CHAPTER XXI
A PROCESSION OF SACRIFICE
Next morning it was Nikander himself who came to awaken his daughter. The house was full of the bustle and awe of the departure. The dawn was yet grey. Melantho brought a white festal robe and for one long hour she and Baltè dressed the young candidate, pinning the robe at the shoulders, clasping the girdle, drawing the soft fabric up through it, full over the breast, then adjusting the long straight folds to the sandalled feet.
Melantho brought the casket of jewels.
“Where are the pearls?” she complained. “You should have the pearls to-day.”
Theria put her deft fingers among the jewels, stirring their glitter.
“Please leave me without jewels, Mother,” she said quietly. Then she added, “Oh, Mother, let me give them to the god. Apollo loves gifts. He says if one gives one’s all it is as great as the bowl of Crœsos. These are my all. Perhaps they will help.”
So they crowned her with red roses and hung a great garland of roses about her neck. Baltè thought she had never seen any one so beautiful as her dark-eyed darling.
But Nikander, coming to look at her, was touched with anxiety.
“Daughter,” he questioned, “your hope is yet strong in you? Do you feel that you can reach the god?”