“Speak!...” commanded Astis.
“What can I tell thee, queen? My heart is rent by jealousy.”
“Speak!”
“Never yet has the king loved any as he loveth her. He doth not part from her for an instant. His eyes shine with happiness. He lavishes favours and gifts all about him. He, the Abimelech[5] and sage,—he, like a slave, lieth at her feet and, like a dog, taketh not his eyes off her.”
“Speak!”
“O, how thou dost torture me, queen! And she ... she is all love, all tenderness and caresses! She is meek and abashed, she sees and knows naught save her love. She arouses wrath, envy, or jealousy in none....”
“Speak!” furiously moaned out the queen, and, clutching with her pliant fingers the black curls of Eliab, she pressed his head against her body, scratching his face with the silver embroidery of her diaphanous chiton.
And in the meanwhile, at the altar, around the image of the goddess covered with its black pall, the priests and priestesses were careering in a holy frenzy, with shouts resembling barking, to the clashing of tympani and the jarring strum of sistrums.
Certain ones among them were flaying themselves with many-tailed whiplashes of rhinoceros hide; others were inflicting long, slashing wounds upon their own breasts and shoulders with short knives; others still were tearing their mouths with their fingers, tearing at their ears, and excoriating their faces with their nails. In the midst of this mad round-dance, at the very feet of the goddess, with inconceivable rapidity the anchorite from the mountains of Lebanon was whirling on one spot, in snowy-white, waving raiment. The head priest alone remained motionless. In his hand he was holding the sacred sacrificial knife of Æthiopian obsidian, ready to pass it over at the ultimate, frightful moment.