Just here the moon sailed clear of the housetops over the way and filled the narrow lane with light. She could see him standing there, his head thrown back to see her—his golden hair bound and crowned. His very standing was elastic, spurning the ground. So much had his few weeks of gymnastic restored to him of Hellenic health and attitude. She could see the curious, searching light in his face—a light of tenderness such as she had never known but which she recognized as all maidens do. Oh, why did her heart leap? Was she, too, in the power of a god? Now he startled her yet more. “Dear lady, I am coming to this house to-morrow night, I am Nikander’s guest.” Delphians, though proud as Olympians, were yet the most cosmopolitan of Greeks. They were taught by the Oracle to receive all men hospitably. Theria’s dread increased. What would her father think? What might not this strange youth tell! “I shall ask to hear that song,” added the youth. “The prize song which you made for Dryas, your brother.” “I made no song,” she asserted, loyal to her house. “Oh, yes, you did. All the Precinct whispers that. But I shall know, dear maid, whether the song be yours. If it came from your spirit, it will go to mine.” Steps were heard in the lane. She cried out a low warning. Her anger swept back again that the youth should thus bring her into fear. But he was gone almost before her cry. He was among the hills. Theria turned, dazed, from the window. There on the moon-lit floor lay flowers strewn, one bunch upon another—faded ferns, fresh anemones, violets half dry. Evidently a gift for every day. If the youth came in this fashion sooner or later someone would see him. They would punish her. Worse! They would laugh at her. A street song, a vulgar old catch, struck across her mind, one of the common gibes at women: Always as of old—— They roast their barley sitting as of old They on their heads bear burdens as of old— They buy themselves sly dainties as of old— They still secrete their lovers as of old. Ahai! so she had thought herself different, better! She was like all other silly women. No wonder the men gibed. Only for a moment had she been guilty, but it was such a vivid, unforgettable moment. The moon had shone so bright upon him, the youth had looked so impossibly beautiful. Fool! The youth was plainly mad. Never would she allow herself to see him again. Wrathfully she gathered all the flowers at one sweep and flung them far out of the window. Theria had heard of physical love. She had heard of no other kind. How was she to understand this sudden placing of her upon a pedestal? How should she guess that the youth through the suffering of slavery, through the purity of his gratitude, had stumbled upon an emotion old as creation, beautiful as dawn, strong as life, which the Greeks had utterly quenched and set aside?