Presently she returned radiant. "It's all right," she said. "You can come; I told you I should manage it"; and she showed me to Lydia's room.
Lydia was lying on a couch with a shawl thrown over her knees; but the chiton loosely fastened over her right shoulder showed all the beauty of her bare arm. Very different, indeed, did she look from the girl I awoke to find bending over me on the hill on Tyringham. The warm color of the sun had left her skin, which was now white and extremely delicate. Her head, then strong and erect, now leaned upon a pillow so gently that it seemed
"A petal of blown roses on the grass."
Her mother was standing as I entered and pushed a chair for me by Lydia's side. I sat upon it, and taking Lydia's hand, kissed it. A tear came in her eye at this act of sympathy and she said:
"I am glad you have come to see me."
"I would not have dared to come," said I, "were it not that I have to warn you in Chairo's interest and in your own to say nothing for the present."
"Say nothing!" she exclaimed, raising her head erect. "What! does Chairo wish me to say nothing when I can by a word exonerate him altogether!"
"How so?" I asked.
"I consented," she said. "If the charge is that he carried me away it must fall when I say that I consented."
"Lydia!" exclaimed her mother. "Do be careful! Our friend here can be depended on; but such an admission might be used against you; it may be no crime in law to have consented, but in the cult you will be disgraced forever."