Giustina had now recovered herself enough to see that this Arethusa was very lovely, and she momentarily forgot the danger she had escaped.
'You are his slave!' she repeated slowly, and still breathing hard. 'Ah—I begin to understand.'
'So do I,' Zoë answered, looking at the handsome, heavy face, the dyed hair, and marble hands.
There was something like relief in her tone, now that she had examined her rival well.
'When did Carlo buy you?' asked Giustina, growing coldly insolent as she recovered her breath and realised her social superiority.
'I think it was just five weeks ago,' Zoë answered simply. 'But it seems as if I had always been here.'
'I have no doubt,' said Giustina. 'Five weeks! Yes, I understand now.'
Then a fancied sound waked her fear of pursuit again, and her eyes turned quickly towards the door. Yulia was standing beside it, listening with her ear to the crack; she shook her head as she met Giustina's anxious glance. There was nothing; no one was coming.
'You had better tell me what has happened,' Zoë said. 'You met some one who frightened you,' she suggested.
Giustina saw that Zoë was in complete ignorance of the Tartar's visit, and she told what she had seen and heard downstairs. As she went on, explaining that Tocktamish demanded ten thousand ducats in Zeno's name, Zoë's expression grew more anxious, for she gathered the truth from the broken and exaggerated narrative. After failing in his attempt to free Johannes, Zeno had fallen into the hands of the soldiers he had won over to the revolution; they demanded an enormous ransom, and if it was not forthcoming they would give him up to Andronicus.