ned on deck with the sculptor. What cared they for the inclement
weather, while one was recalling to mind and telling his friend how the
hate of an offended woman had unchained the gloomy spirits of revenge
upon him, the other, who had defied death on land water, listened to his
story, sometimes in surprise, sometimes with silent horror?

After the examination to which she had been subjected, Eumedes had
believed Ledscha to be as Hermon described her. He found nothing petty in
this beautiful, passionate creature who avenged the injustice inflicted
upon her as Fate took vengeance, who, with unsparing energy, anticipated
the Nemesis to whom she appealed, compelled men's obedience, and instead
of enriching herself cast away the talents extorted to bring down fresh
ruin upon the man who had transformed her love to hate.

While the friends consulted together with lowered voices, their
conjecture became conviction that it was the Biamite's inextinguishable
hate which had led her to the Gauls and induced her to share the attack
upon the capital.

The assault upon the houses of Archias and Myrtilus was a proof of this,
for the latter was still believed to be Hermon's property. She had
probably supposed that the merchant's palace sheltered Daphne, in whom,
even at Tennis, she had seen and hated her successful rival.

Only the undeniable fact that Ledscha was the bridge-builder's companion
presented an enigma difficult to solve. The freedman Bias had remained on
Philippus's galley, and could not now be appealed to for a confirmation
of his assertions, but Hermon distinctly remembered his statement that
Ledscha had allowed the Gaul, after he had received the money intended
for him, to take her from Pitane to Africa.

When the short November day was drawing to a close, and the friends had
strengthened themselves with food and drink, the rain ceased and, as the
sun set, its after-glow broke through the rifts and fissures in the black
wall of clouds in the western horizon like blazing flames in the
conflagration of a solid stone building. Yet the glow vanished swiftly
enough. The darkness of night spread over the sea and the arid strip of
land in the south, but the greedy croaking of the ravens and vultures
echoed more and more loudly from the upper air. From time to time the
outbursts of rage and agony of despairing men, and horrible jeering
laughter, drowned the voices of the flocks of birds and the roaring of
the tempestuous s