"By the two G.o.ddesses! it serves her right." Suddenly, a still more excited mob rushed towards a point of the Agora, followed by a rising rumour which drew all the pa.s.sers-by after it.

"What is the matter? what is the matter?"

And a shrill voice dominating the tumult shouted over all their heads:

"The High-Priest's wife has been killed!"

Violent consternation took possession of the crowd. It was incredible.

People refuse to believe that so atrocious a murder could have been committed at the very height of the Aphrodisisae, bringing down the wrath of the G.o.ds upon the town. But the same sentence pa.s.sed from mouth to mouth in all directions:

"The wife of the High-Priest has been killed! The festival at the Temple is put off."

News arrived rapidly. The body had been found, lying on a pink marble seat, in a lonely place, at the summit of the gardens.

A long golden pin penetrated her left breast; the wound had not bled; but the a.s.sa.s.sin had cut off all the young woman's hair, and had carried away the antique comb of Queen Nitaoucrit.

After the first exclamations of anguish, a profound stupor gained the uppermost. The whole mult.i.tude grew every minute. The whole town was there: it was a sea of bare heads and women's hats, an immense herd pouring simultaneously from the streets bathed in blue shade into the dazzling brilliance of the Alexandrian Agora. Such a throng had never been seen since the day when Ptolemy Auleter had been driven from the throne by the partisans of Berenice. And even political revolutions seemed less terrible than this piece of sacrilege, on which the safety of the whole city might depend.

The men pushed their way close to the witnesses. They clamoured for further details. They put forth conjectures. Women informed the new arrivals of the theft of the celebrated mirror. The wiseacres swore that these two simultaneous crimes had been committed by the same hand.

But who could it be? Courtesans, who had made their offerings the night before for the ensuing year, were fearful lest the G.o.ddess should pay no attention to them, and sat sobbing, with their heads buried in their robes.

An ancient superst.i.tion had it that two such events would be followed by a third and still graver one. The crowd awaited the third. After the mirror and the comb, what had the mysterious robber taken? A stifling atmosphere, inflamed by the south wind and filled with sand dust, weighed upon the motionless crowd.

Gradually, as if this human ma.s.s were a single being, it was seized with a shivering which grew little by little until it became a panic, and all eyes were turned towards the same point on the horizon.

It was at the distant extremity of the long straight avenue which traversed Alexandria from the Canopic gate and led from the Temple to the Agora. There, on the top of the gentle incline, where the road opened upon the sky, a second terror-stricken mult.i.tude had just made its appearance and was running down the hill to join the first one.

"The courtesans, the sacred courtesans!"

n.o.body stirred. n.o.body dared to go and meet them, for fear of hearing of a new disaster. They arrived like a living flood, preceded by the dull noise of their footsteps on the ground. They waved their arms, they jostled one another, they seemed to be in flight before an army. They were to be recognised now. One could distinguish their robes, their girdles, their hair. Rays of light gleamed on their golden jewels. They were quite near. They opened their mouths. There was a silence.

"The necklace of the G.o.ddess has been stolen, the True Pearls of Anadyomene are gone!"

[Ill.u.s.tration]

A clamour of despair arose at the fatal utterance. The crowd retreated at first like a wave, then poured headlong forward, beating the walls, filling the road, thrusting back the frightened women, in the long avenue of the Dromos, towards the desecrated immortal saint.

IV

THE RESPONSE

And the Agora was left empty, like a beach after the tide.

Empty, but not completely: a man and a woman stayed behind, the only two mortals who knew the secret of the great public emotion, the two beings who were the cause of it: Chrysis and Demetrios.

The young man was seated on a block of marble near the port. The young woman stood at the opposite end of the square. They could not recognise one another; but they divined one another mutually: Chrysis, drunk with pride and finally with desire, ran in the full glare of the sun.

"You have done it!" she cried; "you have done it, then!"

"Yes," said the young man simply. "You are obeyed."

She quickly sat herself on his knees and embraced him deliriously:

"I love you! I love you! I have never before felt what I feel now! G.o.ds!

At last I know what it is to be in love! You see, my beloved, I give you more than I promised you the day before yesterday. I, who have never denied anyone, I could not dream that should change so quickly. I had only sold you my body upon the bed, now I give you all my excellence, all my purity, my sincerity, my pa.s.sion, my virgin soul, Demetrios. Come with me; let us leave this town for a time; let us go into a hidden place, where there are, only you and I. We will spend days such as the world has never seen. Never did a lover do what you have done for me.

Never did a woman love as I love: it is not possible! it is not possible!

I can hardly speak. I am choking. You see, I weep. I know now what it is to weep: it is through excess of happiness. But you do not answer! You say nothing? Kiss me!"

Demetrios stretched out his right leg to ease his knee, which was a little cramped. Then he raised the young woman, stood up, shook the creases out of his garments, and said softly with an enigmatic smile:

"No . . . Adieu . . ."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "You say nothing! Kiss me!"]

And he tranquilly turned away.

Chrysis stood rooted to the ground with stupefaction, her mouth open and her head dangling.

"What? What . . . what . . . what do you say?"

"I say adieu," he said, without raising his voice.

"But . . . but it cannot be you who . . ."

"Yes. I had promised."

"Then . . . I fail to understand . . ."

"My dear, whether you understand or not is a matter of indifference to me. I leave this little mystery to your meditations. If what you have told me is true, they are likely to be prolonged. This affair occurs most conveniently to give them occupation. Adieu."

"Demetrios! what do I hear? . . . what is the meaning of this tone? Is it really you who speak? Explain! I conjure you! What has happened between us? It is enough to make one dash one's head against the wall."

"Am I to repeat the same thing a hundred times? Yes, I have taken the mirror; yes, I have killed the priestess Touni in order to get the peerless comb; yes, I have stolen the great seven-stringed necklace of the G.o.ddess. I was to hand you over the presents in exchange for a single sacrifice on your part. It was putting it at a high value, was it not? Now, I have ceased to estimate it at this extraordinary value, and I have nothing more to ask of you. Act in the same way, and let us part.

I wonder you do not understand a situation the simplicity of which is so evident."