Harmony between them! if such harmony existed, it was surely the harmony of hostility. They were enemies that evening, not friends. If an understanding existed, it was, on her part, the understanding that he was mocking her; on his part, the understanding that she, in her fear, must preserve the veneer of self-assurance, and that some fundamental convention--if the term was not too inherently contradictory--demanded his co-operation. He granted it. On other occasions his manner towards her might be rough, violent, uncontrolled; this evening it was of an irreproachable civility. For the first time in her life she felt herself at a disadvantage. She invented pretext after feverish pretext for prolonging their evening. She knew that if she could once bring a forgetful laugh to Julian's lips, she would fear him less; but he continued to smile gravely at her sallies, and to watch her with that same unbending intent. In the midst of her phrase she would look up, meet his eyes bent upon her, and forget her words in confusion. Once he rose, and stretched his limbs luxuriously against the background of the open roof and the stars; she thought he would speak, but to her relief he sat down again in his place, removed his eyes from her, and fell to the dissection, grain by grain, of a bunch of grapes. She continued to speak; she talked of Kato, even of Alexander Christopoulos; she scarcely knew he was not listening to her until he broke with her name into the heart of her sentence, unaware that he interrupted. He stood up, came round to her chair, and put his hand upon her shoulder; she could not control her trembling. He said briefly, but with all the repressed triumph ringing in his voice, 'Eve, come'; and without a word she obeyed, her eyes fastened to his, her breath shortened, deceit fallen from her, nothing but naked honesty remaining. She had lost even her fear of him. In their stark desire for each other they were equals. He put out his hand and extinguished the candles; dimness fell over the court. 'Eve,' he said, still in that contained voice, 'you know we are alone in this house.' She acquiesced, 'I know,' not meaning to speak in a whisper, but involuntarily letting the words glide out with her breath. As he paused, she felt his hand convulsive upon her shoulder; her lids lay shut upon her eyes like heavy petals. Presently he said wonderingly,-- 'I have not kissed you.' 'No,' she replied, faint, yet marvellously strong. He put his arm round her, and half carried her towards the stairs. 'Let me go,' she whispered, for the sake of his contradiction. 'No,' he answered, holding her more closely to him. 'Where are you taking me, Julian?' He did not reply, but together they began to mount the stairs, she failing and drooping against his arm, her eyes still closed and her lips apart. They reached her room, bare, full of shadows, whitewashed, with the windows open upon the black moonlit sea. 'Eve!' he murmured exultantly. 'Aphros!...'