"I know!" She gave a quick gesture of her head, tired, insolent, indifferent; and a terrible darkness stole over her face; what matter how beautiful she might be, she had no beauty in her own sight, for the eyes of Arslàn had dwelt on her cold, calm, unmoved, whilst he had said, "I would love you—if I could."
"You know your value," Sartorian said, dryly. "Well, then, why talk of poverty and of your future together? they need never be companions in this world."
She rose and stood before him in the rosy glow of the fire that bathed her limbs until they glowed like jade and porphyry.
"No beautiful woman need be poor—no—no beautiful woman need be honest, I dare say."
He smiled, holding his delicate palms to the warmth of his hearth.
"Your lover drew a grand vision of Barabbas. Well—we choose Barabbas still, just as Jerusalem chose; only now, our Barabbas is most often a woman. Why do you rise? It is a wet day, out there, and, for the spring-time, cold."
"Is it?"
"And you have been ill?"
"So they say."
"You will die of cold and exposure."