"So Amulon intimated."
"Where is he?"
"Down the well, for aught I know. I fled from him, and he gave chase. He was half drunk and stumbled over the fountain curbing, but whether he pitched in or not I do not know. I didn't stop to look back."
"He didn't; trust his luck for that. And you? How did you get out?"
"Why, through the court of the lions, of course."
"They might have killed you."
"So I thought; but the king's ocelots are well fed. They did not care to get up to dine off me in the middle of the night."
The rainbow colors of the dawn of the tropics illumined the sky to the east, and below, the hills were swathed in pearl gray mist. Alma breathed deep as he looked at Zara, fresh and radiant as the morning itself. The fleecy robe she had slipped on parted at the throat, her dark head was swathed in a pale blue gauze, broidered with silver stars, and not all the turmoil of the night could disguise the fact that she was young and glad to be alive. As she lifted a slender, rounded, white arm to indicate the violet and orange of the horizon, Alma caught her in his arms.
"Come with me," he whispered, "away from this wicked place. Let me teach you the principles of Abinadi. Together let us live our lives as he has taught, in conformity with the will of the Lord."
"Abinadi!" she murmured. "I already believe in him, although he has taught the strange doctrine that we must return good for evil, instead of demanding an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth. But you must teach me. Alma," she added fearfully, "for there are many things I do not understand. And this strange doctrine of repentance, that they talk so much about—"