He went on, and entered the forge; took the flask from his pocket; held it up before the eyes of the panting Cyclops.
“I have a visitor, Jean. I want to be alone.”
The man, who had been softly manipulating the bellows, ceased of his hold on the instant. The handle, the fire, his brow, all went down together. With no more than a hoggish grunt, he seized the flask, and disappeared. Bonito went to the door, and called softly.
The fire had fallen so low when she entered, that they were only phantom darknesses to one another; but he kept a shrewd eye, for his part, on the undulations of the gloom which was addressed to him. He was the first to speak.
“So, you decided to follow, Priestess, and to satisfy yourself of the reality of your vengeance. I had half looked for you, I confess. Your presence in the Court did not surprise me.”
Her silence, something in the atmosphere of her regard, warned him to be vigilant and watchful.
“It was strange,” he went on, “how circumstances rushed to complicate my simpler purpose. Call it coincidence, if you will—’tis but another term for Providence. I’ll show you why—show you good reason to be grateful for the course that things have taken.”
“Do you know what I have in my hand?”
Her whisper came like a snake’s hiss through the darkness. It was his turn to be silent.
“I have my finger on the trigger,” she said. “I give you a moment to answer. Have you forgotten what you swore?”