-trees without needing to let the hussies feet touch the ground. At this, Melitta uttered a cry of triumph. Escaping again, she continued her flight through an avenue of palms, where she met a lad, named Mikyllos, seemingly lost in the forest. She offered to be his guide, but led him astray designedly, so as to keep him with her for her own purposes. Mikyllos was not long in fathoming Melitta’s intentions, as well as her tiny talents and capabilities. Soon becoming companions, rather than lovers, they ran along side by side in solitude that grew more and more silent. Suddenly, they came in front of the sea.