His face was a map of innocence as he touched his thin horse with the whip and rode forward a little faster.
“What is there to see at Olympia, Nicholas?” she said, speaking rather loudly in order that Dion might hear.
Nicholas woke up, and hastily, in a melodious voice, quoted some scraps of guide-book. Rosamund did not find what she wanted among them. She knew already about the ruins, about the Nike of Paeonius and the Hermes of Praxiteles. So she left the young Greek to his waking dream, and possessed her soul in a patience that was not difficult. She liked to dwell in anticipation. And she felt that any secret this land was about to reveal to her would be, must be, beautiful. She trusted Greece.
“We aren’t far off now,” said Dion presently, as they rode up the valley—a valley secluded from the world, pastoral and remote, shaded by Judas trees.
“How peaceful and lovely it is.”
“And full of the echoes of the Pagan feet which once trod here.”
“I don’t hear them,” said Rosamund, “and I am listening.”
“Perhaps you could never hear Pagan echoes. And yet you love Greece.”
“Yes. But I have nothing Pagan in me. I know that.”
“It doesn’t matter,” he said. “You are the ideal woman to be in Greece with. If I don’t come back to Greece with you, I shall never come back.”