Even thou wilt be
submissive to me--for having lost one wife through indulgence, I shall
be most tyrannical to the one yet in my power!"
She drew herself up in splendid defiance.
"I have not submitted!" she said. "I will not submit!"
"No? Nothing stands in your way now but yourself. Your supplanter hath
removed herself. And I shall make your submission easy."
She turned from him and would have hurried back into the Greek's
andronitis, but he put himself in her way.
"Listen!" he said, suddenly lifting his hand.
In the stillness which she finally was able to observe over the
tumultuous beating of her enraged heart, a profound moan of great
volume as from immense but remote struggle came into the corridor.
Through it at times cut a sharp accession of sound, as if violence
heightened at intervals, and steadily over it pulsated the throb of
tireless siege-engines. It was the groan of the City of Delight in
mortal anguish.
"This," he said in a soft voice touching his breast, "or that,"
motioning toward the dying city. "Choose. And by midnight!"
While she stood, gazing at him transfixed with the horror of her
predicament, there was the sweeping of garments, the soft tinkle of
pendants as they struck together, and Salome, the actress, was beside
the pair. Close at hand was Amaryllis. The Greek showed for the first
time discomfiture and an inability to rise to the demand of the
occasion.
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