Then the sculptor took in his two hands Touni’s sweet face and turned it towards him. She opened her eyes which grew big with surprise. “Demetrios! Demetrios! You!” Her two arms seized hold upon him. “Oh!” she murmured in a voice vibrating with happiness, “oh! you have come, you are there. Is it you, Demetrios, who has awakened me with your hands? Is it you, son of my Goddess, O God of my body and life?” Demetrios made a movement as if to draw back, but she at once came suddenly quite close to him. “No,” she said, “what do you fear? I am not a woman to be feared by you, one surrounded by the omnipotence of the High Priest. Forget my name, Demetrios. Women in their lovers’ arms have no name. I am not the woman you believe me to be. I am only a creature who loves you and is filled with desire for you.” Demetrios made her no answer. “Listen once more,” she went on. “I know whom you possess. I do not desire to be your mistress, nor do I aspire to become my Queen’s rival. No, Demetrios, do with me what you will: look upon me as a little slave whom one takes and casts aside in a moment. Take me like one of the lowest of those poor courtesans who wait by the side of the pathway for furtive and abortive love. In fact what am I but one of them? Have the Gods given me anything more than they have bestowed upon the least of all my slaves? You at least have the beauty which comes from the Gods.” Demetrios gazed at her still more gravely. “What do you think, unhappy woman,” he asked, “also comes from the Gods?” “Love.” “_Or death._” She got up. “What do you mean? _Death...._ Yes, death. But that is so far away from me. In sixty years’ time I shall think of it. Why do you speak to me of death, Demetrios?” He simply said-- “Death to-night.” She burst into a frightened laugh. “This evening ... surely not ... who says so? Why should I die?... answer me, speak, what horrible jest is this?...” “You are condemned.” “By whom?” “By your destiny.” “How do you know that?” “I knew it because I, too, Touni, am involved in your destiny.” “And my destiny wills that I die?” “Your destiny demands that you die by my hand upon this seat.” He seized her by the wrist. “Demetrios,” she sobbed in her fear, “I will not cry out. I will not call for help. Let me speak.” She wiped the sweat from her forehead. “If death comes to me through you, death will be pleasant. I will accept it, I desire it; but listen to me.” She dragged him into the darkness of the wood, stumbling from stone to stone. “Since you have in your hands,” she continued, “everything we receive from the Gods, the thrill which gives life and that which takes it away, open your two hands upon my eyes, Demetrios ... that of love and that of death, and if you do so, I shall die without regret.” He gazed at her without replying, but she thought she could read assent in his face.