“Again, a learned and pious physician and healer gathered the young men about him in the marketplace to give them solemn warning against the Monster and his scarlet slaves. But his words returned upon himself, and he was branded with shame as one who worshiped not the Veiled Goddess, and was presently driven forth from his own place into the wilderness.
“Then there came into the hall of the City Fathers a woman with disheveled hair and tear-worn cheeks, who beat upon her breast and cried:—“‘Vengeance, O Wise and Great Ones! My son, my little son went to the public baths, and the venom of the Monster was upon the waters, and my son is blind forever. What will ye do, that others may not suffer my grief?’
“And the Wise and Great Ones spoke together and said:—
“‘Surely this woman is mad, that she thus fouls her lips.’ And they drove her out of their presence.
“From among their own number there came a terror and a portent. For their Leader, who had been stricken in youth, but thought himself to have thrown off the toils of the Monster, rose in his place and spoke in a voice that piped and shook:—
“‘Because no man taught me in my unripe days, I strayed into the paths of the Scarlet One. For the space of a generation I hoped; but now the clutch is upon me again, and I die. See to it, O my Fellows, that our youth no longer perish in their ignorance.’
“So he passed out from the place of honor; and the strength of his mind and his body was loosened until he died. But, rather than violate the taboo, the Wise and Great Ones gave a false name to his death, and he was buried under a graven lie.
“Finally there came to the Council Hall one with the fire of martyrdom in his eyes.
“‘Though I perish,’ he said, ‘I and mine, yet will I speak the truth for once. My daughter I have given in marriage, and the Monster has entered into the house of her marriage, and from henceforth she must go, a maimed creature, sexless and childless, to the end of her days. Shame upon this city, that it endures such shame; for my daughter is but one of many.’
“‘The shame be yours,’ replied the Fathers, ‘that you bring scandal upon your own. Go forth into exile, in the name of the Veiled Goddess, Modesty, beneath whose statue we meet.’