Her father was in danger! Her father might be destroyed! This fact overtopped all others in Theria’s loving mind. Even the impending war was dim in this presence. And at nightfall Theria learned that her father had gone away from Delphi. He had gone on some mysterious business. Lycophron had seen him depart but even he did not know Nikander’s destination.
For the next two weeks Theria was well-nigh impossible to live with. Her temper took fire at everything.
“I cannot sit and spin,” she declared. “Ah, gods; but I cannot!”
She threw down her distaff, defying her mother’s authority. In her room she paced up and down, maddening for activity. “If only Father were here,” she would repeat. “If only here, so that I might plead with him to keep out of danger.”
But if Nikander should come, would she dare to question him and his state policies? Never in her life had she doubted her father’s wisdom. Theria had in some way gleaned a knowledge of Nikander’s far-reaching powers—Nikander who seldom thought in terms of the individual but nearly always in terms of the state. But now his statecraft was bringing him into personal danger. That very danger made him seem to her in the wrong. Yet to question him face to face, that seemed to Theria the height of impiety. What could she, an ignorant girl, say to so wise a statesman? Yet persuade him she must. He was in danger—in danger!
From this perturbation Theria found her old solitary place in the back storeroom an only refuge. Here she could at least breathe the air, could see the turbulent stream, could watch the gradual increase of nooning light or its golden decline.
CHAPTER XVII
A YOUTH UNDER THE WINDOW
One evening she had sat there until the violet twilight gathered and the stream down in the lane ran uproarious among the damp mists. Presently she heard footsteps and looking down saw emerge from the hill a youth, a beautiful lithe fellow, walking with that swift grace that youth is heir to. He looked directly to her window and threw out both arms as if in surprise and greeting.
Theria retired at once. She was quick enough for adventure, but not this sort of adventure. She had no taste for romantic secrecies. But the youth stopped under her window.