Zuan raised a hand to his temples, where the blood throbbed.
"I—do not know what has come over me," he said, and turned a few steps away across the room. In a moment he was back again, on one knee before her.
"You lay a spell upon me!" he cried, whispering into her bent face. "I am unmanned. Strange things stir my heart, child—mount to my head like wine. You lay a spell upon me."
"No, lord," she said, very low. "I am but a maid. I cannot work spells or sorcery. It is only that I am alone and beset and miserable. It is pity that you feel, lord. Ah, you are kind and merciful. Lord, I—wish that I might do you a service for the service you have done me."
"Pity?" said young Zuan.
"Pity, lord," she said again, and to his awkward, unskilful tongue and to his unaccustomed hands no occupation seemed to come, so that he knelt silent and troubled before her in the lantern-light.
If it seem that enchantment came overswiftly upon him, overprecipitately, it must be borne in mind that he was a soldier, wholly unused to a woman's company, and that this girl, young, beautiful, and in sore straits, was brought before him in the manner most certain to waken his chivalry—ay, to stir his ready heart. The maid spoke shrewdly. It was pity he felt. But other emotions wait hard upon pity's threshold. Further, in young Zuan's day, love came swiftly or not at all. It was not the day of courtship. Love was born of a look—a smile—a hand-touch. And such love has wrecked empires. It is a sober truth that no great passion was ever of slow maturing.
There came from without the door eager voices and quick steps, and the lieutenant whom Zuan had sent to fetch the maid's outer garments—krozet, saruk, and girdle—burst into the room. His eyes were round, starting out of his head, and his face was flushed with excitement.