He smiled, and she said:
“Why do you come here in the desert? Are you seeking here for the Jewel, or the Glass that magnifies?”
He smiled and shook his head.
“No, Psyche,” he said gently. “I have never sought for the Jewel nor for the Glass.
“But first tell me: why are you here and sleeping by the Sphinx?”
She told him. She spoke of her father who was dead, of the light-gold Chimera, of the purple desert and the sorrowful night. She told him of her tears.
“I have followed them, O Psyche!” he replied. “I have come ever since I saw you before your father’s throne—a day never to be forgotten!
“I have come here every day. Every day I leave my garden of the Present, to ask the awful Sphinx for the solution of my problem.”
“What problem, Prince Eros?”
“The problem of my grief. For I am grieved about you, Psyche, because you would not follow me and stayed with your father.... Now I know why. You loved the Chimera....”