And he explained this by some elaborate illustrations with his sheathed sword, until Ægisthus said that he thought he understood how it was done.
But Clytemnestra suddenly, with a kitten-like girlishness that sat but ill upon her, pounced playfully upon the weapon. 'I want to see it drawn,' she cried; 'I want to look upon the keen flashing blade which has penetrated the inmost recesses of so many of our country's foes. Oh, it won't come out,' she added, as she attempted to pull it out of the scabbard; 'do make it come out!'
The King tried, but the blade stuck half way, and what was visible of it seemed thickly coated with rust; but Agamemnon said it was gore, and his orderly must have forgotten to clean his accoutrements after the fall of Troy. He added that it was the effect of the sea air.
'Troy really has fallen then?' asked Ægisthus. 'I suppose you stayed to see the thing out?'
'I did, sir,' answered the monarch proudly; 'I sacked the most fashionable quarters myself. I expect my booty will be forwarded—shortly. Didn't you know Troy was taken?' he asked suspiciously. 'Couldn't you see the beacon I lighted just before I started?'
The courtier murmured that it was wonderful to find so long and tedious a journey accomplished in such capital time.
'What do you mean by that? How do you know how long it took?' demanded Agamemnon.
'Don't you see?' said Clytemnestra. 'Why, you say you had the fire lighted at Ida when you started; then, of course, they would see it directly over at Lemnos, and light theirs; and then at Athos, and then——'
'You are not a time-table, my love,' interrupted the monarch, coldly. 'I won't trouble you for all these details. Come to the point.'
'The point is,' she explained sweetly, 'that we have only just seen the beacon flame arrive here at Arachnæus, after leaping from height to height across lake and plain; so that you, my dearest, must have made the distance with almost equal celerity!'