"And the time flieth apace," sighed Beltane, "and I have mighty things to do. O, methinks I have tarried here overlong!"
"Ah—and would'st be going, messire?"
"'Tis so methinks my duty."
"Go you alone, messire—or goeth she with thee?"
"Ah, God! How dare ye so think?" cried Beltane, in anger so fierce and sudden that though she fronted him yet smiling, she drew back a pace. Whereat his anger fell from him and he reached out his hands.
"Helen!" said he, "O my Helen, what madness is this? Thou art she I love—doth not thine heart tell thee so?" and fain would he have caught her to him.
"Ah—touch me not!" she cried, and steel flickered in her hand.
"This—to me?" quoth he, and laughed short and bitter, and catching her wrist, shook the dagger from her grasp and set his foot upon it.
"And hath it come to this—'twixt thee and me?" he sighed.
"O," she panted, "I have loved thee nor shamed to show thee my love. Yet because my love is so great, so, methinks, an need be I might hate thee more than any man!" Then, quick-breathing, flushed and trembling, she turned and sped away, leaving Beltane heavy-hearted, and with the dagger gleaming beneath his foot.