'Of forgiveness, all that can be desired; but of forgetfulness, none. There is one thing that no man can forget; and were I to repulse the admonitions of my judgment, and strive to pass that thing by, who would sooner scorn me than yourself? Let all this end. Know that I love you not, and could never love you again. Your scorn, indifference, and deceit have long ago crushed from my heart all the love it once held. Know further, that if I did still love you, my pride would condemn the feeling, and I would never rest until I had destroyed it, even were it necessary to destroy myself rather than to yield.'
'These are brave words, indeed!' she exclaimed, taunted by his rebuke into a departure from her assumption of affection. 'But they better suit the freeman upon his own mountain side than the slave in his cell. Samos is still afar off. The road from here to Ostia has not yet been traversed by you in safety. Even this door between you and the open street has not been thrown back. And yet you dare to taunt me, knowing that I hold in my hand the key, and, by withdrawing it, can take away all hope from you. Do you realize what will be your fate if you remain here—how that on the morrow the lions and leopards of the amphitheatre will quarrel over your scattered limbs?'
'Is this a threat?' he cried. 'Is it to tell me that if I do not give my love where my honor tells me it should not be given, I must surely die! So, then, let it be. I accept the doom. One year ago, I would have cheerfully fought in the arena for your faintest smile. Now I would rather die there than have your sullied love forced upon me.'
Without another word he sat down again upon the stone bench. Even in that darkness she could note how resolute was his expression, how firm and unyielding his attitude. She had roused his nature, as she had never seen it before. She had not believed that a spirit which she had been accustomed to look upon as so much inferior in strength to her own, could show such unflinching determination; and for the moment she stood admiring him, and wondering whether, if he had always acted like that, he might not have bound her soul to his own and kept her to himself through all temptation and trial. Then, taking the other key, she unlocked the door in the rear wall of the cell, and threw it open. The narrow street behind the court was before him, and he was free to go.
'I meant it not for a threat,' she said. 'However low I may sink, I have not yet reached the pass of wishing to purchase or beg for affection. Why I spoke thus, I know not. It may be that I thought some gratitude might be due me for rescuing you. But I cannot tell what I, thought. Or it might have been that words were necessary for me, and that I used the first that came. But let that pass. Know only that your safety lies before you, and that it is in your power to grasp it. And now, farewell. You leave me drifting upon a downward course, Cleotos. Sometimes, perhaps, when another person is at your side, making your life far happier than I could have made it, you will think kindly of me.'
'I think kindly of you now, Leta,' he said. 'Whatever love I can give, apart from the love which I once asked you to accept, is yours. In everything that brotherly affection can bestow, there will be no limit to my care and interest for you. Nay, more, you shall now go away from hence with me; and though I cannot promise more than a brother's love, yet with that for your guide and protection, you can reach your native home in peace and security, and there work out whatever repentance you may have here begun.'
'And when we are there, and those who have known us begin to ask why, when Cleotos has brought Leta back in safety, he regards her only as a sister and a friend, and otherwise remains sternly apart from her, what answer can be given which will not raise suspicion and scorn, and make my life a burden to me? No, Cleotos, it cannot be. Cruel as my lot may be here, I have only myself to answer for it, and it is easier to hide myself from notice in this whirl of sin and passion than if at home again. And whatever may henceforth happen to me, the Fates are surely most to blame. How can one avoid his destiny?'
'The Fates do not carve out our destiny,' he said. 'They simply carry into relentless effect the judgments which our own passions and weaknesses pronounced upon ourselves. O Leta! have you considered what you are resolved upon encountering? Do you not know that some day this master of yours will tire of you, and fling you to some friend of his—a soldier, actor, or what not—that as the years run on and your beauty fades, you will fall lower and lower? Have not thousands like yourself thus gone on, until at last, becoming old and worthless, they are left to die alone upon some island in the Tiber? Pray that you may die a better death than that!'
'It is a sad picture,' she answered. 'It is not merely possible, but also probable. I acknowledge it all. And yet, if I saw it all unrolled before me as my certain doom, I do not know that I would try to shun it. Already the glitter of this world has changed my soul from what it was, and I am now too feeble of purpose to spend long years in retrieving the errors of the past. There came into my heart a thought—a selfish thought—that you might forget what has gone before; and then it seemed that I might succeed in winning back my peace, and so shun the fate which lies before me. But you cannot forget. I blame you not: you are right. You have never spoken more truly than when you said that I would have despised you if you had yielded. Therefore, that hope is gone; and now I must submit to the destiny which is coming upon me.'
'But, Leta, only strive to think that—'