Ninyas paused at the threshold; then advancing on that silent inmate, took her hand, and passed his arm round her waist.
"I have quitted lighted hall," said he, "and circling wine-cup, because of the Lily of Ascalon, without whom there seems no savour in the feast, no mirth in the revellers. My lily is drooping here in solitude—lo, I come to transplant her to a fairer garden and a richer soil."
Quick as thought she flashed one glance into his beautiful face, and made up her mind even while she looked.
"His servant felt cruelly disappointed that my lord bade her not to the banquet," was the deceitful answer. "It is to my shame and sorrow, if I have in any way displeased my lord."
Thus speaking, she disengaged herself gently from the encircling arm, and fell at his feet in an attitude that expressed the utmost humility, but made it exceedingly difficult for Ninyas to embrace her again.
"You know," said he, "that you are always welcome to your prince. Come when she will and how she will, he only desires to lay the lily in his bosom, and place Ishtar beside him on a throne."
"Then my lord is no longer wroth with his handmaid," said she, unveiling and rising to her feet, while she called into her beautiful eyes a look that thrilled her admirer to the core. "I have sat here silent and sad, thinking that the cloud between us was never to pass away. Lo, my lord looks favourably on his servant, and she is glad in the light of his smile once more."
Rejoiced, no less than surprised, by the happy turn matters seemed to have taken, pluming himself also on his own wisdom in having left her for a space to herself, all the heart Ninyas possessed flew to his lips while he exclaimed:
"I love you, Ishtar! love you better than power, riches, a warrior's fame, a king's throne, the wine I drink, the very air I breathe! O, I love you so, my pure and precious pearl, that I sometimes think the pleasure can never pay me for the pain!"
Fickle, self-indulgent, unstable as he was, yet in the fierce impulsive ardour of his youth he meant it—honestly and heartily—for the time.