those wide clear eyes, but not a stain
of fear. With one hand she clasped her golden locks around her; the
other long white arm was stretched upward toward the great still Christ
appealing--and who dare say in vain?--from man to God. Her lips were
opened to speak: but the words that should have come from them reached
God's ear alone; for in an instant Peter struck her down, the dark
mass closed over her again.... and then wail on wail, long, wild,
ear-piercing, rang along the vaulted roofs, and thrilled like the
trumpet of avenging angels through Philammon's ears.

Crushed against a pillar, unable to move in the dense mass, he pressed
his hands over his ears. He could not shut out those shrieks! When would
they end? What in the name of the God of mercy were they doing? Tearing
her piecemeal? Yes, and worse than that. And still the shrieks rang
on, and still the great Christ looked down on Philammon with that calm,
intolerable eye, and would not turn away. And over His head was written
in the rainbow, 'I am the same, yesterday, to-day, and for ever!' The
same as He was in Judea of old, Philammon? Then what are these, and in
whose temple? And he covered his face with his hands, and longed to die.

It was over. The shrieks had died away into moans; the moans to silence.
How long had he been there? An hour, or an eternity? Thank God it was
over! For her sake--but for theirs? But they thought not of that as a
new cry rose through the dome.

'To the Cinaron! Burn the bones to ashes! Scatter them into the sea!'
And the mob poured past him again....

He turned to flee: but, once outside the church, he sank exhausted, and
lay upon the steps, watching with stupid horror the glaring of the
fire, and the mob who leaped and yelled like demons round their Moloch
sacrifice.

A hand grasped his arm; he looked up; it was the porter.

'And this, young butcher, is the Catholic and apostolic Church?'

'No! Eudaimon, it is the church of the devils of hell!' And gathering
himself up, he sat upon the steps and buried his head within his hands.
He would have given life itself for the power of weeping: but his eyes
and brain were hot and dry as the desert.

Eudaimon looked at him a while. The shock had sobered the poor fop for
once.

'I did what I could to die with her!' said he.

'I did what I could to save her!' answered Philammon.

'I know it. Forgive the words which I just spoke. Did we not both love
her?'

And the little wr