“‘But if any of you ill-treat the stranger, if ye do violence or speak harsh words, then shall others be your masters and make you slaves for ever.’”
“But we will never be slaves?” Theria would inquire anxiously. “We will never do those wicked deeds and be slaved?”
“No, never.” Nikander would kiss the child who cuddled so close in his arms and then with yet more fondness kiss his son Dryas.
Such was the ennobling tradition which the little girl Theria treasured in her heart. But she knew, too, that the Delphi god had not always been master of his shrine. Story upon story, faith upon faith went back into the misty past where the chaste belief in Apollo was underlaid with grotesque stories of Gaia—Mother Earth—and dragons.
It was from her nurse Baltè that she heard these older tales though they were sternly and fearfully believed by all Delphians.
Baltè one afternoon found the little girl sitting by Nikander’s front window gazing outward in silence. It was a place of wide prospect. The house was one of the few which stood above the main road, and so steep was the incline that the roofs across the way seemed but little higher than the road itself. Theria could look over them and over other roofs in sharp downward succession into the violet depth of Pleistos gorge and then up to the fir-clad mountain beyond.
A storm of clear-edged cloud was sweeping along that slope with flashes and mutterings. She watched wistfully its swiftness and its strength.
Baltè came from behind and kissed her.
“Now an’ why aren’t ye down in the aula playin’ with Clitè an’ Nerea? It’s always I find ye by yourself at the window. It isn’t right for little girls to be seen from the street.”