"Well for thee my grandsire never knew," Agrippa put in, leaning against one of the cestophori which guarded a blank panel in the wall.
"He never knew; but I would have died before I would give over the memory of it. She was slight, willowy, with the eyes of an Attic antelope, yet braver and more commanding than any woman-eye that ever bewitched me. Her mouth—Praxiteles would have turned from Lais' lips to hers."
Agrippa's hand slid down the side of the cestophorus and fumbled a little within the edge of the molding.
"Her hair was loose," the old man went on, "the sole drapery of her bosom—a very cloud of night loomed into filaments—"
An inert, moldy breath reached Marsyas. He turned his head. The panel between the cestophori was gone and a square of darkness yawned its miasma into the hall.
The prince made a lightning movement; noiselessly the two servants dived into the blackness; Marsyas followed; after him, the prince.
An eclipsing wall began to slide between them and the hail they had left.
"Her arms were languidly lifted—arms that for whiteness shamed this marble—" the old man was saying as the panel glided back into place and shut them in darkness.
"Ow!" Agrippa whispered in delight, "he tells that story better every year!"