“Speak to him,” she said. “Have confidence in him. He loves her and wishes her well.”
“I can clearly see that he loves her,” Chimairis replied. “If he loves her he wishes her ill. If he loves her I will not speak.”
Demetrios trembled with anger, but did not speak.
“Give me your hand,” the Jewess said to him. “I will see whether I am mistaken.”
She took the young man’s left hand and turned towards the moonlight. Melitta leant over to watch, although she did not know how to read the mysterious lines; but their fatality attracted her.
“What do you see?” Demetrios asked.
“I see—may I tell you what I see? Shall you be pleased? Will you believe me? First of all I see happiness, but that is in the past. I see love, too, but that is lost in blood.”
“Mine?”
“The blood of a woman. Then the blood of another woman; and then, a little later, your own.”
Demetrios shrugged his shoulders.