And while
she alternately hoped and doubted, Philadelphus, in the chair opposite
her, talked.
"It follows that you and I must work together to gain diverse ends. If
our fortunes are to be tragic, we are undoing each other in this
conjunction. Since I in all frankness prefer it to turn out comedy,
let us make no error. Are you weary of John? Do you seek a new
diversion?"
She looked at him, at first puzzled, then with a frown. It leaped to
her lips, grown impatient with suffering, to tell him all that she had
evolved of the histories of himself, his lady and of Hesper; but there
seemed to be an element of recklessness in that which threatened to do
away with a means for her success. He did not wait for her answer.
"And I," he said with mock intensity, "am done to death with
weariness--with my moneyer, this lady of mine. Let us be diverted
while we live, for by the signs we shall all die soon."
"Where," he began when her mind wandered entirely from him, "dost thou
think the mysterious man hath taken my other wife?
"I would I knew," he continued, conducting his inquiry alone. "It will
be right simple to have her beauty spoiled in this hungry town, unless
he takes tenderest care of her."
There was still no comment, but the lively sparkle in the Greek's eye
showed that he had touched upon a jealous spot.
"And by the by," he pursued, "what does this stranger, whom I can not
remember having known, look like? A villain?"
She answered now in a voice filled with rancor.
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