She finished the sentence with drooping head, as if utterly crushed, and this time she did not laugh, but Hermon felt his wrath transformed to sympathy, and he asked warmly and kindly if she would let nothing appease her, not even if he begged her forgiveness for the wrong he had done her, and promised to obtain her life, nay, also her liberty.

Ledscha shook her head gently, and gravely answered:  “What is left me without hate?  What are the things which others deem best and highest to a miserable wretch like me?”

Here Hermon pointed to the bridge-builder, bound to the post, saying, “Yonder man led you away from the husband whom you had wedded, and from him you received compensation for the love you had lost.”

“From him?” she cried furiously, and, raising her voice in a tone of the most intense loathing:  “Ask yonder scoundrel himself!  Because I needed a guide, I permitted him to take me away from my unloved husband and from the Hydra.  Because he would help me to shatter the new and undeserved good fortune which you—­yes, you—­do you hear?—­enjoyed, I remained with him among the Gauls.  More than one Alexandrian brought me the news that you were revelling in golden wealth, and the wretch promised to make you and your uncle beggars if the surprise succeeded.  He did this, though he knew that it was you who took him up from the road and saved his life; for nothing good and noble dwells in his knavish soul.  He yearned for me, and still more ardently for the Alexandrians’ gold.  Worse than the wolf that licked the hand of the man who bandaged its wounds, he would have shown his teeth to the preserver of his life.  I have learned this, and if he dies here of starvation and thirst he will receive only what he deserves.  He knows, too, what I think of him.  The greedy beast of prey was not permitted even to touch my hand.  Just ask him!  There he is.  Let him tell you how I listened to his vows of love.  Before I would have permitted yonder wretch to recall to life what you crushed in this heart—­”

Here Lutarius interrupted her with a flood of savage, scarcely intelligible curses, but very soon one of the guards, who came out of the hut, stopped him with a lash.

When the Gaul, howling under the blows, was silenced, Hermon asked, “So your mad thirst for vengeance also caused this suicidal attack?”

“No,” she answered simply; “but when they determined upon the assault, and had killed their leader, Belgius, yonder monster stole to their head.  So it happened—­I myself do not know how—­that they also obeyed me, and I took advantage of it and induced them to begin with your house and Archias’s.  When they had captured the royal palaces, they intended to assail the Temple of Demeter also.”

“Then you thought that even the terrible affliction of blindness would not suffice to punish the man you hated?” asked Hermon.

“No,” she answered firmly; “for you could buy with your gold everything life offers except sight, while in me—­yes, in me—­gloom darker than the blackest night shrouded my soul.  Through your fault I was robbed of all, all that is clear to woman’s heart:  my father’s house, his love, my sister.  Even the pleasure in myself which had been awakened by your sweet flatteries was transformed by you into loathing.”