“Follow me. It’s rather far,” she said, turning to her sister.
In the middle of the passage was a staircase which she ascended. Then she glided along a never-ending colonnade, opened several doors, walking on carpets, white marble slabs and the mosaic floors of a score of empty, silent apartments.
She descended a stone stairway, and stepped over the dark thresholds of clanging doors. Now and again, the two women came upon soldiers, resting on mats in couples, their spears close to their hands. Some long time afterwards, Cleopatra crossed a courtyard lit up by the rays of the full moon, and the shadow of a palm-tree caressed her hips. Berenice, wrapped in her blue mantle, still followed her.
At last, they reached a massive door, clamped with iron like a warrior’s breastplate. In the lock, Cleopatra slipped her key, turning it twice. Then, pushing open the portal, a man—a very giant in the darkness—rose to his full height out of the depths of his dungeon.
Berenice stirred with emotion, looked in, and with drooping head, said very softly:
“Tis you, my child, who know not how to love. At least—not yet. I was quite right when I told you that.”
“Love for love, I prefer mine,” said the girl. “He gives me naught but joy, at any rate.”
So saying, erect on the prison threshold, and without making a step forward, she said to the man who stood in the shadow:
“Come hither, and kiss my foot, son of a cur!”
When he had done so, she pressed her mouth to his lips.