e moment his eyes searched the tattered tunic, seeking with an
artist's delight the warm tones of her amber skin.

But Rhanto's mind, after evoking these recollections, began again to
wander. Where was Erotion? Had Actaeon seen him? Was he up there with the
defenders? The Greek held her back catching her by the hand to prevent
her climbing to the top of the wall.

The defenders were shouting wildly, shooting their arrows and throwing
darts and stones. The besiegers had begun the attack. Projectiles came
hurtling from outside the walls, passing over the merlons like
dark-colored birds, as if the Africans were covering an assault with
battering-rams and pickaxes to open a breach.

Actaeon, who since his return to Saguntum had again assumed control of
the work of defense, must go up on the wall.

"Run away, Rhanto," he said hastily. "You will be killed here. Go to
Sonnica's house----I will take you to Erotion. But fly! Hide yourself!
See how the missiles are falling around us!"

He shoved her from the stairway with an energetic push which nearly
drove her to her knees.

The Greek ran up hastily, hearing the ceaseless and deadly hisses
rending the air about his head. Before he reached the merlons he heard a
faint groan at his back, a gentle cry which recalled to Actaeon's mind
the bleating of a fawn when pierced by the huntsman's arrow. Turning he
saw Rhanto half way up the steps, wavering, ready to fall backward, her
breast covered with blood and pierced by a long feather-tipped shaft,
still quivering from the swiftness of its flight.

She had started to follow him up the wall, but an arrow had caught her.

"Rhanto! Poor Rhanto!"

Obeying an impulse of grief which he could not explain to himself, but
which was stronger than his will, he forgot the defense of the wall, the
attack of the enemy, everything, to run toward the girl, who sank down
with the gentle flutter of a wounded bird.

He took her in his strong arms and laid her at the foot of the steps.
Rhanto sighed, moving her head as if trying to rid herself of the pain
which had taken possession of her.

The Greek supported her by the shoulders, calling tenderly:

"Rhanto! Rhanto!"

In her eyes, enlarged by pain, the light seemed to condense. The
expression of her face had now become sane; it lost, at moments, the
vagueness of dementia. Pain seemed to have restored her reason, and in
this supreme moment of lucidity the whole past arose clear in her mind.