"Were I not, Lady Theodora, in seeming,--who knows, but that your blood would long have dyed this Roman soil, or some dark crypt contained your wonderful beauty? Bide but the time--" An impatient wave of Theodora's hand interrupted the speaker. "Time has me now! Will there ever be an end to this uncertainty?" "You have not yet told me the name of him whose sudden advent on the stage has brought about so marvellous a transformation," Basil said with an air of baffled passion and rage. "What matters the name, my lord?" Theodora interposed with a sardonic smile. "A nameless stranger then," he flashed with a swiftness that staggered even the woman, astute as she was. "I said not so--" "A circumstance that should recommend him to our consideration," he muttered darkly. "I shall find him--and bring him to the feast--" There was something in his voice that roused the tigress in the woman. "By the powers of hell," she turned on the man whose fatal guess had betrayed her secret, "if you but dare touch one hair of his head--" Basil raised his hand disdainfully. "Be calm, Lady Theodora! The Grand Chamberlain soils not his steel with such carrion," he said with a tone of contempt that struck home. "And now I will be plain with you, Lady Theodora. All things have their price. Will you grant to me what I most desire in return for that which is ever closest to your heart?" Theodora gave a tantalizing shrug. "Like the Fata Morgana of the desert, I am all things to all men," she said. "Remember, my lord, I must look for that which I desire wherever I may find it, since life and the future are uncertain." There was a silence during which each seemed intent upon fathoming the secret thoughts of the other. It was Basil who spoke. "What of that other?" Theodora had arisen. "Bring him to me--three days hence--as my guest. Thrice has he crossed my path.--Thrice has he defied me!--I have that in store for him at which men shall marvel for all time to come!" Basil bent over the white hand and kissed it. Then he took his leave. Had he seen the expression in the woman's eyes as the heavy curtains closed behind him, it would have made the Grand Chamberlain pause. Theodora passed to where the bronze mirror hung and stood long before it, with hands clasped behind her shapely head, wrapt in deepest thought. And while she gazed on her mirrored loveliness, an evil light sprang up in her eyes and all her mouth's soft lines froze to a mould of dreaming evil, as she turned to where the image of Hekaté gazed down upon her with inhuman calm upon its face, and, holding out shimmering, imploring arms, she cried: "Help me now, dread goddess of darkness, if ever you looked with love upon her whose prayers have been directed to you for good and for evil. Fire the soul of him I desire, as he stands before me, that he lose reason, honor, and manhood, as the price of my burning kisses--that he become my utter slave."