"His was a cruel end!"--he said in a low, uncertain voice,--"Sah- luma, canst thou expect mercy from a woman who has once been so merciless?"
"Bah!" returned the Laureate lightly. "Who and what was Nir-jalis? A hewer of stone images--a no-body!--he will not be missed! Besides, he is only one of many who have perished thus."
"Only one of many!" ejaculated Theos with a shudder of aversion.. "And yet, . . O thou most reckless and misguided soul! ... thou dost love this wanton murderess!"
A warm flush tinted Sah-luma's olive skin,--his hands clenched and unclenched slowly as though he held some struggling, prisoned thing, and raising his head he looked at his companion full and steady with a singularly solemn and reproving expression in his luminous eyes.
"Hast THOU not loved her also?" he demanded, a faint, serious smile curving his lips as he spoke, . . "If only for the space of some few passing moments, was not thy soul ravished, thy heart enslaved, thy manhood conquered by her spell? ... Aye! ... Thou dost shrink at that!" And his smile deepened as Theos, suddenly conscience-stricken, avoided his friend's too-scrutinizing gaze.. "Blame ME not, therefore, for THINE OWN weakness!"
He paused.. then went on slowly with a meditative air.. "I love her, ... yes!--as a man must always love the woman that baffles him, ... the woman whose moods are complex and fluctuating as the winds on the sea,--and whose humor sways between the softness of the dove and the fierceness of the tiger. Nothing is more fatally fascinating to the masculine sense than such a creature,--more especially if to this temperament is united rare physical grace, combined with keen intellectual power. 'Tis vain to struggle against the irresistible witchery exercised over us by the commingling of beauty and ferocity,--we see it in the wild animals of the forest and the high-soaring birds of the air,--and we like nothing better than to hunt it, capture it, tame it.. or.. kill it--as suits our pleasure!"
He paused again,--and again smiled, . . a grave, reluctant, doubting smile such as seemed to Theos oddly familiar, suggesting to his bewildered fancy that he must have seen it before, ON HIS OWN FACE, reflected in a mirror!
"Even thus do I love Lysia!" continued Sah-luma--"She perplexes me, . . she opposes her will to mine, ... the very irritation and ferment into which I am thrown by her presence adds fire to my genius, . . and but for the spur of this never-satiated passion, who knows whether I should sing so well!"
He was silent for a little space--then he resumed in a more ordinary tone: "The wretched Nir-jalis, whose fate thou dost so persistently deplore, deserved his end for his presumption, ... didst thou not hear his insolent insinuation concerning the King?"