Cold drops stood on her brow, she buried her hands in her thick, black hair, and a loud cry escaped her—­a cry like that of a tortured animal.  A few minutes more and she had slipped through the stable and the gate by which they drove the cattle in; and no longer mistress of herself, was flying up the mountain to the grotto of Mithras to warn Phoebicius.

The anchorite Gelasius saw from afar the figure of the girl flying up the mountain in the moonlight, and her shadow flitting from stone to stone, and he threw himself on the ground, and signed a cross on his brow, for he thought he saw a goblin-form, one of the myriad gods of the heathen—­an Oread pursued by a Satyr.  Sirona had heard the girl’s shriek.

“What was that?” she asked the youth, who stood before her in the full-dress uniform of a Roman officer, as handsome as the young god of war, though awkward and unsoldierly in his movements.

“An owl screamed—­” replied Hermas.  “My father must at last tell me from what house we are descended, and I will go to Byzantium, the new Rome, and say to the emperor, ’Here am I, and I will fight for you among your warriors.’”

“I like you so!” exclaimed Sirona.

“If that is the truth,” cried Hermas, “prove it to me!  Let me once press my lips to your shining gold hair.  You are beautiful, as sweet as a flower—­as gay and bright as a bird, and yet as hard as our mountain rock.  If you do not grant me one kiss, I shall long till I am sick and weak before I can get away from here, and prove my strength in battle.”

“And if I yield,” laughed Sirona, “you will be wanting another and another kiss, and at last not get away at all.  No, no, my friend—­I am the wiser of us two.  Now go into the dark room, I will look out and see whether the people are gone in again, and whether you can get off unseen from the street window, for you have been here much too long already.  Do you hear?  I command you.”

Hermas obeyed with a sigh; Sirona opened the shutter and looked out.  The slaves were coming back into the court, and she called out a friendly word or two, which were answered with equal friendliness, for the Gaulish lady, who never overlooked even the humblest, was dear to them all.  She took in the night-air with deep-drawn breaths, and looked up contentedly at the moon, for she was well content with herself.

When Hermas had swung himself up into her room, she had started back in alarm; he had seized her hand and pressed his burning lips to her arm, and she let him do it, for she was overcome with strange bewilderment.

Then she heard Dame Dorothea calling out, “Directly, directly, I will only say good night first to the children.”  These simple words, uttered in Dorothea’s voice, had a magical effect on the warm-hearted woman—­badly used and suspected as she was, and yet so well formed for happiness, love and peace.  When her husband had locked her in, taking even her slave with him, at first she had raved, wept, meditated revenge and flight, and at last, quite broken down, had seated herself by the window in silent thought of her beautiful home, her brothers and sisters, and the dark olive groves of Arelas.