"But canst thou wholly acquit me—wholly justify me, Marsyas?"
He looked at her with pleading in his eyes, and made no answer.
"No man should wed or worship with a single doubt," she said.
Fearing more than he dared confess to himself, he caught her hands and would not let her leave him.
"Lydia, I have not had the portion which God and women allot to most men," he said almost piteously. "There are delights that should be mine by right, but they are denied me! Other men have their dreams, their moments of tender preoccupation. They can live again through hours between only themselves and one other. They can feel again the touches of a woman's hand upon them, the warmth of her cheek and the love in her kiss. No matter the evil, the sorrows that follow, these things are theirs, to hold in memory! No matter the time or the place, they can summon it all from a song, drink it from a goblet of wine, or breathe it in from a flower! It is twice living it; once, in the actuality; again, in the dream! But I—I have nothing! My teaching did not permit me to look forward to such a thing—and thou, Lydia—Lydia, thou dost not permit me to look back upon it!"
Her eyes filled with tears, and a rush of tender words trembled on her lips. His gaze, quickened by longing for the thing these signs typified, caught the softening in her young face. He seized upon the hope that it gave him.
"Dost thou love me, Lydia?" he asked.
"I love thee, Marsyas."
He drew her to him, put his arms about her and pressed her to his breast. She did not resist him, for she was tired of contention with herself, tired of distress, afraid of the menace the future showed her, and withal fainting in hope. She dropped her head on his shoulder, with her face turned up to him. Marsyas' soul filled to the full with subdued, bewildering emotions. It was not the first time he had held this sweet child-woman in his arms, but fear, tumult, impetuousness and protest had claimed preëminence in his thoughts before. Now in the quiet and shelter of the alabarch's deserted presiding-room, he found new experience, new feelings. Under the low light of the clustered lamp, he looked down on the face turned to him, smoothed with soft touches the long, delicate black brows; passed light fingers over the bloom of her cheek and saw the faint rose color come again in the white lines the little pressure made; put back the loose curl fallen before her perfect ear and marveled at its silkiness; watched the quiet palpitation in the milk-white throat—sensed, somehow, the repose in herself, the command, even in this momentary surrender, the divinity in her womanliness. He was ashamed of his distrust, startled at his new sensations.
Perhaps she saw the passing of feeling over his face, for she stirred and would have raised herself, but the movement brought him back to reality, and a fiercer rebellion against it.