Zibya bowed profoundly, his outspread hands almost touching the floor in the servility of his obeisance, and backed out of the room as humbly as though he were leaving the presence of royalty.  When he had gone, Theos looked up from the news-scroll he was perusing: 

“Is it not strange Niphrata should have left thee thus, Sah-luma?".. he said with a touch of anxiety in his tone ...  “Maybe".. and he hesitated, conscious of a strange, unbidden remorse that suddenly and without any apparent reason overwhelmed his conscience..  “Maybe she was not happy?"...

“Not happy!” ejaculated Sah-luma amazedly, “Not happy with me? ... not happy in my house,—­protected by my patronage?  Where then, if not here, could she find happiness?”

And his beautiful flashing eyes betokened his entire and naive astonishment at the mere supposition.  Theos smiled involuntarily.. how, charming, after all was Sah-luma’s sublime egotism!—­how almost child-like was his confidence in himself and his own ability to engender joy!  All at once the young girl Zoralin spoke,—­her accents were low and timorous: 

“May it please my lord Sah-luma to hear me...” she said and paused.

“Thy lord Sah-luma hears thee with pleasure, Zoralin,” replied the Laureate gently.  “Thou dost speak more sweetly than many a bird doth sing!”

A rich, warm blush crimsoned the maiden’s cheeks at these dulcet words,—­she drew a quick, uneasy breath, and then went on,—­

“I love Niphrata!” she murmured in a soft tone of touching tenderness, . .  “And I have watched her often when she deemed herself unseen, . . she has, methinks, shed many tears for sake of some deep, heart-buried sorrow!  We have lived as sisters, sharing the same room, and the same couch of sleep, but alas! in spite of all my lord’s most constant kindly favor, Niphrata is not happy, ..and.. and I have sometimes thought—­” here her mellow voice sank into a nervous indistinctness—­“that it may be because she loves my lord Sah-luma far too well!”

And as she said this she looked up with a sudden affright in her dark, lovely eyes, as though she were alarmed at her own presumption.  Sah-luma met her troubled gaze calmly and with a bright smile of complacent vanity.

“And dost thou plead for thine absent friend, Zoralin?” ... he asked with just sufficient satire in his utterance to render it almost cruel..  “Am I to blame for the foolish fancies of all the amorous maidens in Al-Kyris? ...  Many there be who love me, . . well,—­what then?—­Must I love many in return?  Nay!  Not so! the Poet is the worshiper of Ideal Beauty, and for him the brief passions of mortal men and women serve as mere pastime to while away an hour!  But.. by my faith, thou hast gained wondrous boldness in thy speech to prate so glibly of the heart’s emotion, —­what knowest thou concerning such things.. thou, who hast counted scarcely fifteen summers! ... hast thou caught contagion from Niphrata, and art thou too, sick of love?”